191. Writing As Alchemy: Character Arcs & Creative Breakthroughs With Megan Fuentes
191. Writing As Alchemy: Character Arcs & Creative Breakthroughs With Megan Fuentes
From Wound to Story Arc: Writing with Megan Fuentes
What happens when you mix character psychology, story structure, and solo RPG journaling? You get the magic of Megan Fuentes—a story coach who helps writers go from stuck and scattered to deeply connected and narratively aligned.
In Episode 191 of The Embodied Writing Warrior Podcast, Megan shares how to build a character arc using the “wound → wrong idea → right idea” model and why this structure helps bring both fictional and personal stories to life.
Whether you're a plotter, pantser, or something in between, Megan’s method—including her rock tumbling metaphor—offers a grounding, creative way to transform inspiration into finished work.
We also dive into:
Using For The Words to build consistency and crush perfectionism
The power of solo journaling RPGs to reconnect with your creativity
Turning your reading preferences into writing strengths
Crafting character arcs in memoir and personal narrative
What your favorite love tropes say about your emotional journey
The messy middle of writing—and why it’s the hardest part
Megan also shares how to rubber duck your way through writer’s block, what a black-cat/golden-retriever pairing can teach you, and how to find your unique voice through journaling and structure.
Embodied Challenge:
Download Megan’s Wound → Wrong Idea → Right Idea worksheet and try mapping out a story arc from one of the following:
A beloved fictional character
A character you're currently writing
A moment in your own life
Links Mentioned:
Transcript
Kayla: Hello Megan and welcome to the Embodied Writing Warrior Podcast.
Megan: Hello. I'm happy to be here, Kayla. Thank you for having me.
Kayla: Thank you for joining us because you have one of the coolest jobs I've ever heard of. You are a story coach. Mm-hmm. So can you please share what that is and what the life a day in the life of the story coach looks like?
Megan: Yeah. So I, as a story, coach writers frequently, as you, know, have issues where their characters aren't speaking to them. Or maybe the plot that they're looking at is more a bunch of tangled threads than any one cohesive tapestry. Very might feel very discombobulated or just simply like not motivated and not sure why they fell in love with it in the first place, not feeling connected to it anymore.
There's a lot of reasons why you might come to me, but if among those reasons you feel them, you come to me and I. We assess where your story is at presently. And then we'll talk your protagonist. We'll find nestled within them what their core wound is. The wrong idea that wound, that bad thing that happened in their past, made them believe the right idea, which is to say kind of the opposite of the wrong idea.
The lesson they'll learn by the end of the story. And we will build a character arc for them, taking them from deeply believing the wrong idea, to deeply believing the right idea. And that is what will be woven in. And we'll attach it to plot points and things like that. And that's what you weave into your book or your, short story or your series or what have you.
Kayla: What I love about that is you could even. So one thing I'm obsessed with is turning a person's like food freedom journey or like personal growth journey. Into like a love story or like anything like that. So you could even take that same concept as you're doing some kind of a personal growth journey and like take yourself through that arc, which I think is very, very cool.
And I love that you use that as a way to create a cohesive narrative because at the end of the day. In my personal opinion, the best stories do have that really strong character development.
Megan: Yeah, I agree too. Lots of action can be going on, explosions or romantic moments or what have you.
But if you don't like the characters or you can't find something human about them to relate to, you're not gonna care. Most of the time you need characters to carry you through a plot no matter what kind of plot it is.
Kayla: Can you think of like one or two of your favorite four wound, wrong idea, right Idea combos that you've worked with in the past?
Megan: Core wound. Wrong idea, right Idea combos that I've worked with in the past. I usually like working with ones. That I obviously, that I relate to that, that, connect with me on that kind of deep level. So the ones where they have, childhood. Friends who were not super kind to them, like friends who, the protagonist, for example, like Ms.
Reeds, that those people actually weren't the kind, caring people that they thought they were or. Some such and then they're mistrusting of people in general and isolate themselves. And then they have to learn to grow beyond that and be like, no, okay, people are fine. It is just that not all of them are, you know, not all of them are the way that I experienced in the past.
