I think I’ve always been the most effective when working with the writing form. I don’t want to call myself a writer (complicated thought), but it’s the profession I build my resume around. This is a realization I’ve had recently and I’ve only started to apply it in all parts of my life.

I watch a lot of movies. I do some reading (I’d like to do more, but that’s another conversation). I do a fair amount of writing. Let’s focus on the movies since they’re the easiest to visualize: I have found myself following dialogue a lot closer. In doing this, I’ve noticed that there are some lines that don’t fit. This could be me being pretentious but I believe there’s something about writing that a person can’t really control. Dialogue is something that cannot be forced. In that way, once a character is created there are some things they would say and others they would not.

There’s a natural progression and way of speech for each character because they’re usually built on the idea of a person. A person has a lot of default reactions and vocabulary so it’s easier to interact with the world around them. Characters are not to be used by the writer. They are created but once they take their own form there is a specific way they interact with the situations they’re forced into. A writer (at least in fiction) is supposed to make characters, put them into specific situations, and follow the characters through the events that follow. The process of writing is a journey, a writer can’t control a character because there is some semblance of rules in the anatomy of personality. You could argue that a writer can make up a species but there will have to be rules. Those rules or lack of rules will still create a character with some understanding of their existence which influences the way they act.

Besides the dialogue, the writer also has the ability to create focus for the audience. This is more common in books. What I mean is that the writer chooses which details to focus on. There was a book I read recently where the ending centered on the romantic aspects of the story. I’m fine with a romantic ending, the relationship wasn’t the problem, it was a logical progression. The problem I had was the intense focus on the relationship in the end. It felt forced, it was what the writer wanted and not how the story ended. I understand that endings are difficult but I also have strong opinions on a lot of things. I want to offer an alternative ending, but I cannot because they aren’t my characters, so I can only express my dislike.

I’m not calling writers out individually or trying to put down their work because the job isn’t easy but, like anything, there’s room for improvement. Still, in a lot of major productions there are a lot of situations where creative control is split between powers. Sometimes, there’s a committee involved and other times a deal has to be struck. There’s a difference between writing for business or media and writing for art, usually one gets published and the other doesn’t get finished. No matter why something is written, a part of the process requires sacrifice.

Some people would tell me to write my own story if I’m so good. I do want to and I kind of am but those take more time and I’m busy and I’m struggling with my identity as a writer and what exactly that means for me…Anyways, being a critic is much easier and that’s why people do it more often. Still, I want to be clear that I don’t intend to criticize in the usual way and say something is good or bad. I’m only trying to share my thoughts and the things I notice based on the rules I’ve learned.

Like anything, writing has a process. While you can create something without attention to the process, there is usually something that ends up suffering.