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If you’ve ever been in a serious relationship, you know all about conflict. Love hurts! It’s when our emotions are highest, that disagreements turn into arguments, which turn into fights and all those stinging words we wish we could take back. Remember the old playground rhyme: “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me.” What a load of bull! Seriously, it’s much easier to recover from a black eye than to repair the damage that words can create. But the worst emotional scars don’t come from a teammate who calls you stupid, the boss who says…

You will create many different types of characters in order to flesh out your story. Obviously, the protagonist - hero or anti-hero - is your main character and deserves the most attention. However, most stories also include an antagonist, hopefully a villain that is complex and layered, and then there's the plethora of supporting characters - friends and rivals, even symbolic and nonhuman characters - that are essential to moving the story forward. When creating characters - main and supporting - it's helpful to explore them through writing exercises. These five…