, 'Cause that's a lesson that I've had to learn myself. I had to learn like, okay, I don't need to write everyone off as being, you know, just 'cause I was wounded in the past doesn't mean that I have to carry that wound with me. I can grow from that. I can let go of the wrong idea and embrace the right idea.
What other ones do I really like to work with? People who think that they are just one thing and then, learning that they are allowed and can grow beyond that are also very, very interesting, ones for me to work with because I, I, getting stuck in a particular mindset is so easy and attaching yourself to one identity and only thinking of yourself as that one thing is so easy to do and can be so limiting.
Kayla: I love both of those, and I imagine those resonate with a lot of people, especially the ones who do have the bullying growing up. And then I think there is a tendency to put characters or ourselves into boxes. And like you said, that limited us since, like we grow so much over the years and it's really freeing to embrace a more fluid identity for sure.
Megan: The growth, I was an elementary education major and, one of the like very popular topics that, was around while I was being taken through my, well, during my schooling was the idea of a fixed mindset versus a growth mindset. I don't know whether the self-help space picked it up before or after the elementary ed stuff, but I learned it during elementary ed, so we were obviously talking about, like, speaking of it to kids.
But it was so helpful for me, even as the teacher of the material to be like, okay, you know, 'cause I was a smart kid. Other people, were like the pretty ones or the popular ones. But you can grow beyond.
That's why it's called a growth mindset. You can grow beyond that. Maybe I'm not considered. Popular yet, but it's just because I haven't found my friend group or, things like that. Those kinds of moments of, going beyond the boundaries that were keeping you where you were.
Kayla: I think the word yet has to be one of the most powerful ones to keep in mind, especially if you totally do wanna create change. And it hasn't yet happened. It doesn't mean it won't.
Megan: Yeah, it's so easy to become like, oh, I haven't taken off yet. I'm not at the spot where my money is, where I want to be.
How many of us today think like, oh God, I am behind, you know, I'm not married, or I don't have kids, or, I don't have, the things that I'm supposed to have by this age or that age and like, it's a lie. It does not by any means, mean that you still have many more stories to live through.
Kayla: Exactly. I think everything happens in the timing it's meant to, especially in terms of, you know, getting married, having kids. I think about who I might have married in my early to mid twenties, and I'm. Glad that I was in my thirties when I got married for that reason. Right? Like everyone's so different.
So thank you for sharing that. Okay, so we talked about this core wound, wrong idea, right idea? What's another step you use with authors if they've got like a scattered inspiration and you're trying to turn it into a cohesive narrative?
Megan: Yeah, so I, um, when they're, when they're feeling very scattered, that is typically because they have a lot of things that they are excited about.
So I like to have them tell me, by brainstorming or, listing it all down on paper, all of the things that are making them excited. And then, play, connect the dots. What are the aspects of this that, carry through. So if you have, if you're really into astronomy, you really wanna write a fantasy story,
and you really like astrology as well. Like we can connect that into a story about fate and a story about, you know, the stars coming to, coming to life. The zodiacs embody, certain. Aspects that you take on as the protagonist and go through time. I'm sure there is an idea in here somewhere that I'm not articulating well.
What do I call them? I call them free radicals. 'cause I went through Rachel Stevens and I highly recommend this course, by the way. 'Cause it taught me a whole lot about what I write.
Rachel Stevens, story Magic Academy, one of the things that she teaches is story seeds. Which is the concept not to spoil it for people who may want to take the course, but it's basically like compiling, aspects of stories that are alike. I keep a list of things that don't fit into any stories that I have yet and I call that list free radicals.
I keep those and they look nothing. They don't connect at all. They don't look like they could be anything. But every once in a while I will scroll through those, and I will get excited about one of them and I will find getting excited about that one that others actually do, kind of melt into the other ones.
So that's always really exciting to see things come together like that for, for myself and for others.
Kayla: That is so interesting. So how often do authors come to you with just like bunch of scattered ideas and how often do they come to you with like plot and they know they're beginning and their end, but they're so like, how do I get there?
This must be like two very different challenges.
