September 16, 2025 • 19 mins
If your structure is perfect on paper, but your story still falls flat, this might be what you're missing.
Have you ever structured a story with all the right pieces, but something still feels flat?
You check all the boxes on paper:
✅ Inciting incident
✅ Progressive complications
✅ Turning point
✅ Crisis
✅ Climax
✅ Resolution
And yet it still falls flat. They mostly align, probably, you’re pretty sure. But somehow, they’re not working together the way they should.
The turning point doesn’t pack the right punch. The crisis doesn’t feel devastating enough, even though all is technically lost. The climax doesn’t feel like a cathartic payoff, but a gentle womp-womp.
All the pieces are there. So what went wrong?
Here’s the thing: in order for the six elements of story to work, you have to understand your character’s goal.
Most writers have a vague sense of what their protagonist generally wants. But that’s not enough.
You need to know specifically the thing that they want—and the thing they don’t want.
So in this episode, I’m putting the goal under the microscope. You’ll learn:
- Why it’s not enough to know what your character wants
- A super-simple framework for a character’s goal (seriously, it’s ridiculously easy)
- How that framework summarizes the meaning of the entire story
- And how the goal glues all six elements of story together, driving the entire story from inciting incident to resolution
Without a clearly defined goal, all the structure in the world won’t make your story come alive.
With it, everything else falls neatly into place.
Dig deeper with these related episodes:
- Inciting incident (qualities & traps)
- Progressive complications (qualities)
- Progressive complications (traps)
- Content genres
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
You've built your story socarefully.
(00:03):
You've mapped out the storystructure, and you've been
checking off every one of thesix elements from the inciting
incident to the resolution.
But something's not quite right.
The turning point isn't packingthe punch that it needs.
conflict happens, but it doesn'tseem to matter in the way that,
you know, it should.
Every element of story seems tobe doing its job on paper, but
(00:24):
in practice it feels weirdlydisconnected and flat.
Here's the thing, the sixelements of story don't work
without an engine to drive them.
In order to make the turningpoint rock your protagonist's
world to make the crisis adevastating, all is lost and the
climax a cathartic payoff.
(00:45):
You must understand what yourprotagonist is really trying to
achieve, and that is trickierthan it sounds most writers
think the goal is simple.
The character wants X.
Save the world, get the girlsolve a crime.
But that's only half theequation.
(01:06):
The other half, the part thatgives your story, its meaning
and power is what yourprotagonist doesn't want to do
in order to get X what they'retrying to avoid.
what would feel like failure,even if they technically
achieved their goal?
And in this episode, I'mbreaking down both sides of that
equation.
I'm sharing the framework thatcaptures this tension and
(01:27):
becomes the engine of everygreat story.
It's deceptively simple, and yetit will bring every piece
together and bring your story tolife.
(02:26):
Welcome to your next draft.
In our series of episodes on thesix elements of story, my
favorite story structureframework.
We've covered the incitingincidents and progressive
complications, which means thatthe next logical step is the
turning point.
I was super prepared to put theturning point under the
microscope for this episode.
(02:46):
I spent a month gathering myideas and running them by Kim
and Brannan, my editorcolleagues.
I had all the pieces, the thingsI look for, and the traps that
writers fall in and examples.
and then I sat down to writethat episode, and within three
sentences I realized we can'ttalk about turning points yet.
(03:06):
Something huge is missing thegoal.
In order to understand theturning point, first we have to
understand the protagonist'sgoal because the turning point
is the event that makes it clearthe protagonist cannot
accomplish their goal in the waythat they wanted to achieve it,
which means we literally can'thave a conversation about
(03:29):
turning points without talkingabout the goal.
as you've probably guessed,based on every other episode in
this series, I have a lot to sayabout goals.
So I set the Turning Pointsepisode aside.
We'll come back to it, Ipromise, and I set out instead
to share the way that I thinkabout goals in a story.
The goal is the engine thatdrives the protagonist through
(03:51):
the story.
It's the conflict at the heartof the story's purpose and
meaning.
It's the glue that ties all theelements of story together.
It is essential incredibly.
It is also easily distilled intoa simple and hyper useful
framework.
This framework was codified bySean Coin and Story Grid, and I
(04:13):
absolutely love it.
So get ready for a deep diveinto the goal.
We'll cover a super simpleframework for a character's
goal, a breakdown of each partof that framework.
