Character Motivation Entry: Seeking Out One’s Biological Roots

What does your character want? This is an important question to answer because it determines what your protagonist hopes to achieve by the story’s end. If the goal, or outer motivation, is written well, readers will identify fairly quickly what the overall story goal’s going to be and they’ll know what to root for. But how do you know what outer motivation to choose?

[image error]If you read enough books, you’ll see the same goals being used for different characters in new scenarios. Through this thesaurus, we’d like to explore these common outer motivations so you can see your options and what those goals might look like on a deeper level.

Character’s Goal (Outer Motivation): Seeking Out One’s Biological Roots

Forms This Might Take:

Tracking down one’s birth parents
Connecting with a half-sibling that one has just discovered
Returning to an orphanage in one’s country of origin in hopes of uncovering one’s past
Searching for the family one was kidnapped from
Trying to find biological relatives (if one’s birth parents were killed)
Seeking connection with maternal or paternal grandparents if one was abandoned by parents
Trying to find surviving family members long after a war or violent event scattered the family across the globe
Seeking out one’s relatives after being rescued as an child refugee by aid workers and taken elsewhere

Human Need Driving the Goal (Inner Motivation): love and belonging

How the Character May Prepare for This Goal: 

Request access to one’s birth records (once one turns eighteen)
Ask one’s adoptive parents for details
Research the laws surrounding adoption at the time to understand the information hurdles ahead
Interview those involved in one’s adoption
Return to the city, town, and hospital where one was born and ask for records
Return to a foster home where one was before the adoption was finalized
Seek advice online from other adoptees in one’s situation (forums, support groups, websites)
Reach out to organizations that help adult children reconnect with birth families
Reach out to organizations that deal with refugee placement (if applicable)
Track down one’s family name if one knows it, searching for others with the same name
Get a job or put in extra hours to save up for a trip to return to one’s country of birth
Hire a lawyer to help facilitate access to one’s records (especially if they are in another country)
Look for police reports of local kidnappings, abuse or child abandonment (if this is a factor)
Hire a private investigator
Learn a foreign language or hire a translator (if there’s a language barrier)
Make a list of phone numbers and addresses of possible relatives to visit and interview
Start contacting possible leads and set up meetings if one is able

Possible Sacrifices or Costs Associated With This Goal: 

Becoming obsessed to the point it strains relationships with one’s adopted family
Losing one’s job because one is always needing time off to travel and investigate leads
Losing one’s sense of self and identity as one digs deeper into one’s past
Friendships that become strained because one is no longer working to maintain them
Draining one’s finances to pay for information, travel, and professional services (lawyer, etc.)
Reopening old wounds of rejection and abandonment as one uncovers information that may be hard to take
Discovering a past history that is difficult (that one’s parent is a serial killer, that one was part of a human trafficking ring, etc.)

Roadblocks Which Could Prevent This Goal from Being Achieved: 

Ineffective lawyers, investigators, and advocates
A fire or other disaster that destroyed one’s records
A lack of record keeping at the time (especially in the case of civil unrest)
Discovering the adoption was off the books and so documents are false
Discovering information that doesn’t mesh with what one’s parents were told
Language barriers
People who don’t want to talk for fear of repercussions
Finding relatives that are unhelpful (fearing inheritance issues, who are hurt by the discovery etc.)
Discovering leads have died because much time has passed
Discovering a cover up by the state because of some sort of wrongdoing
Running out of money for bribes (if needed)
Running into dangerous people determined to see one does not succeed (criminals, people involved in a past war crime, etc.)
Having to travel to dangerous areas to obtain information

Talents & Skills That Will Help the Character Achieve This Goal:

A Knack for Languages
Good Listening Skills
Blending In
Gaining the Trust of Others
ESP (Clairvoyance)
Empathy
Enhanced Hearing
Charm
Lip-Reading
Making People Laugh
A Knack for Making Money
Multitasking
Photographic Memory
Reading People
Self-Defense
Strategic Thinking

Possible Fallout For the Protagonist if This Goal Is Not Met:

Feeling incomplete because one doesn’t know one’s roots
Low self worth and doubt at not knowing why one was given up
Guilt that one should have tried harder or did more (in the case where the adoption was not the biological parent’s choice)
Having a lot of debt and nothing to show for it
Not knowing one’s medical history and running into possible complications as a result

Clichés to Avoid:

A “pauper to prince” scenario, where one discovers one is actually royalty and was adopted out for safety reasons (heir to a fortune, one’s enemies seeking out one’s children and killing them, etc.)

Click here for a list of our current entries for this thesaurus, along with a master post containing information on the individual fields.

Image 1: Foundry @ Pixabay

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