Megan: They are different challenges. It's definitely, I, I'm currently experiencing a lot more of the latter. I offer 15 minute fixes where you can come to me and chat with me about the story that you're currently, pursuing, or if you have a bunch of story ideas that you'd like to pursue, which one could we boil down to the one you should write?
I've found. That, people aren't ready to make the commitment to work long. I don't do long-term continuous coaching. It is a one-time session with as many times you can call me back and we can work over it again as you like. More people I find are willing to take the step of booking me when they've got the idea and they want to write it, they're just having a very hard time with the messy middle.
I do a lot of reworking with the messy middle. I have a call on Friday about that actual,
Kayla: I imagine for 99% of writers, that's gonna be their biggest part, right? Because most people start at that beginning. They know what kind of ending they want. And then there is a lot in the middle where they have a lot of things to connect and, turn it into something that is cohesive.
Megan: Yeah. Well, with a book it's like. You know, you might have your, your 10,000 words. I as a kid started stories all of the time, but because I was a kid, I didn't know how to finish them. So I have started, and most writers I imagine have as well started way more stories than I have ever finished.
So most writers are going to have really strong ideas for beginnings. And then the endings are where they're like, because we want the emotional satisfaction of. The arc, we can kind of picture what the ending is going to be but we have not had any practice in getting there. And sometimes the distance between the beginning and the end is a hundred thousand words, or it's like 50,000 words or 70,000 words.
And to even remember what you were supposed to be saying moment to moment, chapter by chapter, what the, what the, you know, I'm, I'm supposed to be working through, you know, or having a, what are they called? I am supposed to be having an epiphany right now, or the main character, I'm sorry, supposed to be having an epiphany right now because we're at the midpoint of the story.
We're supposed to be hearing about the right idea from this sage character or what have you. But when I sit down to write every day, it's like, what am I talking about again? What's seen is this, what's going on? So it can be really hard to carry all of that information. And it's obviously not just the character arc and the plot, but the settings and the.
Pros that you have to carry all the way through. Writing is hard work, writing is hard.
Kayla: So do you normally work with an outline and do your authors work with an outline or does it depend?
Megan: The authors that I work with. Run the gamut from pants to plotter. I tend to get, more plotters, because I am naturally more of a plotter.
I wasn't when I was younger, but now that I'm older, it's definitely more plot. I work out the wound, wrong idea, right idea for my protagonists and if applicable, any antagonists that I might have. And I will, then write out an eight point story structure, which is cobbled together from, Rachel Stevens plot embryo, like I said, and the.
Eight point story structure that Eva DeVere teaches, and several other story structures that I've studied. I have a book here of story structure types that I, compiled and thought through I've made up my own little eight stage story structure and I will go through each of those for each character that has an arc, or a failed arc.
And. Then I will you by going through those plot points have to happen. Like you will have to have things in the plot happening in order for the, catalyst to switch from one state of mind to the other. And so those, it's just then a matter of weaving them together. I write a lot of dual POV romance in my personal time, so it's, that's especially, I think, easy to, because you're having, you're having the two character arcs kind of.
Going back and forth, talking to each other through the deal with POVs. So yeah, that's about what I do. And then I'll go chapter, I'll also chapter by chapter, outline. Once I have those, the character act settled and then I will bracket draft. All the way through. And then I'll write pros on top of it.
And by the time I get to the pros on top of the bracketed draft, like it's darn near right where the book, right, where the story should be. Because I've like read over it so many times and edited things so many times. I have a blog post on it that's called, it's a 'cause I use a rock tumbling metaphor when I'm talking about it.
Typically, the coarse grind, is determining like what the idea is, what the wound wrong idea, right Idea is. You have your medium grind, which is getting the actual arcs together and figuring out what the plot is going to be versus just like the elements that you like.
The medium grind is bracketing everything and then the fine grind. The plane grind is, getting the pros just right and getting the wording, perfect and polished. Polish is the state where you're getting everything, ready to actually publish where you're fixing the typos and things like that.
And that is my whole, my whole process start to finish.
Kayla: I love that metaphor and it makes so much sense when broken down like that. So thank you for sharing that. On the topic of dual POV romance. One reason I reached out to you is you have this workshop you've done. Trop love to true love.