The way that this frameworkcaptures the meaning of a story
by weaving the internal andexternal arcs together.
A bunch of examples so you cansee how it works.
(04:35):
And a sneak preview of how thegoal glues all six elements
together.
Let's kick it off with theframework.
Here it is.
A character wants X without Y.
That's it.
A character wants X without Y.
Told you it was wonderfullysimple.
(04:56):
Feel free to stop this episoderight here if you feel like
you've got it.
Want more?
Let's break it down First, whatdoes want X mean?
This is the thing the characteris trying to get or achieve.
It's a specific, literal,external thing the character
wants.
Okay.
every content genre has a stockgoal that a character in that
(05:19):
type of story is always pursuingin an action story where the
core need of survival, theprotagonist wants to save a
victim from a villain in a crimestory where the core need is
safety.
The protagonist wants to uncoverthe truth in a love story, where
the core need is connection.
The protagonist wants to fall inlove or gain a relationship if
(05:42):
those feel generic.
That's because they are, theyare the broad categories that
stories fall within, and thereare many, many, many ways to
create nuanced variations ofthose goals.
The goal of a specific characterin a specific story will be a
narrower, more specific versionof those stock goals.
Let's look at some examples.
(06:03):
Pride and prejudice is a lovestory.
Elizabeth Bennett wants to marryfor love.
Ender's game is a war story.
Ender wants to protect himselfat first, and ultimately he
wants to protect all ofhumanity.
Rita Hayworth and ShawshankRedemption is a prison break
crime story.
Andy wants to get out of prison.
(06:25):
How to Train Your Dragon is astatus story and an action
story.
Hiccup wants to gain theapproval of his tribe.
Red, white and royal blue isanother love story.
Alex, the son of the UnitedStates President wants to date
Henry the Prince of England.
Marry for love, save the world,get out of prison, gain approval
(06:46):
and respect, get the boy.
All of these are specificconcrete goals.
They can be externally measured.
Is Andy in prison or out ofprison?
Does hiccups community ridiculehim or honor him?
Is ender alive or are he and allof humanity obliterated?
(07:06):
And all of these goals alignwith the content genre of their
story.
Elizabeth Bennett doesn't wantto save the world.
She's in a love story.
Andy doesn't have an opportunityto get a girl.
He's in a prison break.
Crime story ender doesn't havetime to solve a crime.
He's in a war story to be fair.
Hiccup wants to gain respect,keep his community safe, and get
(07:27):
the girl.
That's because he's in aninternal status story and an
external action story with alove story subplot.
But one of those genres must bethe primary genre because three
things is too many things tomeasure all at once.
And so we can distill all ofthat down to the thing Hiccup
wants most to gain the approvalof his community.
(07:50):
So that's the want X side.
There is a specific, literal,external thing that the
character wants to get orachieve.
What about the without why side?
Well, the character doesn't justwant to get X at any cost.
They want to get X in a specificway.
Under specific circumstances.
(08:11):
There are things that they donot want to do, and it would
feel absolutely horrible if theyhad to do them to get X.
If they did Y, they might stillfeel like they failed, even if
doing Y allowed them to gain x.
So the without y side is thething that the character does
not want on the way to achievingx.
(08:34):
I think of this in twocategories.
The first category is avoid thecharacter wants to avoid doing
something.
There is something that they donot want to do, an action they
do not want to take.
The second category is preserve.
There is something the characterwants to maintain, an existing
state that they want to keep.
(08:56):
They like something about theway things are right now and
they do not want to break it.
Avoid and preserve are two sidesof the same coin.
The way that characters preservean existing state is by avoiding
taking an action that woulddisrupt that state.
But I mention these twocategories because they give you
some flexibility around how youphrase Y in the without Y
(09:18):
framework.
The character wants X withouttaking an action, or they want X
without disrupting an existingstate.
Let's look at our examplestories and see what our
intrepid protagonists do notwant.
Elizabeth Bennett wants to marryfor love without changing her
(09:39):
judgment of people.
That's an avoid, an action.
She does not want to take Enderwants to save himself and
ultimately save humankindwithout hurting his enemy.
That's another avoid.
Andy Dufrene wants to get thefreedom that he justly deserves
without breaking the law to getit.
(10:01):
This is phrased as an avoid, anaction that he doesn't want to
do, but I think it's actuallyeasier to see Andy's goal from
the perspective of preserve.
