Sometimes the characters who look most like us are the hardest ones to write.
TLDR:
- Writing characters similar to ourselves often leads to unconscious projection of our own habits and traumas
- The creative mind sometimes rebels against what makes logical sense for a character’s arc
- Breaking free from autobiographical writing requires deliberate resistance to our natural impulses
The Mirror Problem
Courtney Maum’s confession about finding male characters easier to write than female ones struck me like cold water. Here’s a successful female author admitting that writing women feels like wrestling with ghosts. Her mother barges into the room. Her father’s absence looms. Every female character threatens to become a writer because, well, that’s what Maum knows.
I’ve felt this magnetic pull toward autobiography disguised as fiction. You create what you think is an entirely fictional person, then realize they’re drinking your coffee order and harboring your specific anxieties about parallel parking.
When Characters Have Their Own Agenda
The most fascinating part of Maum’s struggle with Vivian Anderson wasn’t writer’s block. It was character rebellion. She literally could not make this woman stay home with her children, even though the story demanded it. Vivian kept getting jobs, becoming an entrepreneur, moving constantly.
Think about that for a moment. A professional writer, someone who understands narrative structure, couldn’t override her own subconscious assumptions about what women should do. Modern AI fiction writing tools might generate characters without these psychological hangups, but they also miss the messy humanity that comes from our biases.
The Uncomfortable Art of Writing Away
Maum had to transform Vivian from a steamroller entrepreneur into an insecure social climber whose identity confuses even herself. That transformation required writing against her own grain, resisting the urge to make characters productive and purposeful.
This connects to something larger about creative work. Whether you’re crafting stories, designing with AI image generation tools, or preparing manuscripts for publishing across multiple platforms, the most interesting work often emerges when we stop defaulting to what feels comfortable.
Practical Rebellion
Here’s what I’ve learned about writing against type:
- Give characters opposite problems from your own
- Force lifestyle choices that make you uncomfortable
- Question every “natural” decision that feels too easy
The goal isn’t to eliminate yourself from your work entirely. It’s to recognize when you’re unconsciously limiting your characters to the boundaries of your own experience, then deliberately step outside those lines.