Character Flaws

by Katy White

I have a sister-in-law who is darn near perfect.  She is beautiful with three incredible, well-behaved, yet spunky, children.  She does her visiting teaching early and goes to the temple once a week.  She volunteers to do service whenever the Relief Society President has a need.  Her home is always in order, her meals are always delicious, and she runs seven miles a day, six days a week (Sunday is her day off).  On top of all this, she likes really cool music and reads really great books.

It's almost nauseating.

But do you know why I adore her rather than wanting to avoid her and her stupid near-perfection?  She cheats at games.  Any game you play with her, you know she's going to cheat like she's a figure skating judge in the Olympics.  Playing Dominoes with her?  She's sneaking the best tiles.  Playing Monopoly?  She's skimming from the bank.  Playing Apples to Apples?  She's manipulating you into thinking that the best card is hers so you don't want to pick it, thereby increasing the odds that you'll pick hers.  Girl is a sneak.  I love it.

She also speeds.  She speeds like the hounds of Hades are on her heels.  She goes to traffic school like her kids go to regular school.  She has a budget for tickets.  (Okay, maybe not the last one, but it's close).

In other words, she has these delicious character flaws that make me overlook her perfections and see her as being totally and completely human.  Because being human means being flawed.  None of us is perfect.  That's why we like each other.

That's also why we like characters in books.  There's nothing duller than a character who always makes the right choice.  There's nothing that makes me less likely to root for someone than knowing that there's nothing, really, to root for.  If the only thing keeping a character from achieving a goal is external forces, I probably don't care a lot about that character or her goal.  I need to see holes in her game.  I need to know that she's going to make interesting, bad choices on occasion.  Because then I can root for her to overcome the consequences of those choices and grow as a character.

So while I realize the goal of mortality is to strive for perfection, I hope my sister-in-law keeps cheating at games for a while longer.  Rooting for her to lose at Settlers of Catan is my way of rooting for her to win.

The LDS Book Club Reading List

by Anna Jones Buttimore
www.facebook.com/annajonesbuttimore

I recently met someone who is currently reading my latest book, The Saved Saint. She said she was enjoying it, and finding it pleasantly challenging, and that she was going to recommend it to her Ward's book club because it was getting increasingly difficult to find quality books which didn't include sex, swearing or other questionable material.

Obviously I'm delighted, and not just because it means I'll sell a few books.

It did get me thinking, however, that many LDS wards around the world, as well as other Christian churches and other religious groups, have book clubs. Many must struggle to know where to find books they can recommend to their book club which won't go against the values and standards of the members.

Now, I know they can buy books from LDS publishers with confidence, but that isn't always a solution. Here in the UK, these books can be difficult to come by and prohibitively expensive - the cost of importing a physical book means that the price is often double what it would be in the US, and not everyone has an ereader. Plus most readers don't necessarily want to confine themselves to a small niche market. They want to read successful, modern national-market books which they can pick up for £4.99 at their local supermarket, but they need to know that these books are suitable for them and their book club to read.

So, I thought I might start a list of great books I would cheerfully recommend to my book club or LDS friends. These are just three of my favourite books which are completely squeaky-clean. Please feel free to add your favourites - this list is a bit sparse!

1. The Number One Ladies Detective Agency by Alexander McCall Smith
2. The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
3. Going Postal by Terry Pratchett

Storytelling Tips from HIMYM

I love the show, "How I Met Your Mother" for a lot of reasons. I love that it doesn't paint marriage as a death sentence, I love that they balance reality with ridiculousness, and I love that they plant a dozen Easter eggs every season.

But most of all I love they way they tell a story. Not just the big, overarching story of how he met his wife (which we are just barely getting to, eight seasons in), but the little stories, the ones encapsulated in a season, or a few episodes, or sometimes in a single episode. I've been watching the entire show, from the beginning, and I've collected some storytelling tips. 

Don't start at the beginning. Some of the best episodes start at the end. One episode starts at the end, showing a disastrous end to a party. Then the story jumps back five minutes and tells what happened in the living room to lead to disaster. Then it jumps back and tells what happened in the dining room, then the kitchen. They could have told us, start to finish, what happened, but it would have taken five minutes and been much less interesting. 