If you walked up to him andasked him what he wants, he
wouldn't tell you that he wantsto not break the law.
He'd tell you that he wants toget the justice he deserves
within the law.
He wants to preserve an existingexternal state, his innocence of
(10:24):
the crime that he was convictedof, and an existing internal
belief that the justice systemprovides justice.
How about hiccup?
Hiccup wants to gain theapproval of his tribe without
killing a dragon.
This is another avoid, And Alexwants to date Henry without
outing either of them or theirrelationship to the world.
(10:47):
This is a preserve.
He wants to maintain theirsafety within the closet.
So that's the without y, Y is aspecific literal external
action.
The character does not want totake, or an existing state that
they do not want to disrupt.
They do want to get X, and theywant to get X very, very badly,
(11:10):
but just as badly as they wantX.
They do not want y.
Y might be too high a price topay.
Can you see where this is going?
The entire story will force thecharacter to pit X against Y.
Sure.
The character wants X without Y.
(11:30):
But what if X is impossiblewithout Y?
What if Y is inevitable?
What will the character do whentheir goal is impossible to
achieve in the way that theywanted to achieve it?
Let's add one more layer.
Thus far, I've emphasized howboth X and Y are specific,
literal, external things.
(11:50):
They aren't feelings or thoughtexperiments.
They are actual, literal,tangible things, but where this
gets really rich and powerful.
Where it carries the meaning andpurpose at the heart of the
story is the way that it tiesthe internal and external
stories together.
The reason why characters want Xwithout Y is because they
(12:11):
believe that X without Y ispossible to get.
They believe that there's a wayto thread that needle, to have
their cake and eat it too.
They're not out here dreamingimpossible, irrational dreams
just for the heck of it.
They are grounded in realism ineverything they have ever
learned and seen andexperienced, and based on all of
that, they truly believe that Xwithout Y is possible.
(12:34):
Or that Y is not worthsacrificing for X pitting X
against Y challenges not onlytheir external circumstances,
but their internal beliefs aboutthemselves and the world.
Take Andy Frana again.
Andy wants to get his justfreedom from prison without
breaking the law.
That's because he genuinelybelieves that the justice system
(12:56):
meets out justice.
He believes that if he couldsimply present the true facts
before a judge and jury, theywould see the truth and act
justly in accordance with it foras long as he believes that he
will not attempt to break out ofprison because breaking out of
prison would put him on thewrong side of a just system.
if the system is just, it wouldbe irrational to commit a crime
(13:19):
to gain his freedom.
In that case, the system thatwould have freed him would
instead re incarcerate him, andthis time he would deserve it.
In order for Andy to finallychoose to do X with Y.
To gain his freedom by breakingthe law, he must first realize
that his belief was wrong, thatthe system is not just, and he
(13:41):
can never gain freedom throughit.
This is an internal revelationthat makes his external action
possible, and so that without Yside is a tangible, literal,
external thing.
But more than that, itrepresents Andy's internal
worldview, which will be testedthroughout the story.
(14:01):
In order for Andy to gain hisfreedom, He must first realize
the truth about the justicesystem that's imprisoning him.
I point this out because I wantyou to see that the without why
side of the equation isn'trandom.
It's not about some milddiscomfort or annoyance or
inconvenience.
It's about the core challengethat the character is being
(14:23):
tested in throughout the entirestory.
Elizabeth Bennett doesn't wantto marry for love without eating
mediocre boiled potatoes, forinstance.
She wants to marry for lovewithout having to confront her
own proclivity to biasedprejudices, snap judgments and
incorrect assumptions aboutpeople.
Elizabeth's story is about whathappens when we meet a person
(14:47):
worthy of our deepest love, andyet our judgments and pride
prevent us from recognizingthem.
Iner doesn't want to savehumanity without like
embarrassing himself by losing abattle at battle school.
He wants to protect himself andeveryone and everything he cares
about without hurting his enemy.
(15:07):
Because deep down, he caresabout his enemy as deeply as he
cares about himself anddestroying his enemy feels like
destroying himself.
Ender's story is about what itcosts to protect ourselves and
the people we care about, andhow much we're willing to
destroy in order to guaranteeour safety.
get X without Y is the literalphysical pursuit that
(15:32):
externalizes the essentialinternal conflict of the
character.
The goal summarizes the heart ofthe story, the core conflict,
the essence of what it's allabout.
A story asks whether it isfundamentally possible to get X
without Y, and what a characteris willing or able to do.
