Internal Character Conflicts
Image by Karolina Grabowska from Pixabay
Last Monday, I talked about external character conflicts, and how those are the sort of “conflict” that many authors are thinking of when they talk about the subject. At the end of that post, I started to dip a little bit into internal character conflicts, which is what I’m talking about today.
Most people have internal conflicts all the time. What are you going to have for dinner? Are you going to cook, go out, or order in? While these specific internal conflicts may not be the sort you want to base a story around, they give the basic idea of internal conflict–when a character wants something, but they’re undecided on how to get that thing. This could be a character’s internal monologue, but it could also be reflected in the actions the character takes as they dither over their options–starting and stopping a thing, for example.
Some readers might perceive stories involving a lot of internal character conflict as slower paced or not as high stakes. In some instances, that might be what you as an author want to achieve. In other instances, you may need to break up large chunks of internal character conflict with more external conflicts to keep the pace moving and the stakes high. But in a close point of view (which might be first or third person), it makes sense to reveal some of the character’s thoughts or inner turmoil.
For a more speculative element, perhaps this internal character conflict takes the form of a literal (or at least perceived) angel and devil on a character’s shoulders. It could also involve possession or mind control, with the character attempting to resist the influences of another “mind” in their own. With these, though, they almost swing back around to external character conflicts, since there are additional characters other than the primary character involved in these conflicts. This is also closer to the example I gave in my post about collaborative storytelling through games, in the game where two players played Fates who had shared control over a character or object.
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