The past several years have been difficult. At last, my life is improving and I feel like writing again. Many years ago (actually in 1943), Maslow published his Hierarchy of Needs. At the bottom are Physiological (food, water, sleep) and Safety. Until these are assured, the later, higher level needs generally won’t be of much importance. For me, my writing fulfills the highest need: Self-actualization. It also touches on Love/Belonging and Esteem. Here’s the usual graphic of Maslow’s Hierarchy.

Now that I’ve got those basic needs taken care of, I can turn to the higher needs and begin fulfilling them. I’ve set aside several hours each morning to work on writing.

Character Motivation

This is a basic way to view the motivations of your characters, both the good guys and the bad guys. The cliché of a person stealing food is familiar to most of us. But what about a character who kills another over access to water? Can you think of a scenario where access to air is a critical factor for one of your characters? This might be a good motivation for a science fiction story, but then I’m probably biased. 😉

Of course, how a person reacts to the lack of various needs will depend on the individual. A child who grows up experiencing frequent hunger is likely to have a large focus on food in later life. He or she might become obese. Or possibly a farmer or grocer. Maybe a biologist working to increase the yield of crops. Can you think of other reactions? The idea here is to make the reaction logically consistent with the denied need from childhood.

None of this implies that the individual is aware of his/her motivation at this level. Most people just aren’t that self-aware. A serial killer who kills prostitutes could justify his/her behavior by proclaiming a “moral” motivation. “They are an abomination and must be eliminated.” But what underlies that might be a need for safety and thus striving to eliminate the threat he/she feels the prostitutes pose. While your character might not understand his or her motivations, you, the writer, should keep needs and motives in mind. Your characters will benefit by becoming that much more realistic.

ASSIGNMENTS:

1. Go through the needs listed in the Wikipedia article and come up with characters that are motivated by the different needs. You might not like all the ideas you come up with, but you might just create an interesting situation and decide to pursue it.
2. Pick a book and list out the needs motivating the major characters. You can also do this with a movie.