Another episode shows the entire gang at brunch, smiling for a photo. As soon as the camera snaps, they all snarl about how they hate each other. Ted then goes back several days, and explains each person's problem, leading up to the brunch and explaining a lot of character stuff along the way. It it much more interesting to see how Marshall's calves are part of the story or why Ted is mad at his father after seeing how it had an effect on everybody. 

Skip over the stuff that sucks. Several times, Ted tells the audience something along the lines of: "nothing interesting happened all summer... let's skip ahead to the autumn of breakups." If it's not interesting, skip it. I don't care if it makes you feel good to tell us how blissfully happy your main character was before she found out her boyfriend cheated on her. It doesn't matter. Skip the stuff that sucks and get to the stuff that's entertaining. 

Some details aren't important. Ted is telling a story that's about twenty years old (he's narrating from the future), so some details are forgotten. People's names, what order things happened in, what day the goat was really in the apartment, etc. Some of it just isn't important. In the show, they fill in the gaps in a comedic way - her name was Blah Blah, for instance. But in our stories? We can just skip them. 

Give your characters genuine flaws. Lily is manipulative. Marshall is childish. Robin is selfish. Ted is kind of a pompous jerk. Barney is cold, callous, and manipulative. And yet you root for every one of them. Those flaws, though real and truly terrible, are also wrapped up in a package that we can identify with. Who hasn't wanted to step in and stop their friends from making mistakes? Who hasn't wished they could slap somebody for being stupid? Or wished that they could put themselves first? Or that they were able to recite stuff in Italian? Or... no. I've got nothing for Barney. But aside from his flaws, he's a loyal and generous man, and he changes his tune by the time we start really rooting for him. 

Tie it all to the main conflict. The show is about how Ted met his wife. Obviously, eight seasons in, we've talked about other stuff along the way. But just when you start thinking, "What does this have to do with him meeting his wife?" it all gets tied together. We learn about the yellow umbrella. Or the roommate. Or the rock band. We see how this string of events pushed Ted into doing something he wouldn't have done otherwise, and it put him on his path to meeting his future wife. It might be related tangentially, but it's all related to the main story. 

Be consistent. The producers of this show are obviously obsessive about continuity. The show does an incredible number of flashbacks and flashforwards and flash-to-this-is-how-it-could-have-gone-but-didn'ts. And they remain thoroughly consistent. Little things that don't really matter to the scope of the show (Lily's hair color, Barney's tie, Ted's sneakers) are all consistent. If Lily had bangs two years ago, and we're flashing back to two years ago, Lily will have bangs. Which means the girls end up wearing a lot of wigs and the wardrobe department must be a nightmare ("We need a designer dress from six seasons ago, in a petite size!" ... yikes) But it serves the story, and I salute them for it. 

Make your character do something stupid. In the very first episode, we learn that Robin is not going to be Ted's wife. Yet he tries to make it work with her. Repeatedly. And every single time, I feel like I'm yelling at Anakin Skywalker to just choose a different path. We know how it's going to end. But it's entertaining. And it's realistic. So Ted keeps trying, and we keep shaking our heads. I've said it before and I'll say it again: Good fiction is made of bad decisions. 

Give your character a rich backstory, but don't talk about it until it matters. Robin was a pop star, Ted doesn't know how to talk about his feelings, Marshall was the youngest and smallest brother, Lily struggles to connect with her father, Barney doesn't know who his dad is. These things all matter, they drive our characters, but they aren't touched on in the first episode. Or even the first season. The details of their past aren't brought to light until they matter - but once they're there, they are consistent with who the character is. 

Motivations are important. Ted wants to get married. Marshall wants to be an environmental lawyer and save the planet. Lily wants to be an artist. Barney wants to get chicks (his words). Robin wants to be a journalist. All their decisions point them in the direction of their goals. Always. Well...

And motivations sometimes change. Sometimes Marshall just needs a good paycheck, so the environmental stuff gets put on hold. Robin questions her independence. Barney falls in love and wants to be treated with respect. And Ted... Ted loses faith. He loses himself. But despite the changes, the characters still make decisions with an eye toward the ultimate goal. He dates girls who are obviously not "The One" but they are necessary to his growth and development. The story is always written with the end in mind. 

