Splitting My Personality and Writing Many Characters

I've always had a strong belief that when writing engaging fiction, I have to become my characters. When I started writing, I often had trouble believing that my characters were real people. My writing had little personality. Of course they weren't real characters, but I didn't want readers to feel that way when reading. I grew a few gray hairs over this problem, I think. If I didn't find these character personalities very engaging, how could someone else?

Years later I came up with a new solution to my problem. I made a list of characters, before writing an abbreviated bio for each one. Basically the bio explained whether or not a character was "bad" or "good," or "maniacal," or "calm."

They were simple descriptions explaining very base but strong character emotions. After that I put a picture of myself into my computer. Then I imported the picture into Photoshop. In the picture I was smiling, which is very commonplace for my own personal character. I am often smiling. I probably smile while I'm writing often times. This was fine, but not for all of my characters.

First I stared at the portrait until I could imagine it as my protagonist, which wasn't very long as I relate very closely to my protagonist. Mentally I asked myself, "How would this character react after being in a car accident? What if his father, in the driver's seat, died, and the woman who hit them was standing outside the car with a baby in her arms?

While looking at this character, I thought of my own reaction. After I came up with a difficult and emotional answer to my questions, I saved that portrait to my computer as "Picture 1."

With the portrait still in Photoshop, I drew a straight line across my mouth. I then put a "V" shape over my eyebrows to denote a completely different character. The results were kind of scary and funny all at once. But for the time being I took this character seriously. Again, I stared at it, until the character was no longer completely me. I could feel connected to hi personality, though.

Then I asked myself the very same question. What would this evil man do, if the woman, with child, were responsible for his father's death? Seriously, this was a frightening moment. I was looking at myself but, strangely, not looking at myself. This was a different person, capable of terrible things.

What I had were two totally different personalities, based off of myself. Character depictions of my own personal angel and devil. The answer to the question was different. This character could ultimately help make my other character more interesting, and more legitimately real.

This was the side of me that wasn't mundane. I saved this as "Picture 2."

Doing the other character personalities in the list was just as interesting. Sometimes I could scribble longer hair onto the picture, or add a mustache. I've even pasted a few baldheads over the portrait of some character personalities. This process helped me to see my own personality several different ways. Perhaps we are all capable of being different people and doing things we never thought we could.

For writing fictional characters, this can be a useful exercise. Just because a character may not have the same religious or political views as we have, does not mean that they cannot share certain traits with us. For me, it continues to be most advantageous, and adventurous, to take on the skin of my characters as I write them.