Word Soup - Character Chowder

I have goals for the week: writing goals. I want to start a new story, get a few thousand words on the page, and compose my character outlines. Which kind of makes me think of soup.

Yep, that's what I said, word soup and character chowder. I don't want to merely spew strings of letters together on a page and hope they form a story. I want to create a medley of flavors using multiple ingredients. Every word needs to move the story forward and every character has to be multi-dimensional.

I draw a lot of my characters from real life--or at least many of their personality traits, mannerisms, and overall character. I doubt anyone knows people who are only one-dimensional. Of course there are stereotypes, or people who seem to be more one thing than another. But most people are very complex. I learned this fact studying psychology back in college and earning my degree only taught me that there was way more to learn than I had time for in four years.

Anyway, who wants to eat plain potato soup? We all want a little variety...(some salt, pepper, dill, garlic, maybe even a little cilantro or fennel) after all, that is the spice in our lives and in our stories.

So, how do we make a word soup that is tasty...?

Come back tomorrow and I'll give you a few tips that I use when I'm writing.