What else, friends? Any other great story telling tips from How I Met Your Mother? I'm sure there are more... 

TIME OUT!!

             Anyone get to go to the Time Out For Women this weekend??  I did!  For the first time, I might add!  I had a mixture of excitement, and anticipation from the unexpected.  Would it be smaller?  Would there just be a bunch of talks?  Activities?  I had no idea!  All I knew was that a lot of friends of mine had raved about going to it in the past.  I have wanted to go previously, but having the strapped financial background I've been living in prevented it.  This year, I saw a post from a friend on Facebook, and mentioned how I wished I could go.  Someone else responded that there were scholarships for those who couldn't afford to go.  WHA???  Guess what?  I even found babysitters!  Hallelujah!  That almost never happens... 

             So I'm rushing out the door, grabbing my purse, backpack... water... helmet... yes, I am hoping that my brother won't mind that I'm taking his motorcycle since mine is still in pieces waiting to be painted.  It's a beautiful night, there's next to no traffic downtown, I'm gonna save on gas, and I'm on my way to ME time!  I'm going to go find out what TOFW is all about, ready to fill my spiritual bucket!

             Let me tell you, I was NOT disappointed!  I was blown away!  It was at the Richmond Convention Center, and there was so many women!!  Lit up on the big stage was a blue sky background, and the word 'Higher' in big white letters.  A gorgeous black grand promised heart changing music... and two big screens on both sides, one with closed captioning.  In the back Deseret Book had tables of books, music, t-shirts and tons of fun trinkets and memorabilia... I could feel my pocket itching from the moment I walked in.  Surrounding it were displays from different companies, such as Sweet Salt; a modest women's apparel store, Heritage Makers; treats you to a plethora of ways to personalize your home decor and other creative projects, and Thrive Life; all about making it possible to get your food storage put together, for anyone!  

             When I got my TOFW pamphlet, I got even more revved up, because I was going to get to hear Michael McLean and Mercy River, two of my favorite music artists!!  There were so many more that I hadn't heard before too... such as John Hilton III, who talked about seeing the bigger picture, Sandra Turley, oh my GOODNESS does that woman have a voice, and Kris Belcher, a woman who continues to inspire and uplift anyone going through a tragedy.  There were so many more... I could talk about it all day! 

              I know I sound like a starving kid walking into a banquet, but that's exactly what I felt like!   It was a banquet for the mind, spirit and ears!  (Not so much for my purse in the end... ha!)  We all cried so much.  We cried from laughing so hard it brought tears to our eyes, when our hearts broke hearing what incredible trials our speakers have struggled through and when all of it hit home as our lives, feelings and desires were validated.  And all of it we got to share sitting next to our dearest friends and sisters.  

               I'm going to bare my soul here, and share one of my two favorite moments.  It was when Michael McLean sang his song, "She Doesn't Know".  He talked about his wife, mother and grandmother with such love, marveling at how they just don't know how much they mean to him.  I love to hear him sing his songs, because I know that he wrote them, and he sings them with so much emotion because they came from his heart.   The words really hit me, and I knew for a moment that someone knew.

(lyrics from 'She Doesn't Know')
"It's a quarter to 7:00 on a Thursday night, 
And she's running late again.
And she got a ticket because she ran the light,
Racing to help a friend.
And she remembered a promise she made
A couple of weeks before.
She would bake the brownies for the PTA,
but she's run out of time, 
So she gets hers from the store.

It's a quarter to 7:00 on a Friday night
And she's running late again.
Trying to pick out that dress
that's going to look just right,
at the party she's throwing for him.
Living on rice cakes and Diet Coke,
She hasn't lost that much.
Her dress is too tight and her hair, a joke.
And you know what?
That party was a hit, it had her magic touch!

