{"id":570,"date":"2013-10-17T13:10:42","date_gmt":"2013-10-17T20:10:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/?p=570"},"modified":"2018-10-07T09:43:07","modified_gmt":"2018-10-07T16:43:07","slug":"the-influence-character-in-a-nut-shell","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/the-influence-character-in-a-nut-shell\/","title":{"rendered":"The “Influence Character” in a Nut Shell"},"content":{"rendered":"

Stories have a mind of their own, as if they were a person in their own right in which the structure is the story\u2019s psychology and the storytelling is its personality.<\/p>\n

Characters, in addition to acting as real people,, also represent facets of the overall Story mind, such as the Protagonist which stands for our initiative to effect change and the Skeptic archetype which illustrates our doubt.<\/p>\n

Yet in our own minds is a sense of self, and this quality is also present in the Story Mind as the Main Character.\u00a0 Every complete story has a Main Character or the readers or audience cannot identify with the story; they cannot experience the story first hand from the inside, rather than just as observers.<\/p>\n

This Main Character does not have to be the Protagonist anymore than we only look at the world through our initiative.\u00a0 Sometimes, for example, we might be coming from our doubt or looking at the world in terms of our doubt.\u00a0 In such a story, the Main Character would be the Skeptic, not the Protagonist.<\/p>\n

Any of the facets of our minds that are represented as characters might be the Main Character \u2013 the one through whose eyes the readers or audience experience the story.\u00a0 And in this way, narratives mirror our minds in which we have a sense of self (\u201cI think therefore I am\u201d) and it might, in any given situation, be centered on any one of our facets.<\/p>\n

Yet there is one other special character on a par with the Main Character that is found within ourselves and, therefore, also within narrative: the Influence Character.<\/p>\n

The Influence Character represents that \u201cdevil\u2019s advocate \u201c voice within ourselves \u2013 the part of ourselves that validates our position by taking the opposing point of view so that we can gain perspective by weighing both sides of an issue.\u00a0 This ensures that, as much as possible, we don\u2019t go bull-headedly along without questioning our own beliefs and conclusions.<\/p>\n

In our own minds, we only have one sense of self \u2013 one identity.\u00a0 The same is true for narratives, including fictional stories.\u00a0 The Influence Character is not another identity, but our view of who we might become if we change our minds and adopt that opposing philosophical point of view.\u00a0 And so, we examine that other potential \u201cself\u201d to not only understand the other side of the issues, but how that might affect all other aspects or facets of ourselves.\u00a0 In stories, this self-examination of our potential future selves appears as the philosophical conflict and ongoing argument over points of view, act by act.<\/p>\n

Ultimately we (or in stories, the Main Character) will either become convinced that this opposing view is a better approach or will remain convinced that our original approach is still the best choice.<\/p>\n

No point of view is good or bad in and of itself but only in context.\u00a0 What is right in one situation is wrong in another.\u00a0 Situations, however, are complex, and often are missing complete data.\u00a0 And so we must rely on experience to fill in the expected pattern and to project the likely course it will take.\u00a0 Entertaining the opposite point of view shines a light in the shadows of our initial take on the issues.\u00a0 Psychologically, this greatly enhances our chances for survival.<\/p>\n

This is why the inclusion of an Influence Character in any narrative is essential not only to fully representing the totality of our mental process but to provide a balanced look a the issues under examination by the author.<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Stories have a mind of their own, as if they were a person in their own right in which the structure is the story\u2019s psychology and the storytelling is its personality. Characters, in addition to acting as real people,, also represent facets of the overall Story mind, such as the Protagonist which stands for our […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[23,11,33,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-570","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-characters","category-dramatica","category-narrative-psychology","category-the-story-mind"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p36xpN-9c","jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/570","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=570"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/570\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":571,"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/570\/revisions\/571"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=570"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=570"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storymind.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=570"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}