In fictional stories, characters are always oblivious to what’s really controlling and motivating them. To a point where, when a character has too much self-awareness, we often say, “feels like author intrusion” because we all know that moment of epiphany when the protagonist realizes What’s Really Going On Here ™.
If you’re a writer, you’ve written that moment of personal reveal, that awareness of motivation or woundedness that’s been driving a person the whole story until they reach the point where they can throw it off and embrace the freedom that knowledge can bring. And take a chance on whatever thing they have to take a chance on.
But up until that moment, they are oblivious.
And some of us (less likely those of you who regularly read my stuff because you’re probably on a pretty aggressive self-development journey, but… some of us) are oblivious to how our backstory is driving our actions.
Especially oblivious to how the fear of something going wrong or being wrong is driving our consistent daily actions. It’s often the reason why we say, “I don’t want to do this thing anymore,” and then we go right out and do that thing. Even when we don’t want to.
It’s often also the reason why we don’t get what we want, or we aren’t happy, even when we’ve done the thing we think should make us happy.
There’s backstory that needs to get actualized. Fix your backstory, my loves.
(And again, if you regularly read my stuff, you probably have already done this excavation work. But. I always like to put in a plug for this stuff. There’s a reason 95% of adult behavioral change doesn’t take, and it’s because backstory is pattern. Choosing against that pattern is hard to sustain.)
I know some of us won’t like this post, and you’re ok to argue with me about it. I’m good hearing pushback. We may not agree in the end, but I don’t need you to agree with me. Just to consider something a little different, even if you ultimately reject it. Just QTP. Sometimes after we QTP, we find we were ok in our original premise, but we should always at least QTP…
– Becca
