Creating Character Arcs: The Masterful Author's Guide to Uniting Story Structure, Plot, and Character Development

by K.M. Weiland

“Change is hard at first, messy in the middle, and gorgeous at the end.” —Robin Sharma

When the character’s positive choice brings her closer to the post-arc state, the best “reward” in storytelling terms would be to bring her closer to her external goal. When a negative choice backfires, the biggest “punishment” is to take her farther away from her external goal. We slowly force the character to see that her pre-arc beliefs and behaviors will no longer work, and she must try something new.

Properly structured scenes are split into two segments: action and reaction. The action half will be structured into three parts of its own: goal, conflict, outcome. That outcome is almost always going to be disastrous or partially disastrous. We call these partial disasters “yes, but…” disasters. They are disasters in which the character’s main scene goal is obstructed, but only partially. In the first half