beaten up creative writing

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beaten up - quotes and descriptions to inspire creative writing

• blood gushing
• Blood trail
• bloody hands
• broken finger
• wound or injury

There is the damage to the skin, yet the damage to the brain takes far longer to heal. For rewiring back to empathy, to happy memories and a positive sense of self requires the patient layering of neurones daily. The damage of moments requires the healing of years. Being beaten up is, in reality, being beaten down.

Gina walked up the bloody mess on the floor that had been her adversary. He was grotesque. Already his eyes were swollen over and bloody spit drooled from his slack jaws. He was now as revolting as he should be, finally the outside reflects the man within. This cockroach of the law who prevented medicine reaching the sick, who tracked down hard working families who do no more than deliver people what they really want, lies foul in his own fluids. Even if he makes it these scars will be forever. With a wrinkled nose she took a step backwards, it was tempting to whisper something in his ear, that he was broken and she had won, but what was the point. He'd be lucky to remember his own name. She dialled for an ambulance herself, maiming a cop doesn't bring down nearly the same heat as killing one, and this way his walking disfigured face would be a living reminder to his colleagues of what happens to those who mess with Gregor's daughter.

When the dawn comes I can barely move, and not because Darwin is snuggled in so close. Every muscle has seized up. My body is struggling to recover, to repair the damage. Unable to move with any grace my movements are jerky. Darwin wakes, this time not in panic but sleepily. I tuck him back in and he stays, thumb in mouth. I edge into the light that flows water-like through the windows and strip off my topmost layer. On each arm there are great purple welts that will only deepen over the coming week. Against my ghostly skin they are grotesque, but I know I am lucky not to have broken bones...I look as beat up as I did in my early days of training, sparring with guys two heads taller and over twice my mass. At least they didn't go for my face - unlike those gang patsies. I don't need to be walking about looking like I came off worse in a fight so I guess I’m gonna be hauled up here for a while. Without looking in a mirror I know my face is as purple as my arms.

Found in Darwin's Ghost - first draft , authored by daisy .

When Parker first comes into view I don't recognize him, he's too far away and his gait is all wrong. He walks like a scarecrow more than a man and all lop-sided at that. As he nears my heart falls right through my sneakers, he's more purple than brown. His left eye is swollen, he can't be seeing a thing out of that and he won't for a while yet. His face still bears congealed blood and his clothes are an utter mess. Then he tries to say my name, his cracked lips failing at the first syllable, but he doesn't need to, I'm already on my feet and running.

Grayson makes his entrance late. I hear the door swing open more loudly than usual. I don't turn, don't acknowledge him. He's late and I don't play nice when he doesn't show up on time. Then he speaks, I know it's him but the voice is all wrong, like he's speaking while being choked. I turn. In one shattered moment my heart and breathing stop, just stop. He's a bloody mess, nose smashed and eyes almost shut with swelling. His arms are wrapped round his guts like he's holding them in and to be honest he's beat so bad he could be.

Jay lay in the hospital bed, eyes fixed on the window until Lara walked in. He turned, knowing already what face she would make, and she did. Her eyes got that wide look, her bottom lip trembled and she hurried to sit by his bedside. Her eyes walked from one injury to another, taking in the gore that was her husband. Jay could see the conflict already, her wanting to be strong for him and the raw need to weep welling up. "It's alright," he croaked, "you can cry." It was all the permission she needed, head down on the white woollen blanket, minutes passing until she could speak his name.

Ronald could never recall how long the beating had gone on for, only the final kick and the sound of the iron bar falling to the concrete. His face wasn't too bad, just a cut above his eyebrow, the scarlet blood flowing into his eyes. It was his body that was damaged almost beyond the point at which recovery was possible. When the paramedics cut away his clothes the blooming purple patches told of internal ruptures, likely organ damage. They had looked at Ron with encouraging faces but were utterly ashen when he couldn't see them, giving involuntary shakes of their heads. And all the while there was Mera crying in the background like her heart had snapped in two.

The shadows of the beating were on Evan's skin and on his heart. The knowledge that his own brother could do such a thing just broke something inside of him, something that would remain long after his skin and bones were healed. It was a sadness in his eyes, a heaviness, an unyielding sorrow that slowed his speech and robbed him of his once easy smile.

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7 Ways To Write A Damn Good Fight Scene

Fight scenes are the single hardest character interaction to write. Many authors who know their craft in every other respect can’t write a fight scene to save their (or their hero’s) life. But don’t despair. There are a few strategies you can use to ensure you write the kind of fight scene that grips a reader from start to finish. Let’s take a look at seven of them…

1. Detail is a dirty word

I stepped back, balancing my weight on my left foot, and threw my right fist out in a curved punch at his temple. Turning ninety degrees to the side, he brought his right forearm up to counter the blow, formed a fist with his left, and threw it at my outstretched jaw. I was in trouble.

This might be exactly what you imagine happening, but the excessive stage direction stretches the moment out, turning a frenzied series of blows into a dissection of body language and intent. This fight feels slow, and that feeling is paramount – if your reader is instinctively bored by a fight, you can’t convince them it was exciting by describing more of it.

2. Pace is everything

The cliffs were very close behind him now. Inigo continued to retreat; the man in black continued advancing. Then Inigo countered with the Thibault. And the man in black blocked it.

Each sentence is short, the written equivalent of a sudden move. Every time a new person takes an action in this passage, Goldman starts a new line, making the reader encounter each attack as a sudden, vital event.

3. Perspective defines experience

Instead of looking who had pushed him, Fletch tried to save himself from falling. The edge of the parade route’s pavement shot out from under him. Someone pushed him again. He fell to the right, into the parade. A foot came up from the pavement and kicked him in the face.

The writing, and thus the reader’s experience of events, conforms to Fletch’s experience: the attempt to right himself interrupted by sudden acts of violence. You can also write to match the perspective of the attacker: there’s something especially brutal about a villain methodically taking an opponent apart.

The opposite can also be true

4. verbs not adverbs (and avoid passive voice), why the passive voice won’t work, 5. sensory information is relatable.

He pulled him to his feet, almost tearing the collar… He heard the slight rasp of material ripping.

6. Make the result clear

I asked Tyler what he wanted me to do. Tyler said, “I want you to hit me as hard as you can.”