And again, I'm gonna butcher the exact whatever it was 'cause I to you about this for forever ago. And it was kind of about determining what you like in love stories and what that says about. Your own kind of romantic preferences. Am I getting that somewhat? Yeah. No, you're
Megan: nailing it.
You're nailing it. So, yeah. The idea behind that workshop that I did for, Danica Bloom's author ever after group is, we all experienced or at least saw, examples of love throughout our lives. Those were from the people who raised us other groups of adults, other adult pairings that we saw growing up.
And. For a lot of us movies and books and TV shows that showed us examples of what love looks like. In that workshop I talked about, getting out on paper, all of your favorite love stories, the ones that hit you the hardest and finding there are always going to be pattern.
And similarities between those sets. One pattern that comes through for me is like Sassy girl, basically. And, like sassy, smart girl and like guy who adores that aspect of her. Like, if you look at my family, which has a lot of successful marriages in it, that template plays out in my family as well. Like a very, like sassy, outspoken, knows what she wants girl. And then the guy, also has his own inner world and has tons of other things going on, but like really is like jazzed when his girl gets excited and, loves to support her in that way.
So that, but that's something that I only figured out that that's. A, a something that I should be writing when I broke down all of the TV shows and the movies and the books that I've read and watched and seen, and figured out like, oh, that's a pattern that's appearing for me a lot. I bet I would be good at writing it.
And it turns out that's one of my favorite things to write about. One of my favorite dynamics to write about is that, and then conversely, so that would be like to my reading tastes and to my writing tastes. And then you have writing aversions and reading aversions. So you might not like I, which are different.
I'm saying your tastes and your aversions between your reading and your writing are different. So I like to read really like angsty books. And I can write angst. It's not impossible, but I am not as good at writing it, particularly like the cheating trope.
I can read about it and I'm like, oh, the scandal. I'm watching actually, one of the romcoms that I was watching, we talked about before I hopped on, like I'm watching romcoms, while I clean. One of them, I'm watching something borrowed right now that's free on YouTube, and that one has cheating in it.
And I do not, I could never condone that in real life and I cannot, I can't write it at all. I have a project that I'm basically, on the verge of, well, I am kind of having to rewrite it almost entirely because it had cheating in it. 'cause I was like, I like to read it. I bet I could write it. And like, it's not to my taste, it's not to my writing taste.
I can't make that sound authentic. I can't get into that head space. And so that's what I talked about during that workshop. A whole lot of, figuring out not only what you like, but what you were good at, writing according to the patterns that you've lived through and, seen, played out in front of you.
Kayla: Laughing a bit because I had the opposite. I didn't have a lot of good examples of relationships growing up, and I'm thinking of my own writing and the stuff I love to read, and it's always like this really like. Badass independent woman who doesn't need anybody. And then she finds the one guy that she's like, okay, I actually love and wanna be with this guy.
But she still maintains that independence.
Megan: Mm-hmm.
Kayla: Do you see that happening for people sometimes?
Megan: Yeah. That's the rebellion. I was never a rebellious girl. I was obedient. And, did what I was told basically all the way through.
But if you have that spark of rebellion in you, absolutely you're gonna chase the things. You're gonna want to see the patterns played out and crave the patterns played out that you did not get to see, or that feel right to you. Whether that's in order to say screw you past influences, or if it's just because, that's genuinely who you are inside.
That is something that I see happen quite a bit. Yeah.
Kayla: Here's one more 'cause I'm curious about this one too. As a female? Female, I'm not alone. 'cause I have friends that are like me too.
Megan: Mm-hmm. What
Kayla: about females who just love like male, male romances? Usually one of the males is like a morally gray kind of jerk.
And the other one is like just a sweet, tender hearted one that like melts the morally gray one that say about someone's preferences.
Megan: When I'm writing romance, I am typically because I am in a male female relationship. Most of my clients, have been male, female, although I have got, uh, that's what they're writing.
