What I've learned about storytelling up until this point : Why burning the boats is a good move.

In pursuit of furthering the collective knowledge base that is the internet, I'm going to share a little bit of what I've been learning recently. On the road to creating this realm, I've been studying a ton and working to lock down a lot of the major story aspects that have to be resolved. 

Manikk Realm is a portal to worlds. 
In each of these worlds there are locations and characters that must be fully realized. 
In order to get this done right, I've been digging into a few books. 
Some of which are about story and structure, 
some about characters and personality traits that we come across in the real world. 

Once these aspects are more heavily integrated, the worlds that are created will tie in better to the one that we currently share. 

I'll start simply with story structure. Got a little help from some talks by Will Smith on these. 

When writing stories, at a point the story itself gets out of the way. 

We know that all stories are about a protagonist, and they're faced with a few key questions,
more so , we as the audience are.   

We must ask: 

What do they want?
Why do they want it?
​What will happen if they don't get it? 
What are the obstacles stopping them from getting it? 

The most powerful moments in the story are when the external obstacles cause the most internal difficulty.

If these are solved and arranged well the story should hold ok. 

The next bit is the emotion.If we focus on the main human emotions : Hope,fear, love, hate, we can paint in broad strokes and then become more specific and more nuanced as we refine out works. 

The third piece of information that's useful when creating stories is to Make It Honest. 
In creating stories it's tempting for us to dream and venture off into all kinds of worlds, but in order to most effectively tell the stories in a believable way, we must speak from a point deep within ourselves. 

Speaking from your own experience even if transposed into a different context will work far better because you know how things actually work. Sharing bits of insider knowledge , and "speaking the language" of your viewer or reader, will do two things. It will let them know that you actually know what you're talking about, and it will create a more complete world without awkward information gaps. If you were to write a story about dancers but had never been a part of a dance community in any capacity, then it would become a more daunting task. It would do you better to involve yourself and to consult people who live that lifestyle to more accurately portray it. 

Doubling back to an earlier point ​

​When writing stories, at a point the story itself gets out of the way. 

The function of the research and key questions and the honesty, is that they form into a flow. This flow takes the reader from the beginning through to the end of the story in a clear way. They're driven forward, asked questions that they need to solve. They'll keep pushing through or be pushed from event to event in a way that just makes sense. 

One other very important thing that I've picked up in terms of story is to eliminate the " Why don't they just...?" questions. If you can ask yourself this question throughout the story and pull the chords that lead the protagonist down any of these routes, you'll save yourself from quite a few plot holes. Put simply, burn the boats behind your characters. The only way that they can go is forward. In story this can be done with figurative lateral steps, but as a whole, if they can't just stop, or not participate, the reader and the audience will mostly likely be more heavily invested in seeing this journey through. 

So, to recap. 

KEY QUESTIONS. 
KEY EMOTIONS.
MAKE IT HONEST.
​BURN THE BOATS. 

Keep these things in mind and your storytelling journey will be a little easier. 

BONUS: Actionable Steps - Go watch 3 of your favourite movies and make notes on where each of these tips comes into play. Ask the Key Questions, Figure out the important emotional pulls at play , Look into who wrote and directed the work. Find a behind the scenes reel if you can and see where their point of honesty came from, and finally note the key moments where they " burned the boats" . 

- MANIKK -