Two screens into my demo to Microsoft, I taste blood… My boss doesn’t know the material, but he won’t let me run the demo with a black eye and half my face swollen from the stitches in my cheek.

7. Context is key

Your fight scene as an action scene, fight for your write, bronwyn hemus, 79 thoughts on “7 ways to write a damn good fight scene”.

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WRITERS HELPING WRITERS®

Helping writers become bestselling authors

How To Accurately Write About Your Character’s Pain

February 9, 2017 by ANGELA ACKERMAN

The best thing about this online world of ours is you never know who you are going to meet. I don’t know about you, but one of the areas I struggle with is writing a character’s pain in a way that is raw, realistic…but not just “one-note.” So when I crossed paths with a paramedic-turned-writer, I got a little excited. And when she said she’d share her brain with us about the experience of pain, and how to write it authentically, I got A LOT excited. Read on, and make sure to visit Aunt Scripty’s links at the end. Her blog is full of more great medical info for writers.

Writing About Pain (Without Putting your Readers in Agony)

Pain is a fundamental part of the human experience, which means that it’s a fundamental part of storytelling. It’s the root of some of our best metaphors, our most elegant writing. Characters in fiction suffer, because their suffering mirrors our own.

In good writing, physical suffering often mirrors emotional suffering. It heightens drama, raises the stakes, adds yet another hurdle for our hero to jump before they reach their glorious climax.

So why can reading about pain be so boring?

Consider the following (made-up) example:

The pain shot up her arm like fire. She cringed. It exploded in her head with a blinding whiteness. It made her dizzy. It made her reel. The pain was like needles that had been dipped in alcohol had been jammed through her skin, like her arm had been replaced with ice and electricity wired straight into her spine.

For your characters, at its worst the pain can be all-consuming.  For your readers, though, it can become a grind. Let’s be honest, you gave up reading that paragraph by the third sentence.

In another story, a character breaks his ribs in one scene, then has, uhhh, intimate moments with his Special Someone in the next. Where did the agony go‽

There’s a fine line to walk between forgetting your character’s pain, elucidating it, and over-describing it.

So I’m here today to give you a pain scale to work with, and provide some pointers on how to keep in mind a character’s injuries without turning off your readers.

How Much Does It Hurt? A Pain Scale for Writers

Minor/Mild: This is pain that your character notices but doesn’t distract them. Consider words like pinch, sting, smart, stiffness .

Moderate: This is pain that distracts your character but doesn’t truly stop them. Consider words like ache, throb, distress, flare .

Severe: This is pain your character can’t ignore. It will stop them from doing much of anything. Consider words like agony, anguish, suffering, throes, torment, stabbing .

Obliterating: This is the kind of pain that prohibits anything else except being in pain (and doing anything to alleviate it). Consider words like ripping, tearing, writhing .

Metaphors, of course, are going to play somewhere on this spectrum, but I would suggest picking one level of pain and targeting it. For instance, don’t  mix stinging with searing when finding a metaphor to build.

How Often Should We Remind Readers of a Character’s Pain?

Most pain that matters in fiction isn’t a one-and-done kind of a deal. A gunshot wound should burn and itch and ache as it heals. A broken bone should send a jarring blast of lightning into the brain if that bone is jostled or hit.

Injuries need to have consequences. Otherwise, what’s the point?

There are three main ways to remind a reader of your character’s suffering: show them suffering, show them working around their suffering, and a third, more advanced, technique that I’ll mention in a moment.

If you want to show their pain, the easiest way is to tell : “her shoulder ached”; “she rubbed her aching shoulder”; “she rolled her shoulder subconsciously, trying to work out the aching stiffness” all convey what we want.

For frequency, try to limit those mentions to once per scene at the most, and perhaps as rarely as once per chapter.

However, we can choose something closer to the show route, by watching the character work around their injuries: “she opened the door awkwardly with her left hand to avoid the burn on her right”; “she led each step on the staircase with her good leg”; “Martin fiddled with his sling irritably”. That can be a little more frequent. It’s a reminder, but it’s also a small challenge that they’re solving before your very eyes. Huzzah!

For a breakdown of possible conflict scenarios that can lead to your character experiencing pain, go here .

One Final Technique: The Transmission of Agony

My best friend is a paramedic. She’s also had spinal fusion, has multiple slipped discs, and takes a boatload of pain medication. And yet I can see how much pain she’s in when we work together by the way she walks, talks, and carries herself.

Her pain isn’t constant. It changes . It ebbs and flows like the tide. It can be debilitating in one minute, bearable the next. So, too, can the agony of your characters:

“The agony had faded to a dull throb.”

“The pain in my shoulder ramped up the from stiffness all the way to searing, blinding agony faster than I could blink.” 

“ And, just when the pain was at its worst, it dissipated, like fog off some terrible lake .”

Go forth. Inflict suffering and woe upon your characters!

If I can offer one more piece of wisdom, it’s this: research the injury inflicted upon your character. At the very least, try to get a grasp on what their recovery might look like. It will add a level of realism to your writing that you simply can’t fake without it, and remind you that they should stay injured beyond the length of a scene.

Looking for a deep dive on pain, and how to describe minor, major, mortal, invisible injuries and more? This series on How to Write About Pain is a huge help.

Aunt Scripty is a veteran paramedic and author of the ScriptMedic blog at scriptmedicblog.com . In just three short months, her blog has attracted several thousand followers and accidentally started a writing advice blog revolution on Tumblr .

She lives in an undisclosed location with her beautiful wife and imaginary pibble, Steve, and can be found @scriptmedic on Twitter. If you’re not careful, she’ll sneak up on you in a dark alleyway and give you a free ebook .

TIP: To describe a character’s pain, visit this descriptive database :

Angela is a writing coach, international speaker, and bestselling author who loves to travel, teach, empower writers, and pay-it-forward. She also is a founder of One Stop For Writers , a portal to powerful, innovative tools to help writers elevate their storytelling.