Although I have gotten some female, female, mm-hmm. I err on the side of like, people being people. That's also something that's played out very frequently in heterosexual pairings as well is the, black cat, golden retriever. My own partner and I are like, I know I'm sunshiny here and I am a generally happy person, but in social situations I am more of a black cat and he is way more the golden retriever, like way more,
so to see that played out, I hesitate to speak on, male, male pairings, because I simply don't know what the difference would be in them from a heterosexual pairing in terms of what that would say about the storytelling aspects.
It just feels like it should be like, yeah, of course, we like grumpy sunshine and black cat, golden Retriever, that works across all types of pairings. There's female, female pairings, male female pairings, et cetera. So the specificity of the male, male, I'm not sure.
What to attribute that to is I think what I'm saying.
Kayla: I know I ask like the hard, weird questions sometimes and, I love being challenged. So, and I think you're right. There is something about just like black cat golden retriever that's just like. Pretty cute. Okay, so let's say a writer you're working with gets stuck, so that could be in their plot, in their character's journey, or maybe they're just not inspired or motivated to write.
What's a tool or exercise you recommend to get them moving again?
Megan: For the words, is genuinely something that I talk about. Which if no one on the if no one's heard about it yet, who's listening, it's something we're both on. It's a. Gaming platform for writers where you defeat monsters based on your word count, for the day.
And so I, and I will straight up recommend the actual site, but when I am saying what, by recommending the site is, write anything, anything, anything. And you will, by getting those gears turning of like. Just putting words down on paper, you will eventually become unstuck. It might not happen while you're writing, and you don't necessarily need to be writing that project either.
If you're stuck on that project, start journaling. Actually what I do very frequently while writing and I'm stuck, is I will drop down a few lines in the document and I will start like, I hate this. I hate that I'm writing this and I hate that I'm stuck. Why am I stuck? And I will ask myself questions and interrogate like, what is going on?
Say, okay, what am I trying to say in this scene? Put it into plain English. Okay, now that I have it in plain English, how do I make this appeal in prose? Like, how will this make sense in prose? Write that out. And just having that kind of like dialogue with yourself back and forth on this screen or on paper is so, so helpful.
'Cause when you just have it stuck in your head, you cannot move anywhere. This is actually a phenomenon that, I see a whole lot played out in, computer programming, both my father. And then, eventually my boyfriend actually also picked up a coding. So I've been around them my whole life. And there's a concept called rubber ducking, and that's where you have a rubber ducky or any kind of other object and you talk to it.
I'm gonna use my, see I like rock tumbling. You can tell. 'cause I have a bunch of weirdo rock things. So this is. I don't know if they'll see, the zoom, but this is, a little oyster made from fluoride. So, not necessarily this object, but any object. You talk to it about like, okay, I'm stuck because of this A, B, C, D, E, F, G reason.
Doesn't that suck? I need to know more about blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I am feeling like I'm not. Understanding my character's wound, right? Like I don't feel like I've tapped into the reason that this bothered her so much, and just talking out loud helps so much, so much. Even though even if it's not to an animate, even if it's not to a person just talking in general, you will then add your next, shower to have the epiphany.
Kayla: I love both of those. And I think you're absolutely right. Whether you are writing in a program like for the words or just talking out loud anything to get it out of your brain so that you have a different way of processing it. And yes, I am 1000% a for the words, huge fan of, what I love about it is it rewards the consistency.
So one of the cool things about it is you write 444 words a day.
Megan: Mm-hmm. And
Kayla: most people that'll take 10 to 30 minutes. Doable for most people. And then your like wings grow and it becomes this thing where you're getting rewarded for consistency over time. And if you're writing 444 words every day for weeks, months, years on end, you're gonna grow that muscle over time.
And I imagine, I don't know if you've experienced this, writer's block becomes less and less the more consistent you are with writing.
Megan: Yes, I def it's, it's all about muscles. I. Used to struggle to get 10,000 words in a month struggle. And now like 30 K is like typical or not? Is it 30 k more like, yeah, 25 to 30 K is like, I can, that's doable to me.
Like a, a normal month I could do that. A, you know, the 50,000 words I. The, the typical challenge of like writing 50,000 words in 30 days, that writers assign themselves. I only accomplished that after finding for the words, 'cause it, it forced you like, and it made it fun too by like dropping that dopamine every time you defeat a monster.
