Your Protagonist and Their Goals

Before you sit down to write your story, there is something you absolutely have to know.

What is your protagonist's goal?

This is a very important question for you to have the answer to. It shapes your entire story.

We already know all about no conflict, no story, so it's crucial to know that if you don't have a goal, you don't have conflict. If your protagonist isn't trying to achieve something, or have some sort of ultimate goal, nothing can get in their way because there's nothing to get in the way of. So, no goal = no conflict = no story.

Now we just have to figure out just how to come up with a good goal.

Notice the title of this post is not Your Protagonist and Their Goal, it's Your Protagonist and Their GoalS. They need to have more than one. They need the one main goal that drives the story, but there also needs to be smaller goals for them throughout the story.

For the sake of this post, I'll be referring to them as the primary goal, which drives the main plot, and secondary goals, which drive the subplots. It's really important that your character has a desire for something and that it's made obvious as soon as possible. Kurt Vonnegut gives a very good piece of advice in this area. He says, "Make your characters want something right away, even if it's only a glass of water."

Now, a glass of water would be considered a secondary goal, but it is a goal nonetheless. The point here is that when you begin your story, your character has to have a goal already in mind. It doesn't matter how small or big the goal is as long as it's there.

Here are some steps you can follow to help make sure you have some good goals for your story.

1. Decide on a goal
There are a million different options you can choose from when figuring out your character's goals. To help narrow down your choices right from the beginning, though, you can choose if it's going to be an external goal, or internal goal. An external goal would be something like finding or discovering something, defeating an enemy, resolving something, or doing something while an internal goal would focus more on changing an attitude or point of view, becoming a better person or trying to get someone else to change. Once you have that question answered, deciding on a specific goal will be much easier.

2. Why is this your goal?
Now that you know what your goal is, you need to know why this is your character's goal. Why does he/she want to achieve this? What's their motivation? If the goal was a glass of water, perhaps your character would want it because they were thirsty. But why are they thirsty? Did they just run a marathon? Are they stranded in the desert? Have they been locked in a cell for three days? Having a goal is something for your character to achieve, but they need a reason to achieve that particular goal or no one will understand what the big deal is. They may also want it even if they aren't thirsty. Perhaps they are painting with watercolors, getting a drink for a sick friend. Even wanting something as simple as a glass of water can start in interesting story.

3. How will this goal affect your characters?
Like everything else about your story, the goal needs to affect your character/s in some way, shape, or form. Achieving (or not achieving) their goal needs to have a personal impact on them. How will reaching this goal change them? What will happen to them if they aren't able to achieve it? Even if you plan on having your protagonist achieve their goal, it's still good to make sure you know what would happen to them if they didn't reach it. This allows you to portray your character more accurately.

4. How do your secondary goals connect with your primary goal?
While your secondary goals need to be different than your primary goal, they have to make sense together. You don't want five or six different stories going on at the same time, you want five or six different conflicts in the same story. One goal is boring, but five goals that lead the protagonist in five different directions is confusing. Keep in mind that you are writing one story and you need everything you write to ultimately move the story forward. All goals, while different, have to connect in one way or another.

These are four pieces of advice to get you started on creating a good story with strong goals. The better you know your goals and why these goals are important to your protagonist, the better you will be able to write the story.