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Reader Interactions

October 4, 2021 at 7:08 am

This post is so timely! One of my MC’s suffers with chronic pain from an automobile accident, and I am portraying him using several ways to alleviate it, such as opiates, alcohol, weed. He also has manic depression. Can you direct me to specific resources regarding how such a person “rehabs’? I have him entering a holistic facility, but I’m also wrestling with whether he can ever come off the other stuff completely. Because, they work, even if temporarily. I feel like pain mgt is so poorly understood and not done well for most folks. And the judgment! I have a pharmacist friend who was loathsome of people desperate to get their opiate scripts filled, calling them “street trash.” Any help portraying my guy accurately “healing” would be most appreciated!

October 4, 2021 at 10:20 am

Hi, Ellen. I’m so glad this resource is helping you with your WIP. It sounds like you’re got a good handle on exactly what your character is suffering with, which is important for getting the information you need. To find that information, I would suggest speaking with a doctor. You can talk to your own physician the next time you go in or even put out a call on social media for doctors or nurses who might be willing to answer a few questions about your character’s situation. I’ve found that people love talking about what they do and their areas of specialty and as long as you’re respectful of their time, you can usually get a professional’s feedback for free.

Best of luck to you!

March 10, 2021 at 10:19 am

Ok so my character is being tortured and she got kicked HARD in the chest but I can’t find a good verb to describe how she went back. I also can’t find a way to describe the pain she felt.

November 29, 2021 at 3:45 pm

Probably start with her not recognizing the pain because of the Adrenaline and then explain how the pain escalates… “The pain exploded in her stomach; the dull ache turned into a searing pain” Just some stuff I’ve seen authors do.

March 1, 2021 at 5:16 pm

I have a character that is badly beaten, (injuries consist of the standard bruises and cuts, she has a rather large gash over one eye, and has also been flogged. she has managed to escape her captors only to loose her footing in a pothole and fall to the ground, she cracks a rib in the process.) she is fortunate that a passer by finds her and takes the time out to clean her up ( he is a surgeon) my issue is describing the wounds as he treats her injuries. I’m trying not to put to much description here at this point as she feigns amnesia and he counters her lies with her injuries. i don’t want to repeat myself if that makes sense.

Many thanks in advance.

February 3, 2021 at 2:30 am

My Character is being hunted by a man and finds out that its the same man that killed her mother. How do I describe the pain that this will cause her to feel?

February 4, 2021 at 2:32 am

Now, I’m not a therapist, and what you’re talking about is an emotional wound more than anything. But you’re probably going to want to start with the processing of shock; denial and numbness to kick things off, as the brain struggles to even process the information Next, this is going to rip open any hurts surrounding that loss, which I’d expect she never got proper closure for in the first place if he’s still at large to keep hurting her/her family; that’ll mean a reliving of the grief, and whatever predominant emotions she has left around it (was she mainly angry at the loss? Did she blame the killer more, or did someone else’s choices put her mother in the killer’s path? Was she left lost and confused, did she feel trapped, were there any things she used to find pleasure in that lost their joy due to associations following the event?) your character’s primary coping mechanism? (Everyone has them, don’t lie.) Does she throw herself into projects looking for distractions? Does she get angry and lash out? Does she hide her hurts away from the world? Depending on how she’d normally handle such a horrifying discovery, the knowledge someone’s actively out to get her might deny her that small comfort, which will exasperate the issue even further. Finally, does she know what this killer wants? Do you? Why is he specifically after her? Why did he kill her mother? Can she hide in a crowd, or will reaching out put the people she cares about in danger? These questions should help you identify the TYPE of pain she’ll be feeling (boiling anger might keep the actual hurt at bay until the problem is dealt with, while self-imposed/protective loneliness can drive someone into a depressive spiral) from whence physical descriptions can be relatively easily found by looking up psych studies or other advice articles. (To stick with those two examples, anger is hot, clouds in the head and fists, can induce very similar symptoms of crying such as a tight throat or burning eyes; meanwhile, that kind of loneliness tends to be cold and clear-eyed, hard to choose but frightfully easy to maintain with a forced smile and a quick deflection, and leaves you feeling listless and hopeless while struggling alone.) It comes down really heavily to the type of person your character is, how she copes with adversity and how she copes with loss. No one but you is deep enough in her head to really know what kind of reaction this’ll induce in her, so no one but you can know what kind of reaction you should be describing. I’ve never been in the situation you’re describing, but I’ve dealt with several intentional deaths before (mostly suicides,) and looking around the room for weeks after the fact, not one person was processing the same emotions at any given point in time. Death and grief are messy, even more so when death and/or pain were the intended outcome of the events. And beyond the simple fear for one’s own life (which once again, everyone would deal with differently; both actually trigger fight-flight-freeze in us, grief just takes a brief stop at “oh shit, I feel vulnerable” before turning INTO fear on the way) those are the associated emotions she will have with this man.

February 4, 2021 at 9:06 am

I think MSF has answered your question nicely, Aldre. It truly does depend on the person (their personality, backstory, support system, what other difficulties they’re dealing with, etc.), since different people respond to the same wounding event differently. So doing the background work on your character to really get to know them is super important in figuring out their response.

January 1, 2021 at 3:40 pm

quick Q: how would one care for a stab wound to the left side of the abdomen, directly under the ribs? its a classic fantasy setting, taking place in approximately the middle of the medieval age, and it is a healer treating them, i’m just not sure what exactly he would do, and other websites aren’t the most useful at the moment. thanks:)

January 2, 2021 at 10:56 am

You might want to visit Scriptmedic’s site listed in the post as she has many different scenarios at her site which might help answer this question. 😉

January 3, 2021 at 2:13 am

thank you:)

November 3, 2020 at 6:55 am

my characters have all gone through something that has changed them , the way they think , the way they do things and their judgment in general. but what I’m basically struggling to do is tell their stories in a way that relates to what the story is about which based on what my characters went through that caused them pain and in a way that will convince readers to want to continue reading and continue to want to get the readers to want to get to know each character better

October 17, 2020 at 8:14 pm

I’m writing a story that sets the “Snow White” fairy tale in the modern world and in my version, she eats a candy apple laced with a paralytic drug. What should the actress be displaying upon ingesting it?

October 19, 2020 at 8:29 am

Hi, Marie. It’s good that you’re looking for ways to write this response accurately, since we always want our stories to read as realistic and authentic to readers. I’m unschooled in paralytic drugs and their effects, so you’ll need to research this. A Google search can get you started and help you find some credible sources. You also could talk to doctors own nurses who may be able to give you some good information. Good luck with your story!