Pushed me to go even further than I thought. I didn't, I'd never had a 3000 word day I don't think before for the words. And now I think I've had, I think I've gotten up to 4,000 words and one day I will hit that coveted 5,000 word day. Like it's been an incredible tool to help, stretch your muscles and, and let go of the perfectionism.
That that's why IC can, could never write more than like a couple hundred words a day. Before then, the perfectionism was so crippling. Which is another wrong idea that I like to see played out and right myself is the, the perfectionist,
Kayla: I think, I'm trying to remember.
There's like five, four wounds. One is I'm not safe, one is I'm not loved, one is I have to be perfect. Mm-hmm. But I think it's interesting to see how kind of all of those have shown up in some way, shape, or form as we're talking.
I would love to know, do you use for the words to journal just about your writing process or do you use it to journal about other things as well?
Megan: I typically. I try to keep it just to writing. I try to keep it to, in, in the hierarchy. I will give you a hierarchy first. First priority is fiction. Writing. Writing the actual fiction.
Second priority is, working on the, brainstorming and journaling about the project and figuring out what comes next in the project or what, you know, getting myself from the. Course grind to, medium grind stage, that kind of thing. Then the next priority is like my solo journaling games.
I will use those, try to work through the thinking process of creating those games for the words. And then finally, will be the usual journaling of like, this is why I didn't get to write today. This is why. This is all that I have to do tomorrow because I cannot think straight, until I figure out how tomorrow is going to go.
And then oftentimes if I start with that, even if I start with like, you know, I'm not intending to write today, it is 11:00 PM I am just writing down, it's every resets at midnight for those that you, you have to keep your streak by midnight. For those who are not familiar with the site, at 11:00 PM if I'm sitting down and I'm like, I just, I just need to get these words out and here's what I'm going to do tomorrow, blah, blah, blah, blah.
Often I will end up getting like 50 or a hundred words anyway for the project just because something popped into my head while I was talking about like the things that I need to work on tomorrow. Truly a great tool.
Kayla: It was definitely my favorite. Solo journaling because this is something you also had on for the words that I'd never seen before.
So can you share what a solo journaling game is and how it can facilitate creativity, personal growth, whatever it is people are looking for?
Megan: Yes. So a solo journaling, the solo journaling role playing game solo journaling, RPGs, solo journaling games that I make.
I made. I kind of discovered that they were a thing. I honestly couldn't even tell you how I did it, but I discovered that they were a thing and I was like, I wanna make one. And I just decided, I just, I had an idea of, I think it was my first, my first attempt at a 30 day 50,000 word writing challenge was, something about the Oracle of Delphi.
And that story idea of having the oracle of Delphi like still sat in my brain, in my heart, in my whatever, dormant. And then I had the idea of like, oh, well combining those into, like I could try this, I could try the same story idea with this new, format. And create something. And I was like, okay, there you go.
What I use a lot for mine, because there's, a bunch of different types. Some are more like mechanical, involved with, your hit points and how much magic you're using and things like that. Mine are all very, symbolism based or they're very, low tools, like all you need to play.
Mine are a die and a deck of cards, typically, sometimes you can do different types of decks of cards, so Oracle cards or tarot cards, but typically a deck of playing cards and a di are all you need. And we use those as tools to create prompts, or to select prompts from a list
most of mine are focused around, the more fictional aspect. So you're going through a story, and those prompts are guiding you through the things that are happening in the story. It's only my most recent one, which is due all day is what it's called.
That one's more journaling as in like you personally journaling. So in that one, you take on the persona of a witch based on like a card you pull. That is you like a card that represents you, stick it back in the deck, and then you pick two cards and based on the symbolism that you've assigned to those cards, combine them and like journal about your day.
And my intention with it, I don't so much spell it out in the instructions, but my intention with it is that your journaling about your own day through the lens of, this witch. And I find that that would be. That kind of makes it easier to process things if they're difficult, is to kind of take that like extra step back.
And it also gives it, or if you had like a more mundane day, that adds an element of like flavor and fun to it that really gets you, interested in what you did and kind of gets your. Imagination going with like, okay, well how, how does this, impact the days that I've had before? And how could this impact future days?