If it's not, where does thatleave us?
(15:55):
If we cannot possibly get Xwithout Y, what in the world
should we do?
The goal is central toeverything.
Without it, there is no story.
And so that brings us back tothe goal as glue, the binding
agent that ties all six elementsof story together.
I'll dig deeper into this ineach elements individual
(16:15):
breakdown.
But here's a crash introductionto the whole structure so you
can see how the goal fits in theinciting incident kicks off the
character's goal.
This is the catalyzing eventthat establishes the desire for
X, the thing that they want, andthe constraint of Y, the thing
that they don't want.
(16:36):
The inciting incident sets thecharacter in motion in pursuit
of the goal.
The progressive complicationsare the space where the
character attempts all the waysto get X without Y.
Sometimes they get the characterreally close to achieving X
without Y, and sometimes theytake the character far away from
X and they call into questionwhether it's even possible to
(16:57):
achieve X without Y.
The turning point though is theevent that makes it inescapably
clear that it is indeedimpossible to get X without y.
Which sends the character intothe crisis.
This is the central question atthe heart of the story, It's a
binary choice.
the truth is revealed and thechips are down, will the
(17:20):
character choose to do Y inorder to gain X Or choose to
sacrifice X in order to avoid Y.
The climax is the moment whenthe character takes action on
their crisis decision.
They do Y to gain X or theysacrifice X to avoid Y.
And the resolution is what theworld looks like afterwards.
(17:43):
It's the result of theirdecision, what they have gained
and what they have lost now thatthey have taken action.
So that is why the goal is soessential.
That's why this framework is sopowerful.
It is the engine that drives theentire story.
It's the glue that holds everyelement together, and it's the
(18:05):
core purpose and meaning thatthe story is truly about.
We cannot use the six elementsof story effectively without it.
And so I invite you to play agame.
It's called, what's the goal?
And I bet you can guess what thegame is.
Think of your favorite storiesand try to spot the
protagonist's goal.
(18:26):
What is X?
The thing they want?
What's y, the thing that theydon't want?
And when you put them togetherin the get X without Y
framework, does that describethe conflict at the heart of the
story?
This is great practice to startseeing goals out in the wild in
the stories that you know andlove so that you can find them
in your story as well.
(18:48):
Plus, I don't know about you,but I think that it's a really
fun game.
I'm super fun at parties.
Alright, we've coveredeverything I need you to know
about goals.
Now, one more thing before I go.
If you enjoyed this episode,would you do me a favor and
consider leaving a rating andreview in Apple podcasts?
Reviews really do help morewriters to find the show and
(19:09):
determine whether it's worthlistening to.
And if you have an Apple device,you can leave review in Apple
Podcasts, even if that's notwhere you usually listen.
I also read every review and Iappreciate every single one.
So that's my little plug.
And there you have it.
Your crash course on goals.
Congratulations.
You're now ready for the turningpoint episode.
(19:30):
Until next time, happy editing.
You've built your story socarefully.
(00:03):
You've mapped out the storystructure, and you've been
checking off every one of thesix elements from the inciting
incident to the resolution.
But something's not quite right.
The turning point isn't packingthe punch that it needs.
conflict happens, but it doesn'tseem to matter in the way that,
you know, it should.
Every element of story seems tobe doing its job on paper, but
(00:24):
in practice it feels weirdlydisconnected and flat.
Here's the thing, the sixelements of story don't work
without an engine to drive them.
In order to make the turningpoint rock your protagonist's
world to make the crisis adevastating, all is lost and the
climax a cathartic payoff.
(00:45):
You must understand what yourprotagonist is really trying to
achieve, and that is trickierthan it sounds most writers
think the goal is simple.
The character wants X.
Save the world, get the girlsolve a crime.
But that's only half theequation.
(01:06):
The other half, the part thatgives your story, its meaning
and power is what yourprotagonist doesn't want to do
in order to get X what they'retrying to avoid.
what would feel like failure,even if they technically
achieved their goal?
And in this episode, I'mbreaking down both sides of that
equation.
I'm sharing the framework thatcaptures this tension and
(01:27):
becomes the engine of everygreat story.
It's deceptively simple, and yetit will bring every piece
together and bring your story tolife.
(02:26):
Welcome to your next draft.
In our series of episodes on thesix elements of story, my
favorite story structureframework.
We've covered the incitingincidents and progressive
complications, which means thatthe next logical step is the
turning point.