June 21, 2020 at 10:09 pm

Here’s a problem I’ve run into:

Character A has been seriously injured in a hostile environment. Character B —a setting-appropriate medic/healer— discovers A and attempts to save A’s life. Functionally, this is a non-combative action scene (a short but vital moment, every choice and instinct raised to the highest stakes, no time/ability to get outside help, this is where the music-director in a movie puts the really intense bits of the score, etc) BUT as a writer, I now have to convey A’s injuries and B’s emergency examination/assessment, how/why this is such a big deal, the moment B chooses (consciously or not) to attempt to save A despite any/all risks, and at least a PORTION of how that treatment is applied, since, you know, the fight to save A’s life is the meat of the scene… without killing the pacing by stopping dead and becoming a textbook. Cutting away to A’s recovery, I’ve found, is good for building up B’s mysteriousness, but risks downplaying the injuries and leaving the audience confused about their repercussions (especially if B tries to comfort A by obfuscating just how serious it was.) Showing B’s struggle to save A’s life is a great character-defining moment for B and gives payoff to the initial trauma, but risks descending into jargon if the steps aren’t explained. Describing A’s injuries in detail really conveys the serious danger A is in, but also brings the momentum to a shrieking halt; keeping the injuries vague once again risks downplaying/confusion.

No one on the internet has written about this problem that I can find; it’s either advice on writing fight scenes, advice on writing injuries (even though emergency treatment is part of dealing with that, right?), or advice on writing actual medical documents.

Challenge modes include: • A is unconscious [and cannot contribute dialogue.] • A and B have never met [this is a character introduction scene.] • B’s healing abilities are beyond current science (either magical or tech,) and have their limits established/reinforced by this scene. [The audience must understand some basic rules of this ability by the end of the scene.] • Scene is from B’s perspective, [meaning B has experience/context the audience might not.] • This is one of your opening scenes, [so you don’t have much time for setting up context before it starts.]

BONUS ROUND! • Be a dumbass like me, and use all challenge modes at once! …Someone please help me…

May 13, 2020 at 10:03 pm

How would you describe someone being in pain because someone they loved was hurting? I am basically transcribing a TV show for my blog/website and one character is being forced to listen to her grandmother dying (On tape) at the hands of a sadistic “Angel of death” They are both handcuffed to a poll so he’s frustrated he can’t physically save her and he’s screaming to get the guy to stop because he’s torturing the woman he loves and he can’t stop him. He just screamed for the angel of death to stop and my heart skipped a beat. It was just well done. He’s trying to get out of his handcuffs. I am not a writer, at all. I usually just transcribe and post screencaps but because this scene would be difficult to do that I am trying to describe what is going on and I don’t have the talent for that.lol Thanks 🙂

May 4, 2020 at 3:33 pm

My character is an animatronic. He’s been captured and tortured by being destroyed and he barely has enough strength to stay conscious. How can I describe his pain?

Sorry if this isn’t a very good question.

May 7, 2020 at 7:28 pm

I would say something along the lines where he could feel his metal structure being torn apart slowly. He probably would have dents in his structure if his body if fully metal. If he has fur/skin/feathers etc with blood and bodily organs like living animals, I would take notice on blood seeping out of wounds, as well as bruises. I’m not the best with animatronics hope this helped fellow writer 😀

November 3, 2020 at 6:33 pm

Thank you! Yes, this helped a bunch!

(Sorry for the late reply-)

March 17, 2020 at 2:52 am

How should I describe someone falling on their back?

March 20, 2020 at 1:04 am

We talking falling from a height?

I’d say winded, it would probably take a few seconds to catch their breath again. Seeing as it’s sorta a heavy feeling of a “Thunk” I would try not so much to describe the pain, but get the reader to relate maybe by describing how hard the surface is so that the reader can infer by their own experience that it hurt. Describe it to make the reader feel uncomfortable or want to rub their back at the thought of it.

You could say that the pain is sudden and maybe include a whip lash effect of their head throwing back and how it pulls up from their shoulders in sudden pain. Maybe some teeth jitters from the head trowed back.

I don’t know that’s a hard one.

February 11, 2020 at 1:58 pm

So in my story there are two times that my main protagonist experiences physical pain. The first would be closer to a physical attack; punched, kicked, the whole nine yards that could be classified as physical abuse. As for the 2nd time, it’s a split second decision as she runs over towards someone to protect them from harm and in turn my protagonist ends up getting stabbed through the chest. I’m having a bit of a hard time describing the sensation from the protagonist’s perspective during the 2nd time of being injured.

March 20, 2020 at 12:52 am

Hello there! I’m quite young and I’m only really here for help with a school thing. I have had personal experience with shock like situations and nerve damage so I figured I would give you some pointers.

Shock is really strange and it honestly takes a lot longer then you would think for your brain to process the situation. Seeing as it’s a split second situation I see this coming into play. Before you understand the full situation you tend to try and move around or look to see what happened to the best of your ability because your body is going through completely unfamiliar sensations. Attempting to move only to then find a sudden pain or you are unable to move as a whole.

As for pain my situation was directly nerve based. Lot’s of numbness and stinging, think someone hammering your funny bone except it shoots throughout your whole body. Seeing as it’s in the chest I would turn to throbbing pain of her heartbeat. The sharp pain comes afterwards when it sinks in and you try your best to move. Shaking is also very important. Think adrenaline and anxiety, your body goes into shock so the thought process isn’t too great. Not a lot of speaking either, it’s hard to make up any sort of conversation.

Passing out because of pain isn’t uncommon either, even more so at the sight of their own blood.

When I was going through shock I asked a bystander to tell me a story to try and distracted myself from the sharp tingly pain and the muscle spasms. Don’t know if any of that helps but I figured I’d say it anyways

January 29, 2020 at 11:27 pm

This was some really helpful information to know! It did help me cover with the light stuff, but I was wondering for times where the scenarios get really gory?

As if the character were to get stabbed, how should it be expressed?

Also, how would it be like if the character just woke up from a coma?

Last question! Do you have a separate page for writing out battle scenes?

November 9, 2019 at 4:42 am

How can I show pain from burning? Like someone was forced to literary walk on fire. I don’t know how to show it to readers. Help please!!!