You know, building off of things, new things to build on, that sort of thing. Did that answer your question?
Kayla: It does, and
Megan: that's
Kayla: just so fun to me because it adds that layer of magic into a person's life and creates more fun because I think one of the reasons. People struggle with being sometimes and not always is that life gets kind of like drudgery and it's just the same every day.
Maybe they don't love their job, maybe this and that. So when they have something like this they can go to, that creates a sense of fun and play. There's a lot of really cool things that can happen.
Megan: The, the, what I like about them, I always include, there are PDFs obviously, that you can download from, from Etsy, or I also have them on Itch io.
When you have them, I make them, I, I give you like a ruled, even, even if you don't have a notebook or something to write. In the last page of my, books of my games is typically like ruled paper. And I also have like specific. Ones that are themed to the game, that, so that you're encouraged to write on paper away from screens.
As I find that when you're tapped into screens, you're kind of still tapped into the world outside. And I think by getting away from that, by journaling. And playing these very immersive, very introspective games. On paper you can work more on yourself and find out more things about you and your own perspective and how you process things, which can be very helpful both in the mental health sense and in terms of what kinds of things do I want to create during my time on this earth
Kayla: well, that's one thing I wish I did more of is paper journaling
Megan: because
Kayla: there is such a difference from like screens versus paper journaling. And I think you're right, it does open up a different part of the brain and does allow you to go a little bit deeper. Like if you're on for the words, which I love and I still use most of the time, it can be tempting to like open up another tab or go check your emails or do something else unless you put it to full screen setting, which I find really helpful.
Megan: Yeah, the, that's helpful. I find, both my, both my partner and me started, oh, I started bullet journaling way long ago and it started like, I spread the gospel of it to like my family and also to my boyfriend, and he does pick up, also picked up bullet journaling. He calls his a bullet journal, I call mine a bullet journal.
They are in no way, shape, or form the same. Thing that we are doing, I do, bullet points of the day, like how the day went, and that is what keeps it. That's what's kept me doing it for like three or four years now. Is that, that makes it much more accessible to me. I may or may not have a DHD that's up to the, that's not up to me, but anyone will tell you.
I think that I have a DHD, so like sitting there and like writing out. The full thoughts sometimes because it's my own thoughts and I don't really so much care about my own thoughts 'cause they're mine. What do I care? They're not like the character's thoughts, then I don't, I would not care to actually literally journal, but because they're bullet points, they go.
Much faster. And then I find myself actually getting more introspective with that. On paper journaling. When I take away the need of like, you have to write like long fluoride sentences about, you know, how, how your morning coffee made you feel or what have you, like training it more utilitarian initially allowed me to, now I will write down my feelings in it more.
Like it opened me up to that and he. Bless him. Went straight for like the journaling of like, he'll, he'll say what he did the day, but he'll also say like, you know, 11 outta 10 day or what have you. Like, he'll give, he'll give like little notes about how he feels too in prose.
But I very, I love that for him. He is so cool that he can do that.
Kayla: Really neat how everybody. Does their writing and their journaling in such different ways and you are able to make it work for you, which is very cool. So I had another question because I imagine this comes up for you. For writers who draw on their own lives, whether they're doing like a memoir or it's a fictional story, but it's based on things that have happened to them.
How do you help them balance emotional truth with crafting a compelling narrative?
Megan: This is interesting because this is exactly, I am, I'm teaching for Janelle Hardy's Dirty, messy, alive Summit. I'm going to be speaking at it and I'm talking about character arts, in memoir. And so what I'm actually gonna say in that, workshop partially anyway, is that.
If you can identify the emotional truth at the heart of what you lived through, that can be your anchor. Because that is also the same thing that we use to create character arcs, that gives you a framework to make it more, narrative reader friendly.
Versus, just kind of like talking about the things that happened to you and how they made you feel like giving them, giving them that connective tissue, really is really helpful. Could you repeat your question?
Kayla: So for writers who are drawing on their own lives, either memoir form or it's a fictional story, but it's based on what's happened to them, how do they balance emotional truth with drafting a narrative that's still compelling?