I was super prepared to put theturning point under the
microscope for this episode.
(02:46):
I spent a month gathering myideas and running them by Kim
and Brannan, my editorcolleagues.
I had all the pieces, the thingsI look for, and the traps that
writers fall in and examples.
and then I sat down to writethat episode, and within three
sentences I realized we can'ttalk about turning points yet.
(03:06):
Something huge is missing thegoal.
In order to understand theturning point, first we have to
understand the protagonist'sgoal because the turning point
is the event that makes it clearthe protagonist cannot
accomplish their goal in the waythat they wanted to achieve it,
which means we literally can'thave a conversation about
(03:29):
turning points without talkingabout the goal.
as you've probably guessed,based on every other episode in
this series, I have a lot to sayabout goals.
So I set the Turning Pointsepisode aside.
We'll come back to it, Ipromise, and I set out instead
to share the way that I thinkabout goals in a story.
The goal is the engine thatdrives the protagonist through
(03:51):
the story.
It's the conflict at the heartof the story's purpose and
meaning.
It's the glue that ties all theelements of story together.
It is essential incredibly.
It is also easily distilled intoa simple and hyper useful
framework.
This framework was codified bySean Coin and Story Grid, and I
(04:13):
absolutely love it.
So get ready for a deep diveinto the goal.
We'll cover a super simpleframework for a character's
goal, a breakdown of each partof that framework.
The way that this frameworkcaptures the meaning of a story
by weaving the internal andexternal arcs together.
A bunch of examples so you cansee how it works.
(04:35):
And a sneak preview of how thegoal glues all six elements
together.
Let's kick it off with theframework.
Here it is.
A character wants X without Y.
That's it.
A character wants X without Y.
Told you it was wonderfullysimple.
(04:56):
Feel free to stop this episoderight here if you feel like
you've got it.
Want more?
Let's break it down First, whatdoes want X mean?
This is the thing the characteris trying to get or achieve.
It's a specific, literal,external thing the character
wants.
Okay.
every content genre has a stockgoal that a character in that
(05:19):
type of story is always pursuingin an action story where the
core need of survival, theprotagonist wants to save a
victim from a villain in a crimestory where the core need is
safety.
The protagonist wants to uncoverthe truth in a love story, where
the core need is connection.
The protagonist wants to fall inlove or gain a relationship if
(05:42):
those feel generic.
That's because they are, theyare the broad categories that
stories fall within, and thereare many, many, many ways to
create nuanced variations ofthose goals.
The goal of a specific characterin a specific story will be a
narrower, more specific versionof those stock goals.
Let's look at some examples.
(06:03):
Pride and prejudice is a lovestory.
Elizabeth Bennett wants to marryfor love.
Ender's game is a war story.
Ender wants to protect himselfat first, and ultimately he
wants to protect all ofhumanity.
Rita Hayworth and ShawshankRedemption is a prison break
crime story.
Andy wants to get out of prison.
(06:25):
How to Train Your Dragon is astatus story and an action
story.
Hiccup wants to gain theapproval of his tribe.
Red, white and royal blue isanother love story.
Alex, the son of the UnitedStates President wants to date
Henry the Prince of England.
Marry for love, save the world,get out of prison, gain approval
(06:46):
and respect, get the boy.
All of these are specificconcrete goals.
They can be externally measured.
Is Andy in prison or out ofprison?
Does hiccups community ridiculehim or honor him?
Is ender alive or are he and allof humanity obliterated?
(07:06):
And all of these goals alignwith the content genre of their
story.
Elizabeth Bennett doesn't wantto save the world.
She's in a love story.
Andy doesn't have an opportunityto get a girl.
He's in a prison break.
Crime story ender doesn't havetime to solve a crime.
He's in a war story to be fair.
Hiccup wants to gain respect,keep his community safe, and get
(07:27):
the girl.
That's because he's in aninternal status story and an
external action story with alove story subplot.
But one of those genres must bethe primary genre because three
things is too many things tomeasure all at once.
And so we can distill all ofthat down to the thing Hiccup
wants most to gain the approvalof his community.
(07:50):
So that's the want X side.
There is a specific, literal,external thing that the
character wants to get orachieve.
What about the without why side?
Well, the character doesn't justwant to get X at any cost.
They want to get X in a specificway.
Under specific circumstances.