November 9, 2019 at 12:44 pm

Tara, have a look here: http://www.scriptmedicblog.com/?s=burns

September 10, 2019 at 11:47 am

In my story i am the 1st person and someone is paralyzed because if my ignorance and now he is in the hospital so how should i write that i am in utter despair and agony. And i want him to forgive me. Can you pls help i want a really nice description on that😊

September 10, 2019 at 11:51 am

And yeah i want a description on inner and spiritual pain but not on physical pain. I would really appreciate if someone help me! Thanks

September 10, 2019 at 11:54 am

what you’re looking for is the Emotional Wound Thesaurus: https://writershelpingwriters.net/the-emotional-wound-thesaurus-a-writers-guide-to-psychological-trauma/

September 10, 2019 at 11:57 am

Hi there, as I mentioned in the other comment, you’ll want to dig into the character’s emotional wounds and think about how their behavior will be unique to the character and the situation they are in. The Emotional Wound thesaurus can help with that. For setting description, you’ll want to look at the Urban Setting Thesaurus where it contains different hospital settings and the sensory description to go with them so your setting seems realistic. (Sorry, I wasn’t sure which area of description you meant you were struggling with here.)

April 23, 2019 at 10:23 am

What is the body language of someone in extreme pain?

One of the characters in my work is, for a bunch of reasons: mute. The only way that she can communicate with my POV character is through actions and body language. She’s been injured so badly that, if not for magic she would be dead in seconds, but she’s conscious, unable to scream.

I’ve described her injuries (with words like ‘mangled’ and ‘twisted’, and descriptions of shards of bone poking out where her knees should be), but I really want to hammer home the nightmarish nature of her situation. Magic is involved, healing magic in the setting is not simple or even kind.

April 23, 2019 at 10:37 am

Hi Steve, One of the Amplifiers in our ebooklet, Emotion Amplifiers is “Pain.” That might help you? https://writershelpingwriters.net/emotion-amplifiers/

January 27, 2019 at 9:45 pm

Thank you so much! This was very helpful but am wondering about how to write about an infection?

January 28, 2019 at 9:15 am

Ryan, I would advise you to do some research on the kind of infection so you’ll know what it looks like and how the character will physically respond. You could also talk to medical practitioners for practical information. Best of luck!

January 28, 2019 at 11:48 am

Also, if you go to the site of this guest poster, you’ll see she had more articles on different types of injuries and how to write them, so I would be shocked if she didn’t have something on infections. Just poke around and I’m sure you’ll find some help there. 🙂

January 1, 2019 at 9:18 pm

I have write a character who as cut their feet on rocks and branches. Luckily I have not experienced that first hand, but that makes it hard to write about.

The character is running away for danger and can’t stop to address his injury. I really don’t know how to describe how that feels, and what it does to the body.

Do you think you could help me with some descriptive words?

I would appreciate it,

Cheers, Bella

November 5, 2018 at 2:29 pm

How do describe a flying elbow to the stomach?

November 5, 2018 at 3:07 pm

Hi, Hayden. While I’m thankful this has never happened to me, it unfortunately doesn’t give me any reference for answering your question. But I do remember times when I’ve had the wind knocked out of me and when I have been knocked painfully by someone else. You’ve probably experienced these things too; use those memories to write about how it would feel. Think about things like localized pain, but what other physical sensations it may trigger, like nausea, losing one’s breath, or what happens to the person if the impact causes additional pain, such as them falling down or stumbling backward and hitting their head, etc.

August 8, 2018 at 11:05 pm

My character fell on his face. Not scraping his palms, just his face.

June 23, 2018 at 11:34 am

How would you write a character who is unable to feel pain? (Or hunger, thirst, tiredness, etc.) This is not congenital insensitivity, this is a light fantasy setting where this is paired with moderately increased endurance as a power/mutation. The character in question is a 12 year old girl.

November 5, 2018 at 3:12 pm

Hi, Georgia. I’m sorry, but I’m just now seeing your comment here. For this, you’ll have to show, through the character’s response, that they’re not feeling pain, and whether or not this is normal for her. For instance, you could show her being knocked down, getting up and dusting herself off, and her fingers coming away bloody. Maybe she’s gashed her leg or impaled it on something, and she didn’t notice. And now that she does, she doesn’t respond normally. Maybe she treats it like an inconvenience, bandaging it up or yanking out the offending shard of glass, then trotting off without a limp. Or maybe she consciously affects a limp because she knows that would be normal with such an injury and she wants to avoid notice. Maybe she mentally recalls that a year ago, this would have hurt like you know what, and that’s how her mutation is a blessing in disguise. The important thing here is to know your character’s state of mind regarding her mutation and having her respond accordingly so it doesn’t come off as unrealistic or explanatory to the reader. I hope I’m not too late and you’re able to use this information.

March 18, 2018 at 5:59 pm

How can I describe a knife across the face?

March 19, 2018 at 8:28 am

Hi, James. I’m afraid you’ll have to do some research on this since I’ve had no experience here. Think about times when you’ve experienced a wound to the face, or a cutting wound and apply that knowledge to your character’s situation. You may even be able to Google the question and find some information. Best of luck!

February 25, 2018 at 9:56 pm

I love causing pain to characters (but don’t do it for no reason) and I legitimately could not stop grinning unless I covered my mouth with my hand……. There’s something wrong with me. Anyway, THANK YOU for this, it’s super helpful!

November 22, 2017 at 2:32 pm

My character has a knife slash across her face. She also lives on the streets after fleeing the hospital. Expert your article helped me with: The voices blurred together, mixing into a haze through the pain as they got her to the hospital. She had gotten the impression that a simple cut would have less medical needs. Looking back on it, Ellen thought she was overwhelmed by it all. She was in searing pain, the force of it ripping through her mind like a bomb, after all.

February 17, 2017 at 4:33 pm

So helpful and timely! Thank you!

February 10, 2017 at 4:05 pm

I love this article!! I have a question. I have an alpha male hero who is an amputee. He’s been through therapy and it’s been about four years since he lost his leg. My question involves phantom pain that I’ve read a lot about with amputees. How bad does this kind of pain get in relation to your Mild, Moderate or Severe pain? I have the scene where when he wakes up and it’s throbbing and it’s swollen so he can’t put on his prothesis. I read this in another book. Is that accurate? I have him taking some pain meds. How long does it take before the pain goes away approximately? I mention that he’s been using accpuncture for the pain as well with some success. Is this even accurate??