And she doesn't know...
She's an angel in disguise.
She doesn't know...
I see Heaven in her eyes!
She doesn't know she's alright,
I guess she's blinded by the light,
of all the good she does..
She just doesn't know.
.......
"She doesn't focus on all the good she does,
because all she sees is where she failed her part.
Can't she see that we think she's a saint,
because she's given all she can--
Straight from her heart!
And she doesn't know we see Heaven in her eyes..
She doesn't know she's alright,
I guess she got blinded by the light,
Of all the good she does.
But she can't see it because,
She hits a traffic jam on a carpool morn ..
And feels guilty what she's thinkin when she honks her horn!
She writes a sympathy note for her dear friend Grace,
and gets it lost somewhere in cyber space!
At the charity auction where she tries to help, 
She raises her hand so much,
She really bids against herself!
........
She doesn't know this songs for her,
She doesn't know that I am so sincere.
She doesn't know that she's the best, 
She doesn't know that she's past the test!
She doesn't know.... She doesn't know! 

             We're all wiping tears from our eyes, realizing why they had tissues for sale in the back, and all of us are scratching notes in our journals throughout the night as fast as we can, knowing that we can/have bought the DVD of the event.  All because we really felt, even if for a time, that we are all angels in disguise.  We want to take that back to our lives... and try to remember it as we go through our routines and service.  

Remember to take your own "Time Out"... <3

Arm Yourselves

I taught the lesson today for the Beehives class.  As I planned this lesson I quickly realized that this lesson is not just for the youth, or even just the members of the LDS church, but for all people.  The lesson was titled "How do I guard my virtue." In class we discussed things like the meaning of virtue and why it's so important to continue learning these things week after week.  The definition I gave the girls for virtue was "the quality of doing what is right and avoiding what is wrong," with the emphasis on doing and avoiding.  Those are action words.  In order to be virtuous we have to act.  My mom had a quote I heard quite often.  She would say something like "You need to be polite," or "You need to clean your room." To which I would always reply "I knoooow!" My mom would then say, "Knowing and doing are two different things."  This holds true to being virtuous as well.  We can know all the right things to do, we can know all the right answers in church, but knowing things and actually doing them are two very different things.  While we need to study and learn all the days of our lives that knowledge will do us no good unless we apply it to our lives and truly LIVE the gospel. 
In today's world it can be very difficult to live a virtuous life.  Satan waits around every corner eager to thwart our efforts.  Luckily we have been given the protection we need.  In Ephesians 6:11-17 we learn about the armor of God.  With it we can protect ourselves from any wickedness in our path.  However, this also takes action.  It's not enough to have the armor.  It doesn't do us any good if it sits at home on display, or worse, lays forgotten in some corner.  We must put on this armor every day.  Even when wearing out armor we will face challenges.  The world will continue to go against us, and Satan will still try to bring you down.  He will work and fight against you until he knows your weakness, and then he will try to exploit that weakness until he sees you fall.  He will do this subtly at first.  He will use other people to lull you into a false sense of security.  Or he will use others to make you feel embarrassed about your armor, "It's so old fashioned, and uncool."  Don't listen.  Don't give in.  If we put our whole faith in the strength of the Lord we can protect ourselves against Satan's attacks. 



Service Marathon

By Lacey Gunter

It doesn't take long perusing the news to feel kind of disgusted with the moral slump in society right now. It would be easy to fall into a mindset of thinking people are selfish and uncaring beings, for the most part.

Granted, there are a lot of people out there who are like that. But, there are an amazing amount of people out there who are not, people who make a profound difference in the lives of those around them and who make the world a more beautiful place one small act at a time.

I have had the pleasure to meet many people like this. Some have been my guardian angels in a time of need. Others have been a shining example or inspiration for the kind of person I want to become. The theme I see in these people is an abiding commitment to help and serve others.

For several years I have had an aspiration to live a life committed to service. Sure, I get the typical opportunities to serve in my neighborhood, church, schools and home. These opportunities are great and I know I am making a difference. Yet, just fulfilling my duties and helping others out when needed feels more like sitting in the passenger seat, when what I really need to do is take the steering wheel and drive toward the kind of person I would like to become.

So, today is just as good of a day as any to start to make a change, and I think I've got some ideas to get me going. Thanks to the example of a friend, I've decided on a realistic, concrete goal to set. Thanks to the example of some strangers, I have realized I need to recruit some friends to share, help and motivate me to accomplish my goal.

