In The Confluence, my cozy romantasy novel in progress, Iris Marin desperately wants to sell the converted granary building she has inherited in Eau Claire, Wisconsin. She has no clue how to run a building or deal with tenants, no patience for plumbing or lock repairs, and she has already picked out the Seattle townhouse she plans to buy with the money. She spends numerous chapters chasing this goal. With the money left over (she thinks) she’ll get her nose fixed—because who could ever love a nose like that?

What she actually needs, however, is to be loved as she is and accept the glorious chaos of community.

This struggle between want vs need is what drives the plot, so poor Iris won’t figure this out, of course, until she’s made her life harder—much harder—than it ever needed to be.

In fiction, characters should almost never get what they want in the way they want it. They should, if we’re doing our job right as writers, get what they need—usually throwing tantrums the whole way there. While I’ve instinctively written this way, and I’ve even said this multiple times to writers at The Narrative Project, I’ve only just fully understood this as a principle that is SO MUCH EASIER to apply in the beginnings of a project rather than hunting for and pulling it out as a thread after the fact.

• Want: The external goal. The shiny object. The thing they’d put on their vision board
• Need: The internal shift. The lesson. The thing their therapist would gently suggest if they could afford one

Jon Snow wants legitimacy and belonging; he needs to learn that honor is a luxury and true belonging is chosen. In The Color Purple, Celie wants to find her sister and safety from the men who abuse her; she needs to find her own voice and know her true worth. Jane Eyre wants love and belonging, but what she needs is her own integrity and self-worth.

In Flight of the Sunsparrow—my epic fantasy about to be out on submission—Meranne Alibar wants to stay safe in her keep, creating soniatic (dream alchemy) potions for more heroic people than herself to use in the fight against evil. What she needs is to become the hero.

Writerly tip: your character should resist their need like a cat being dragged to a bubble bath. Why? Because humans don’t change easily. We cling to our wants because they’re safer than examining what’s broken inside us.

Moving from Seattle to Wisconsin, I wanted to live by the water and ski all winter. What I needed? To understand the value of community and grace in our current political era. To rub shoulders out on the ice with big ol’ guys wearing hats with earflaps. That people are not what the pundits want you to believe.

This is why fiction matters. Not because characters get their happily ever after, but because they show us that what we’re desperately chasing might not be what we actually need. Next time you’re stuck in a scene, ask yourself: Is my character getting what they want too easily? Am I protecting them from what they need because it’s uncomfortable for me to write? Good fiction lives in discomfort. Even cozy romantasy—where the stakes might be lower but the emotional truths hit just the same.

So yes, let your character want the magical talisman/perfect romance/to catch the killer. Then give them the therapy/humility/self-acceptance/community they didn’t know they needed. They’ll hate you for most of the book, but the readers will love you.

What’s your favorite example of a character who got what they needed instead of what they wanted—or my favorite…both? And writers: what does your current protagonist think they want vs. what you know they need?