Thanks, Janice

February 11, 2017 at 10:48 am

Hey Janice! Thanks for your question!

Phantom pain comes from a number of different causes, including damage or pressure on a nerve, especially if scar tissue is putting pressure on it.

While I’m certainly not a pain management specialist, and nothing here is to be considered medical advice — my disclaimer is here ( http://www.scriptmedicblog.com/disclaimer ) — I have a couple of great resources to send you.

The first is an article from the Amputee Coalition, talking about pain and possible treatments, here: http://www.amputee-coalition.org/limb-loss-resource-center/resources-for-pain-management/managing-phantom-pain/

WebMD has a fairly decent article here: http://www.webmd.com/pain-management/guide/phantom-limb-pain#1-4

And Mayo Clinic, my personal favorite resource on the whole wide Webiverse, has a great article here: http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/phantom-pain/basics/treatment/con-20023268

It seems, from reading these sources, that a combination of medical therapy (including opioids like Vicodin / hydrocodone or Percocet / oxycodone, anticonvulsants such as Neurontin / gabapentin or Lyrica / pregabalin, or tricyclic antidepressants including amitryptaline or tramadol) and non-medical therapy (such as mirror box, applied heat, massage, and, yes, accupuncture etc of the affected leg).

You might think seizure medication or antidepressants are a strange thing to give for phantom limb pain, but they interrupt the way neuropathic pain signals are transmitted and received in the brain. Science: It’s Kinda Neat Sometimes, Huh? (TM).

There’s a GREAT TED talk that, among other things, touches on mirror box therapy here: http://www.ted.com/talks/vilayanur_ramachandran_on_your_mind?language=en

(It helps that that guy has one of the best accents I’ve ever heard in my whole life, by the way, and the talk is fascinating even before dealing with this.)

As to how bad the pain gets, I think that’s up to you to decide, though I’ve heard it *can* be severe; however, he’s been dealing with this for four years now.

Swelling of the stump is certainly possible. In fact, after an amputation, it takes weeks for the swelling to go down enough to even fit an amputee for a prosthesis! This far along it may be irritated skin, or your character may have developed an infection in the site. But just like any area, irritation breeds swelling, itching, and pain.

I hope this was useful! I’d say you’re already headed down the right track, and I would personally like to say I would LOVE to see more amputee heroes in fiction!

Best of luck with your tale.

xoxo, Aunt Scripty

February 10, 2017 at 11:34 am

Excellent post. Thank you Angela for sharing. Like you books, too.

February 9, 2017 at 8:06 pm

This is wonderful information! I find when I write about pain that I fall into the problem of trying to over share the pain of my character. When I go back to read it, I stop reading after the first two sentences (like in the example here). Thank you for sharing this! I appreciate the different levels of pain and the descriptive words to help illustrate them.

Cheers, Jen

February 10, 2017 at 12:10 am

Hi Jennifer! I’m so glad you found it helpful! I know in my own writing I’ve tended toward over-emphasizing pain, especially too early in the story.

One thing I didn’t get a chance to discuss is the idea of ramping up the pain — backing off on descriptions early so that you can maximize them later and not have it be repetitive. It’s the difference between a low-level ache in the shoulder when your character gets out of bed and the ripping, tearing agony when they tear their rotator cuff at the worst possible moment in the story. It’s not always appropriate, but in general, ramping up your character’s pain to mirror scene tension can be an excellent tool if done well.

Good luck with your stories!!

February 9, 2017 at 5:12 pm

Very informative particle. Thank you for sharing.

February 9, 2017 at 11:16 am

Thank you for addressing this problem! It’s very useful information.

February 9, 2017 at 10:41 am

Hey Angela! I just wanted to say thanks so much for having me on the blog, and I hope this post has been helpful for your readers. It’s great to appear on such a fantastic blog!

February 9, 2017 at 1:35 pm

So glad to have you. This info is a great help to many writers. 🙂

February 9, 2017 at 9:48 am

Hi Angela: Thank you so much for Posting and for sharing Aunt Scripty’s Post and website. I’ve signed up for her Newsletter and look forward to using the Resources that she offers.

February 9, 2017 at 7:23 am

Wonderful information and ideas.

[…] Resources:How To Accurately Write About Your Character’s Pain10 Methods to Make Your Character […]

[…] writers find pain difficult to write about, at the risk of downplaying their characters’ pain. However, unless some plot device in the […]

[…] Resources: How To Accurately Write About Your Character’s Pain 10 Methods to Make Your Character […]

[…] there! This is a part of a series on pain and suffering in writing. Part 1 of the series, Writing About Pain (Without Putting Your Readers in Agony), appeared on the eminent and excellent blog WritersHelpingWriters. Thanks again to Angela for […]

[…] How To Accurately Write About Your Character’s Pain – WRITERS HELPING WRITERS® […]

[…] Check out Writing About Pain (Without Putting Your Readers in Agony) here! […]

How to Get Violence Right in Your Fiction

Today’s guest post is by Fred Johnson ( @fredbobjohn ), an editor with  Standout Books .

For new writers, throwing in a few combat scenes can seem like an easy way to add some excitement to a novel, but the reality is that violence can be incredibly difficult to pull off effectively.

There are many pitfalls writers will fall into when writing about violence—I want to talk about what they are and how you can avoid them. In their places, I’ve offered up two main alternative methods that I think work for ninety percent of combat scenes.

Violence: The Detailed Method

If you’re writing a fight or battle scene in genre fiction, detailed description will be the way to go nine times out of ten. This is because a fight scene of any scale and duration is likely to involve two or more people tied up in an incredibly fast-paced and complex process. Detailed description serves to guide the reader through the confusion and helps your readers suspend their disbelief.

Some of the worst combat scenes I’ve ever edited have read along the lines of:

“Bob disarmed the guard and killed the seven men behind him.”

What? How did he do that? He’s a single guy against eight assailants! Did he click his fingers and they all dropped dead?

Don’t be like the author of Bob’s brief fight—you need to make your readers believe it’s possible that your James Bond-esque hero shot his way through two hundred trained henchmen, despite what their brains are telling them.