My goal is to complete a service marathon, 26 days in a row where I perform at least 1 act of service outside my typical daily activities. If I fail, I will start over again until I have accomplished the goal.

Now, what I need are some friends to help me achieve my goal. That is why I am posting this here. Perhaps one of you feels inspired to join me in my journey.  I plan to start on September 15th and would love to hear from you on Facebook. I promise to help and encourage you along the way, too. Together we can make the world a little better place, one small act at a time. And, hopefully, in the process, we will change ourselves the most.

Writing is Like Motherhood

by Mare Ball

The two things I'm most crazy about in life are: 

1.  Being a mom
2.  Writing
3.  Chocolate

OK, three things.

But, in the grand scheme of life, motherhood and writing really define me.  I knew from the time I was about eight I wanted to be a mom.  I discovered in junior high school I loved to write.  (I also discovered I did not have the legs for mini-skirts.)

My three children are now young adults, but I still squeeze them whenever I can and pray for them every day, that they will be constantly aware of how much God loves them and know that His plans for them will be more fulfilling than any harebrained ideas of their own.

My firstborn and me

I pray for my writing too - that my harebrained ideas will be filtered out so God can run the show there as well.  Writing is like mothering, in that I'm directing characters that sometimes have minds of their own. 

Motherhood and writing are both huge investments.  Long hours, sleepless nights, mistakes and do-overs.  Shaping character.  Big hopes and dreams.  Praying I get it right.

If I haven't talked to/seen my kids in a while, I get restless.  I just need to touch base, see if all is well.  Same thing with writing.  I have to transfer words to paper (or monitor) regularly, or I get cranky.  Life can spin so fast, sometimes I feel invisible.  Writing inserts a dowel into the bike spokes and halts everything.  It creates space in my head to think and reflect and imagine.

I remember feeding my children at three a.m. and feeling the same way.  Only the moon was up with me as I gently rocked my babies.  For half an hour, the world stopped, and I could think and remember and pray.   

Motherhood and writing have another thing in common: rejection.  We've all heard "I hate you!" from a wailing toddler.  Rejection letters feel the same way, even though they're on fancy letterhead.  The cut is deep, and we might just want to give up.  I don't know what I'm doing! I've thought more than once.  On both writing and motherhood.

Motherhood and writing are the same in my heart.  They are passionate, often tedious, rewarding, soul-searching endeavors.  They can make me cry and rejoice in the same day.

My desire for them is also the same:  I want the end product to honor God.

The Stories We Tell

I warned you I have lots of hats, right?
(Which has nothing to do with this post.)

- a post by Jeanna Mason Stay

Note: Apparently we MMWs this week really needed reminders that we are heroes in our own stories, because here I am adding another one. I hope I can add something to the already wonderful conversation started by Ashley/Jessica and Kasey.

Many moons ago, I was a BYU undergrad taking an amazing memoir-writing class.* Our final project was to write a 15ish-page memoir to workshop with the entire class. Those last days of class before we turned in final revisions were intense as we read and critiqued one another’s stories.

These people looked like your average students, people you’d pass on the sidewalk or at church and never think twice about. But so many of their memoirs were filled with terrible struggles: debilitating illness, child abuse, bulimia, addiction**—more struggles than you would ever guess, because they were buried, deep and dark, in secret places.

With the hurt, the failure, the agony, though, there was passion and courage and bravery. I remember looking at my classmates with new eyes. They were amazing. They had conquered so much. It was incredible to be among them. And it seemed to me that they felt it too—the knowledge that they had won through.

I don’t think I really grasped the power of that experience until a few years later when, as a marriage and family therapy grad student, I was studying narrative therapy. In essence, narrative therapy involves learning to see yourself as the hero of your own story.*** In writing our memoirs, taking a step back from the experience and looking at it more objectively, we saw ourselves a different way. We were no longer the victims of our stories, but survivors—or even better, heroes.

Now, I write fairy tale-esque fantasy, and as anyone who has read “Rumpelstiltskin” knows, words and names have power. What we call ourselves has power—even to influence who we are and who we become. There is a power in storytelling, a power that goes beyond just the words of the story. We make meaning of the world around us by the stories that we tell, both about the world and about ourselves.