(08:11):
There are things that they donot want to do, and it would
feel absolutely horrible if theyhad to do them to get X.
If they did Y, they might stillfeel like they failed, even if
doing Y allowed them to gain x.
So the without y side is thething that the character does
not want on the way to achievingx.
(08:34):
I think of this in twocategories.
The first category is avoid thecharacter wants to avoid doing
something.
There is something that they donot want to do, an action they
do not want to take.
The second category is preserve.
There is something the characterwants to maintain, an existing
state that they want to keep.
(08:56):
They like something about theway things are right now and
they do not want to break it.
Avoid and preserve are two sidesof the same coin.
The way that characters preservean existing state is by avoiding
taking an action that woulddisrupt that state.
But I mention these twocategories because they give you
some flexibility around how youphrase Y in the without Y
(09:18):
framework.
The character wants X withouttaking an action, or they want X
without disrupting an existingstate.
Let's look at our examplestories and see what our
intrepid protagonists do notwant.
Elizabeth Bennett wants to marryfor love without changing her
(09:39):
judgment of people.
That's an avoid, an action.
She does not want to take Enderwants to save himself and
ultimately save humankindwithout hurting his enemy.
That's another avoid.
Andy Dufrene wants to get thefreedom that he justly deserves
without breaking the law to getit.
(10:01):
This is phrased as an avoid, anaction that he doesn't want to
do, but I think it's actuallyeasier to see Andy's goal from
the perspective of preserve.
If you walked up to him andasked him what he wants, he
wouldn't tell you that he wantsto not break the law.
He'd tell you that he wants toget the justice he deserves
within the law.
He wants to preserve an existingexternal state, his innocence of
(10:24):
the crime that he was convictedof, and an existing internal
belief that the justice systemprovides justice.
How about hiccup?
Hiccup wants to gain theapproval of his tribe without
killing a dragon.
This is another avoid, And Alexwants to date Henry without
outing either of them or theirrelationship to the world.
(10:47):
This is a preserve.
He wants to maintain theirsafety within the closet.
So that's the without y, Y is aspecific literal external
action.
The character does not want totake, or an existing state that
they do not want to disrupt.
They do want to get X, and theywant to get X very, very badly,
(11:10):
but just as badly as they wantX.
They do not want y.
Y might be too high a price topay.
Can you see where this is going?
The entire story will force thecharacter to pit X against Y.
Sure.
The character wants X without Y.
(11:30):
But what if X is impossiblewithout Y?
What if Y is inevitable?
What will the character do whentheir goal is impossible to
achieve in the way that theywanted to achieve it?
Let's add one more layer.
Thus far, I've emphasized howboth X and Y are specific,
literal, external things.
(11:50):
They aren't feelings or thoughtexperiments.
They are actual, literal,tangible things, but where this
gets really rich and powerful.
Where it carries the meaning andpurpose at the heart of the
story is the way that it tiesthe internal and external
stories together.
The reason why characters want Xwithout Y is because they
(12:11):
believe that X without Y ispossible to get.
They believe that there's a wayto thread that needle, to have
their cake and eat it too.
They're not out here dreamingimpossible, irrational dreams
just for the heck of it.
They are grounded in realism ineverything they have ever
learned and seen andexperienced, and based on all of
that, they truly believe that Xwithout Y is possible.
(12:34):
Or that Y is not worthsacrificing for X pitting X
against Y challenges not onlytheir external circumstances,
but their internal beliefs aboutthemselves and the world.
Take Andy Frana again.
Andy wants to get his justfreedom from prison without
breaking the law.
That's because he genuinelybelieves that the justice system
(12:56):
meets out justice.
He believes that if he couldsimply present the true facts
before a judge and jury, theywould see the truth and act
justly in accordance with it foras long as he believes that he
will not attempt to break out ofprison because breaking out of
prison would put him on thewrong side of a just system.
if the system is just, it wouldbe irrational to commit a crime
(13:19):
to gain his freedom.
In that case, the system thatwould have freed him would
instead re incarcerate him, andthis time he would deserve it.
In order for Andy to finallychoose to do X with Y.
To gain his freedom by breakingthe law, he must first realize
that his belief was wrong, thatthe system is not just, and he
(13:41):
can never gain freedom throughit.
This is an internal revelationthat makes his external action
possible, and so that without Yside is a tangible, literal,
external thing.
But more than that, itrepresents Andy's internal
worldview, which will be testedthroughout the story.