Megan: Yes. So. Connecting the wound. Wrong idea, right Idea. Finding, finding the wound wrong idea, right? Ideas within the moments that happen to you, not just like what you are going through internally, but finding them like in the moments that you want to. Portray in the story, with that kind of reflection.
Now that you've obviously lived through it and have gotten some distance from it, can be very helpful in, finding the narrative thread that's going to be interesting. Humans love all kinds of stories. So if as long as you can find this story thread. Of the events that happened, you, you will create something compelling.
As long as you stay true to that, stay true to the truth of the situation and stay true to the emotional, string being pulled through it. The idea that something has happened, you react and you learn.
Kayla: That's a powerful point because I know I've coached a few authors and they have these life stories and they wanna put everything in it.
But a life is big and there's a lot of different subplots that are probably going on. And I've told people this is multiple books. So when you're able to take that initial core wound and then the epiphany they have from right idea to wrong idea, it allows 'em to really cut out what is it gonna mean?
Central to that one story, and if they do have a lot of other content, we'll have more than one book in them about their own journey, as well. So thank you for sharing that.
Megan: Oh, thank you. Yeah, that's definitely the case, that everyone has more than one book. We will all pass away with hundreds of untold stories, so prioritizing becomes important.
Yes.
Kayla: So Megan, this has been so much fun and if people want to learn more about you, connect with you, get your solo RPG games, pick you up on your 15 minute call offer, how can they do so?
Megan: Yes. Okay, so here's where to find me. I have a Kofi shop. If you go to k-fi.com/i think it's slash. Fu Pens or slash Megan Fuentes Terrible that I don't know.
It just googling Megan Fuentes Kofi page. You will find it, I promise. That's where you can sign up to, get that free 15 minute call with me also, where you can sign up for story coaching, where I will take whatever story you have that's bothering you and we will together craft that character arc to see you through writing it all the way.
That's. Where you get it. If you wanna find out everything about me, you would go to Fuentes Pens Inc. That's my last name, Fuentes, PENS dot INK. That has a blog story, coaching blog that has my thoughts and it's growing as fast as I can get it to grow, on story structure and how to live the writing life and that kind of thing.
When it comes to my solo journaling games, I actually keep those pretty separate from my story and coaching life, so as to not, confuse the solo journaling crowd, or the RPG crowd is really what they are. You would find those by going on Etsy. And my name on Etsy is by Megan Fuentes, BY Megan Fuentes.
I also have tons of, on my Kofi shop. Lots of like little free worksheets, that could be helpful for, there's a writing tracker on there. I know there's a book series Sparker. And I also have a, a romantic plotting workbook.
There's lots of, lots of good stuff on, on my storefronts.
Kayla: Thank you so much for sharing that, and I will include links to all of that in the episode description as well. I always get my guests to give the listeners an embodied challenge of some kind. It can be a writing prompt, it can be a journaling exercise, just something they can go and do after this episode.
Megan: Download my worksheet, my wound wrong idea, a right idea worksheet. And then go through a wound, a wrong idea and a right idea for either you have, I'm gonna give you three options. One is a character from somebody else that you know and love, like the back of your hands. Which that makes it kind of like a study in it kind of way.
Like, okay, how, what kind of story was being told there? At the heart, at the core of the story. That's option one. Option two is, a character that you are writing currently. What was their core, what's their wound? Wrong idea, right Idea. And then your third option is to take a wound, wrong idea, right Idea from your own life.
It can be one that's like you've carried with you since childhood, and you're like analyzing on the page as like a very intense journaling, exercise. Or you can just do like what yesterday, what happened? Because you, were nearly run over by a shopping cart.
Now you have a wrong idea regarding grocery store parking lots and your right idea can be, no, it's not actually that scary in a grocery store parking lot if you scream help, there is a story there, gosh darn it. But even something like more silly like that. But just getting the practice of finding those three things can be very helpful, in your personal life and in your creative life.
Kayla: Absolutely. I will be trying that one on myself. So again, thank you so much for being here.
Megan: Let me know how it goes. Thank you for having me.
Kayla: Yes, you are very welcome.