Combat needs to be specific and it needs to be rooted in concrete actions. This is doubly true if it’s a case of an underdog protagonist surmounting impossible numbers—after all, for the reader to stay immersed in your book’s story, they need to be able to believe the story’s events. If those events are too preposterous, that’s it—you’ve lost your readers.

Take, for example, this scene from fantasy writer David Gemmell’s White Wolf :

When the death blow came it was so sudden that many in the crowd missed it. Agasarsis lunged. Skilgannon met the attack, blocking the lunge and rolling his blade round the sabre of Agasarsis. The two men leapt back. Blood suddenly gushed from Agasarsis’s severed jugular. The champion tried to steady himself, but his legs gave way, and he fell to his knees before his killer. Servaj realized that, even as he parried, Skilgannon had flicked the point of his sabre across the throat of his opponent. Agasarsis pitched face forward to the earth.

Every movement and detail is picked apart here, slowed down, and recounted by a third-party spectator. The result is a climactic and vivid end to an important encounter.

It’s for the same reason that action movies favor slow-motion effects and sharp editing—the incredibly complex and unlikely actions presented need to be slowed down and examined to be believed. Imagine if, in The Matrix , Neo and Trinity simply arrived to rescue Morpheus and told him “Oh yes, we killed those fifty guardsmen downstairs. No sweat.” No—we need to see it to believe it. And this is much the same for books.

Violence: The Implicit Method

The alternative method to writing good violence only works in certain situations, and is favored in literary fiction and detective novels. The method operates around what is left unsaid; consider Myrtle’s death in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s enormously popular novel The Great Gatsby :

A moment later she rushed out into the dusk, waving her hands and shouting—before he could move from his door the business was over. The “death car” as the newspapers called it, didn’t stop; it came out of the gathering darkness, wavered tragically for a moment, and then disappeared around the next bend.

The precise moment of Myrtle’s death is lost here—we don’t see the impact or hear the scream, and yet we know with terrible certainty that Myrtle is dead. This kind of quiet violence gains power through how understated it is, and is totally reliant upon the power of context. When attempting an implied moment of violence yourself, your prose has to boil over. You’ll want short, punchy sentences and resonant concrete images. For example, this fight between two antagonists is from a fantasy novel I edited recently:

The final blow struck Samson hard in the chest. He reeled back, his knees trembling like aspens before giving way beneath him. The hooded woman watched him fall, saw his eyes widen. Slowly, she drew the long dirk from her boot and ran her finger along its edge. “You’re in for a long night,” she said softly.

It’s the equivalent of when, in a movie, the door swings closed on the man bound to the chair in the mafia den. The scene cuts off, and although we don’t see anything, we all know bad things are happening.

So there we have it. Now, reducing good violence down to two alternative rules might seem rather limiting–I have, after all, suggested either spelling everything out in candid, straightforward language or giving the reader just enough so that she/he can work out what’s going to happen. It could be said that I haven’t left much room for any middle ground.

But, of course, great writers will always find ways to flout these rules and guidelines, so don’t feel like you have to limit yourself–writing is an art, not an exact science, and there’s always room for experimentation. That said, to break the rules, you have to first be aware of them.

Now get out there and give your characters the violent triumphs they deserve.

Fred Johnson is an editor for Standout Books , where he helps authors take their manuscripts from good to perfect. He also writes fiction and poetry, and can be found on Twitter at @FredBobJohn .

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[…] view post at https://janefriedman.com/get-violence-right-fiction/ […]

This is a much-needed essay. As one who has lived in and with violence as a combatant, I find that the vast majority of fictional violence is either ineptly gratuitous or, as William Manchester said, romantically understated.

Neither extreme works; ‘blood gushing’ is a term I hate to see, because that condition is part of the context of combat. To an outsider, it’s horrific, but to a combatant it’s a part of the scenery, and it can make tenuous one’s footing, one’s hold of a weapon. (Blood doesn’t gush, not really. It can flow smooth and thick, or spurt from an arterial laceration, and its predominant sensation to the fighter is its signature coppery-fecal smell. I hate that smell.)

Romantic understatement doesn’t work either, because combat is the most profanely overstated of actions. Every detail is magnified; the kick of an AK is always unexpectedly harsh, and the feeling of one’s knife striking bone is always jarring.

This is, however, from the perspective of one to whom violence is familiar. To those fortunate ones who have escaped its fell effects, what I might consider an accurate description would probably come off as oddly dispassionate, and focused on the strangest of things, like the way dust puffs off a man’s jacket when he’s shot. Those are the details that hold the eye, but I suspect they do not hold the reader’s imagination.

Hi Andrew, I’m glad you enjoyed the article. I certainly can’t speak from the perspective of someone who has experienced combat, so your insights are especially valuable and interesting. That said, I think you’re absolutely right about the magnification of detail–this is what makes violence so shocking, and is something writers need to pay special attention to replicating. I love your detached details–dust puffing from a jacket would make for a wonderful image in-text.

Very helpful. Thank you. On the creative writing course I did we analysed some passages from Hemingway and Dickens. But it is hard if you don’t really know what happens in a fight or when someone is beaten up, for example, as I have found in writing about domestic violence. A little help from my friends was needed in order to produce the kind of slow-motion detailed account you recommend.

Super helpful. Thank you!

You’re very welcome, I’m glad the post helped you out.

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How do I write a scene when a character wakes up from being unconscious?

Often I read about people waking up after being unconscious or asleep in a story. Some authors write the characters as being confused, and it taking a second to remember what was happening before. I'm wondering if this is a real reaction, or just a way to add details. Are there any other details can I add besides the environment around them?

• creative-writing

• 1 Highly related: Help with describing an unconscious character . –  Laurel ♦ Commented Jan 19, 2023 at 2:07

You can use it for characterization as well as storytelling.

I think one of the most important factors for how the character wakes up and what they do are who they are (personality, neuro divergence, habits, psychology, etc.) Another is what happened to them before.

It sometimes happens that when I wake up I'm in a limbo zone between sleep and wake, where the connection between my conscious and unconscious mind seems extra strong, and some thoughts I've had during this time have been very profound. Your readers will likely have had this experience as well and might put extra emphasis on what the character thinks during this time.