(14:01):
In order for Andy to gain hisfreedom, He must first realize
the truth about the justicesystem that's imprisoning him.
I point this out because I wantyou to see that the without why
side of the equation isn'trandom.
It's not about some milddiscomfort or annoyance or
inconvenience.
It's about the core challengethat the character is being
(14:23):
tested in throughout the entirestory.
Elizabeth Bennett doesn't wantto marry for love without eating
mediocre boiled potatoes, forinstance.
She wants to marry for lovewithout having to confront her
own proclivity to biasedprejudices, snap judgments and
incorrect assumptions aboutpeople.
Elizabeth's story is about whathappens when we meet a person
(14:47):
worthy of our deepest love, andyet our judgments and pride
prevent us from recognizingthem.
Iner doesn't want to savehumanity without like
embarrassing himself by losing abattle at battle school.
He wants to protect himself andeveryone and everything he cares
about without hurting his enemy.
(15:07):
Because deep down, he caresabout his enemy as deeply as he
cares about himself anddestroying his enemy feels like
destroying himself.
Ender's story is about what itcosts to protect ourselves and
the people we care about, andhow much we're willing to
destroy in order to guaranteeour safety.
get X without Y is the literalphysical pursuit that
(15:32):
externalizes the essentialinternal conflict of the
character.
The goal summarizes the heart ofthe story, the core conflict,
the essence of what it's allabout.
A story asks whether it isfundamentally possible to get X
without Y, and what a characteris willing or able to do.
If it's not, where does thatleave us?
(15:55):
If we cannot possibly get Xwithout Y, what in the world
should we do?
The goal is central toeverything.
Without it, there is no story.
And so that brings us back tothe goal as glue, the binding
agent that ties all six elementsof story together.
I'll dig deeper into this ineach elements individual
(16:15):
breakdown.
But here's a crash introductionto the whole structure so you
can see how the goal fits in theinciting incident kicks off the
character's goal.
This is the catalyzing eventthat establishes the desire for
X, the thing that they want, andthe constraint of Y, the thing
that they don't want.
(16:36):
The inciting incident sets thecharacter in motion in pursuit
of the goal.
The progressive complicationsare the space where the
character attempts all the waysto get X without Y.
Sometimes they get the characterreally close to achieving X
without Y, and sometimes theytake the character far away from
X and they call into questionwhether it's even possible to
(16:57):
achieve X without Y.
The turning point though is theevent that makes it inescapably
clear that it is indeedimpossible to get X without y.
Which sends the character intothe crisis.
This is the central question atthe heart of the story, It's a
binary choice.
the truth is revealed and thechips are down, will the
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character choose to do Y inorder to gain X Or choose to
sacrifice X in order to avoid Y.
The climax is the moment whenthe character takes action on
their crisis decision.
They do Y to gain X or theysacrifice X to avoid Y.
And the resolution is what theworld looks like afterwards.
(17:43):
It's the result of theirdecision, what they have gained
and what they have lost now thatthey have taken action.
So that is why the goal is soessential.
That's why this framework is sopowerful.
It is the engine that drives theentire story.
It's the glue that holds everyelement together, and it's the
(18:05):
core purpose and meaning thatthe story is truly about.
We cannot use the six elementsof story effectively without it.
And so I invite you to play agame.
It's called, what's the goal?
And I bet you can guess what thegame is.
Think of your favorite storiesand try to spot the
protagonist's goal.
(18:26):
What is X?
The thing they want?
What's y, the thing that theydon't want?
And when you put them togetherin the get X without Y
framework, does that describethe conflict at the heart of the
story?
This is great practice to startseeing goals out in the wild in
the stories that you know andlove so that you can find them
in your story as well.
(18:48):
Plus, I don't know about you,but I think that it's a really
fun game.
I'm super fun at parties.
Alright, we've coveredeverything I need you to know
about goals.
Now, one more thing before I go.
If you enjoyed this episode,would you do me a favor and
consider leaving a rating andreview in Apple podcasts?
Reviews really do help morewriters to find the show and
(19:09):
determine whether it's worthlistening to.
And if you have an Apple device,you can leave review in Apple
Podcasts, even if that's notwhere you usually listen.
I also read every review and Iappreciate every single one.
So that's my little plug.
And there you have it.
Your crash course on goals.
Congratulations.
You're now ready for the turningpoint episode.
(19:30):
Until next time, happy editing.
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