Experiences What Was Your "Ah Ha" Moment?

[GojiBean]

Hoyo!

So, I'm 100% certain that along all of our journeys with writing and role-playing we've had certain moments where something just clicked. Either it was something someone said, it came from a tutorial or analysis/video essay you watched on Youtube, etc. But it was a singular moment where you learned something that you can definitively point to which launched your understanding of writing and role-playing to a new level. That new level could be where you are now, or where you were one or more years ago and have only grown even stronger from since.

So, that's what I'm here to ask today for discussion.

What was your "ah ha" moment which provided the spark that propelled your writing ahead of where it used to be?

For all of us, there's going to be at least one such moment where we can look back and say "that's the moment I understood (insert element of writing)," and "that's the moment I think I suddenly realized the possibilities and started to really improve as a writer and role-player."

For me, that moment came from watching a video from a Youtube Channel called "The Closer Look."

This video essayist analyzes some of our favorite films, scenes from our favorite films, and breaks them down and provides theory and logical understanding to what is happening in the scene and, more importantly, why what we're seeing is happening.

For the longest time the subject of "subtext" was something I struggled mightily with. The unspoken, implied message behind words and actions taken by characters which ultimately lead to outcomes and revelations later in the story which you can clearly recall having been silently foreshadowed beforehand.

And while subtext is not the only topic of this particular video, this was nonetheless the video essay and analysis that opened my eyes to what subtext truly is, what it means, and how to achieve it:

And with the understanding of subtext as outlined and demonstrated throughout this video essay on Tarantino's scene writing style, my understanding of other elements of writing such as suspense, great dialogue, scene structure, and character portrayal all took a jump as well. Comparing my writing from just two or three years ago to my writing today, well... There's no comparison. In fact you'd be forgiven for thinking that me from two or three years ago and me today are two completely different writers. And that's the biggest thing that stands out to me that show's I've improved as a writer compared to where I was before.

So, what about you?

What was your big "ah ha" moment that helped you understand one or more elements of writing and role-playing which you can definitively say improved your skills and confidence?

I look forward to seeing what you guys have to share!!

Cheers!

~ GojiBean

 

[Idea]

I am always learning, is the thing I'd like to open this post with. As, I'm sure, everyone reading this does as well (or most at least), so that's not really anything that unusual, but I happen to be a very introspective person. I went through a whole phase as a teen even, just spending an enormous amount of time taking quizzes on the internet, looking into zodiac stuff, even insisting with my parents to let me take a psychological test to help me nail down where to go for college. My "Idea Creates you a Super Power" thread was in part inspired by these times. XD Point is, I am not simply always learning from experience but I make an active effort to keep up looking into things regarding writing, analyzing my posts trying to understand the ins and outs of writing in general and my own writing and what happened in every given situation where things went right or wrong. If I were to try to make a list of meaningful moments for me I'd be here all day (or night I guess, depends on how you define the time past midnight).

That being said, four main moments come to mind when it comes to the development of my mindset as a roleplayer:


1.Writing Excuses Podcast - I guess I already broke the rules because this isn't really a "moment" but I do think it's worth mentioning in this conversation. The writing excuses podcast was the biggest source of RP learning I ever had and it jumped both my writing itself and my understanding of it to new heights. Those days playing World of Warcraft, just doing dailies and checking Garrison stuff whilst listening to the podcast provided the basis for my future growth as a roleplayer.

2.The Detail Mindsets - This was an extremely crucial step for me, not because of itself, but because of what it meant more overall. To clarify, the detail mindsets (simple, casual and detailed as those 'levels' were called at the time here on RPN) refer to the type of values and thinking that tendentially results in particular amounts of detail and length in posts. My thesis, if you will, was essentially that valuing certain things in a post was essentially at the root of someone considering those things in their own writing, as well as what brought them satisfaction. Some may say I'm wrong, others may say this is obvious, and I was never really one to think more length = better writing. What this got to me to understand, however, was the notion that people with these different writing styles were after very different things. This in turn has three implications:
A) Filters are not prohibitive. They help people find better matches. You can't roleplay with everyone, so it's best if you know how to find people who are most compatible with you and your writing style, rather than trying to accommodate for styles which simply don't want the same from the roleplay, nor what you want to provide. Thanks to this understanding, my rate of success in finding partners whom I mesh really well with has improved considerably.
B) Improvement isn't something that's done irrespective of your style of writing, but rather something done within your style of writing. It's using it's strengths, countering it's weaknesses and understanding how to make the best of the tools at your disposal in that particular style. It put a whole new lens on how I approached things and helped me manage what's important better.
C) It's important to look at what people are trying to get out of whatever means they use. This idea helped change and improve the way I looked into analyzing writing. I guess it could be called a more economical approach as it's looking at why people are making the choices they are.

3.Peace Sign Academia - Peace Sign Academia was a group roleplay I made for the My Hero Academia fandom that was originally intended to be just something to fill up space while I worked on another group RP which years later still hasn't been completed (because I keep redoing parts of that darn game setting due to the hiatuses). It ended up becoming one of my most successful group roleplays ever, if we go by longevity as a criteria. It had a number of cooperative players, which really helped, and fandom is good at catching a lot of people especially when it's something that big. That RP gave me more time as a GM than any other, and let experience a lot of feedback and trying out of things that I didn't have before. I use to make a whole huge list of rules every roleplay for instance, and I was very strict in enforcing them. Nowadays I make an active effort to abridge things more and try to provide more flexibility. I was very strict in trying to keep things to a certain plot as well, and again it's something I learned to be more flexible with. These are just a couple of the many lessons I learned with managing that roleplay.

4.Golden Rule of Consistency - The last thing that comes to mind is one I have a bit of a hard time pinpointing. I don't quite recall when this happened, though I believe either it was when I tried participating in NaNoWriMo, or when I discovered WorldAnvil and began more seriously working on my Euphorium setting. Either way, it resulted in one of the most useful tools I have which I apply almost by instinct, long before I ever 'coined' the term 'Golden Rule of Consistency'. It's a real content-generator and keeps everything about my characters, worlds, plot and such much more neatly tied together in a consistent whole.



Well, I'll leave it at that for today. I hope you've found the read enjoyable!