There have been times when I “wrote” my story as a hero and times I “wrote” myself as a victim or a passive observer. Guess which times I felt happier, stronger, more capable?

It doesn’t just work with writing longer memoirs. It works with our thoughts, with our journal entries, with our blog posts, our Facebook updates, our tweets. Every word we write, wherever it is, contributes to the story we tell, which changes the stories we’ll tell in the future. We shape the past, the present, and the future with our words.

* Taught by Louise and Tom Plummer, who I can only hope to be like when I grow up. Gracious, funny, willing to own up to all their faults—and their strengths. And perfectly happy to be curmudgeonly when it suited them.
** These are examples of the types of issues people wrote about, not the actual issues. I still abide by our classroom rule of confidentiality. Sure, it’s great to deal with your problems, but no one else should be revealing them for you.

*** Actual narrative therapists out there, please don’t send me hate mail; I do know I’m oversimplifying.

I'm On Active Duty

I slept and dreamt that life was Joy
I woke and saw that life was Duty
I acted, and behold, Duty was Joy

- Rabindranath Tagore

During my undergrad I chose quite a few political science classes that dealt with international development. I was fascinated with underdevelopment – why some countries were so poor while others were so wealthy. I really loved learning about this and loved meeting other students who were equally concerned with international social and economic issues. I remember one guy named Mitchell who wanted to farm onions in India when he finished his degree because he was disgusted with our greedy, indulgent North American capitalist system. His parents once returned from a vacation in Mexico and when they went to show him their pictures he mocked “That isn’t Mexico! You guys didn’t go to MEXICO, you went to some American resort that doesn’t even come close to representing what real life in Mexico is…..” He was passionate.
I too wanted to make a difference and my interest in humanitarian work grew….but then my view kind of shifted. At the end of my degree, after all I had read and heard my conclusion was this: The world doesn’t need big heroes as much as it needs needs good citizens, good mothers, good fathers, good aunts and uncles, good grandparents. People who live decent lives and serve their families, neighbours and communities. I’m not saying humanitarian work isn’t important, I just really think there would be so much less of it to do if every one offered their humble contribution of love and duty. I gave up my dream of being a Mother Theresa for being a Mom and I genuinely feel that my offering is just as noble.

“If and When were planted, and Nothing grew.” ~Proverb

Post by Amber Lynae

One of these days I am going to get help for my procrastination problem.  But for now, like everything else, it will have to wait.  

Have you ever visited procrastiNATION?  Once there you are pretty much stuck.






The pile of laundry needs conquered.  It can wait. 

We don't really need to go to the store today.  I mean, toilet paper isn't really THAT important.  Is it?

Six month prior: Signing up for the half-marathon=good idea + lots of training
Six weeks prior:   I can walk a half-marathon, right?  

If it weren't for the last minute, I wouldn't get anything done.  Okay, that isn't completely true.  However, the big jobs can be so daunting.  When it comes to my to do list, I often tackle the quick easy tasks.  Am I the only person who has the habit of saving the big jobs for WHEN I have more time?

IF I plan to do something conditionally, the condition is never met; and the job will remain undone. 

We can not live our lives by IFs and WHENs.  We are to live our lives with purpose and direction.

I was surprised to realize that my sickness creeping into my writing habits as well.  But anyone who has done it know that writing a novel is one of those big tasks.  So it got shoved down to the section of my TO DO LIST labeled, THINGS I WISH I DOING (but do not have time for).  I also have THE THINGS I WISH SOMEONE ELSE WOULD DO FOR ME section, but I digress.

Along with many other items on the virtual to do list, writing is being moved to a new section, THINGS THAT I REFUSE TO IGNORE ANY LONGER.  I challenged last week to make September a month of writing. While I did begin reading Million Dollar Outlines by David Farland, I have not finish it yet.  So I will continue with that.  But on top of that goal, I have made a goal to write 500-1000 words 6 days a week.  Now to some that may seem small, but the purpose of the challenge is to reestablish good writing habits. 

A writer writes.   So that is what I will do.