Connecting With Your Character(s)

As far as writing and roleplaying goes, I've usually stuck with "safe" characters that I could easily relate to. Characters that shared my mind set and morals. My current character however is nothing like me. I could realistically say if we met in real life we'd probably end up each others throats. Easily.

So... essentially, how do you connect with your character? Especially if they aren't anything like you...?

I've played a variety of characters. Some of them take my own characteristics, some of them don't. I try my best to just put myself in my characters shoes, and then act as they would based on the character biography I made for them. It is hard, sometimes, to branch outward from my typical reaction in any situation, but I think I've managed pretty well in most cases.

I think the way that I connect with them is just by letting them shape the story. I don't try to force their path in any way, except, of course, for the ultimate goal. I let them choose how to get there though. I do this by writing without any forethought. I start on a blank page with a blank mind and just start writing. Everything I write I try to do from the characters perspective on the situation, rather than mine. Its worked in a lot of situations, though sometimes I don't hold to that as well as I would like.

I'm rather of the same mind-set. When I write up a bio for my character, they become, in a sense, real people with distinct personalities, foibles and fears. They are a shard of my own personality in most cases.

The boisterous, the goof, the aloof, and so on. By isolating a main trait and then expanding on that within the character, I find they become quite unique entities.

From there, like Silvone, I just write. I let the characters write themselves. They tell me how they would react, how they think and where they want to go. More or less, I'm just recording their exploits for them like a chronicler.

I actually suffer a bit of a reverse... where the character has influenced me because I played her too much.

I have my niche in RP. I don't do so well with male characters, and my characters also tend to fall into similar categories.

I put myself into the mindset of the character, as deeply as I can. Sometimes it requires a bit of ‘meditation’ to do so, other times not. Often I write with music in the background, even if I’m not paying attention to it. It has to be proper music though, because when it is just having it playing helps to set the mood, emotion, atmosphere and so forth. Often, more so than not, I will ‘act’ out things, taking on the facial expressions the character would have, lowly reciting dialogue to myself and so forth. Usually this only happens with my serious writing though; I willingly admit that in standard role-playing I don’t take it to such an extreme.

Nothing I do is ever planned, the only time that I try to recall something from memory is when the idea comes to me at random when taking a shower, out walking through nature, or so forth. Then I return and have to attempt to draw from memory what the random ‘writing inside my head’ was… sadly it never comes out as good the second time. I really wish I could have a memory recorder…

I have also suffered the same thing Anemone is talking about, where I become influenced by a character. Or even a mood of a story… sometimes it has quite the ill effects since I love writing darker things. I remember writing an old styled horror story when I was around sixteen, alone at about midnight during winter. Just had candles for like (my preference) and ended up getting into the thing too much… making it a little hard to get sleep that night. Strange, really, since I can watch anything horror/thriller and it doesn’t bother me. I honestly don’t understand how my own imagination freaks me out when movies and such don’t.

I usually have a very chaotic style of writing my characters and their interactions. My characters can come from some strange place like the dark corners of my mind or putting together two (or more) favorite characters of mine together. I do tend to have a consistent way of post though which usually involves music and running the scene through my head several times. Course the music has to set the right tone and mood.

I have recently looked back on my characters and found bits of me staring right back. The ones I love to write about are indeed me. The are all me in different situations. How would I act if I was crippled, and only had my mind left for living? What would happen if I let myself go? Could I actually be a hero? (This answer is no, for complicated reasons.) Who would I be if I lived a hundred, a thousand, ten thousand years?

However, only recently has this realization come to pass, because my characters are still real. They are still not me. They have their own personalities, issues, and problems that are not my own. Creating a person for me is not difficult as writing good plot lines. I am my characters, they are me, and then they stand alone. They stare back at me in my mind, and live through my writing. In a sense, I convey them.

I know this may sound strange, but I kind of let my mind go blank when I play a character unlike myself. The hardest part about playing a character that is unlike you is making sure you're not calling the shots secretly. For all it's worth, I sometimes allow my attention deficit disorder to help me. I allow myself to go into a type of writer's trance. For me, it's a short burst of thinking that lets me feel like my character. Strange, yes, but it works.