For instance, I'm a person that likes puns. I'm also a person that has problems with sleep. And time is also a problem. Oversleeping is not unheard of. So the morning the first thought through my head was "this will bend adly" was rather characterizing for me. (And yes, I made that backward talk up then an there... or rather, it felt like my unconscious did...) What I did after having that thought (laughed and wrote it down) is also pretty characterizing.

Showing how the character's morning routine looks is another way to characterize. Do they jump out of bed to do pushups while the coffee brews, do they moan and snooze the alarm or something in between?

Depending on how the character lost consciousness the reaction to waking up can be different. For instance, do they remember where they were when they lost consciousness? Are they waking up in an unusual place? Sometimes it can be enough to fall asleep "upside down" in bed to wake up really confused (that is also really characterizing, who does that?) You can get similar effects from forgetting you're in a hotel room and not at home.

I have no experience of waking up from surgery, but I've had surgery, so my guess is that one predominant experience after surgery might be pain first of all.

I've woken up from sleep after a night of drinking more than once and pain can be pretty high up there as well (though more of a headache). I guess you could have a blackout about going to bed and wake up confused, but otherwise, it pretty much works like regular sleep (+ possible headaches and dehydration).

Losing consciousness due to other reasons (crimes or accidents) might work like getting blackout drunk. It's pretty obvious that if you're a woman and, after a night at the bar, wake up on the floor in your apartment with no memory of how you got there, your wakeup is going to be harrowing at best.

At what point in the sleep cycle you wake up (deep sleep or REM sleep) can also have a profound impact on how clearheaded you are. If you wake up to an alarm and it's the same time every day, you're likely to be totally clear and aware as soon as you wake up (or even before the alarm goes off), even more so if you use a sleep app.

If, on the other hand, you're out of sync and get woken up during deep sleep, you could be very groggy and confused and need some extra time to figure out where you are. In extreme cases, I've felt like I was drunk. (i.e. so unstable I had to support myself against things to not trip—bouncing between the walls so to speak...)

I guess a final factor would be how urgent you need to visit the bathroom. You're not likely to spend much time smelling the roses if you're seeing yellow submarines...

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Stabbed or Scratched: How to Describe Pain in Writing

Think about the worst pain you’ve ever experienced. How would you have described it when you were in the moment? What did it feel like? Did it have a color and texture? Maybe even a sound or a smell? Did it make you perceive your world in different ways? Did you notice what was going on around you? 

Chances are, if you were in enough pain, you probably didn’t notice much beyond, “Wow, this hurts.” It might be after the fact when you start to think more about how pain affects the body and the mind. Although the weird thing about pain is the body is designed to forget it—otherwise no one would ever have more than one child–so it can be hard to recall what exactly it felt like. 

Incidentally, my worst pain was probably giving birth to my son. The epidural had worn off, and it was too late to do anything about it. He was coming, and it was time to push. All I can remember are bright lights, screaming (not sure if that was me or my husband), and a lot of people surrounding me because things weren’t going very well and my little guy was stuck. 

If I had to give it a color, it would have been white or light blue for the lights and uniforms of the medical personnel. If I were giving it a texture, I would say it was smooth, simply because everything was just passing me by like I was sliding through a tunnel until that moment of absolute relief when the worst of it ended with a healthy baby boy placed in my arms. 

When it comes to writing about the pain your characters experience, you need to walk a fine line between taking your reader along to feel that pain without beating them over the head with it (which would also be painful).

With all that in mind, let’s talk about how to describe pain in your writing. In this article, we’ll go over:

• Challenges of writing pain
• Tips for writing about pain
• A list of pain descriptions you can use in your writing

Challenges of Writing Pain

Of course, one of the challenges of writing about pain is that everyone experiences it differently. What might feel like off the charts pain for one person might just be another day in the life of someone who lives with a chronic illness. A splitting migraine for you might feel like a normal headache to your neighbor. 

We also express pain in different ways. Some people try to suppress it and pretend they’re absolutely fine, while others will make sure you know about every single ache and stitch they’re experiencing. Multiple times. And of course, there are the majority of people who will fall somewhere in between. 

The other challenge with writing pain is that it can feel like a real drag to read paragraphs of how much something hurts. 

Consider the following paragraph…

“She dragged herself up as needle-sharp bolts shot through her shoulder, her teeth clenching so hard her jaw ached. Her body trembled and sweat dripped down her forehead as she groaned. When she inhaled, another flash of pain had her seeing double as her head throbbed and her arm felt like it had been cut in two. She stumbled, clutching her flaring limb as her vision went dark and waves of agony seared through her body.”

OKAY, enough already. 

She hurts, we get it. 

You can see from that paragraph how easy it is to go from describing pain in your character to inflicting pain on your reader. It’s a fine line that, like anything, you can get better at with practice.

Tips for Writing About Pain

And of course, to help you out, we’ve got some tips to make it even easier to learn the intricacies of writing about pain. 

Consider the pain level

Not all pain is created equal and some will impact your life in large ways, while others will be nothing more than a minor inconvenience. You can divide your character’s pain into four categories:

• Mild/minor/low: This is the kind of pain that is a little annoying but doesn’t hamper you. A mild headache or a sore muscle. Use words like pinch, sting, stiff, sore. 
• Moderate/medium: This is a higher level of pain that doesn’t debilitate but still  distracts your character from a task or breaks their concentration. Here, you might use words like ache, throb, or flare. 
• Severe/high: This is a type of pain that prevents your character from doing pretty much anything. It’s the kind of pain that will have them laid up in bed. Consider words like anguish, stabbing, or torturous. 
• Obliterating/extreme: This, of course, is the kind of pain that will have your hero writhing on the ground, unable to think of anything else, even pushing away thoughts of how to actually stop it. Think of words like shredding, twisting, knifing, or ripping. Ouch. 

You can also consider the injury and what kinds of pain would result, such as:

• Getting stuck with a pointed object like a sword or tree branch: pricking, drilling, penetrating, stabbing, piercing
• Getting cut with an object like a blade or knife: slicing, cutting, lacerating, sharp
• Having something tear like a muscle or a joint: pulling, wrenching, tearing
• Getting crushed by something heavy like a stone or piece of a crumbling building: pressing, crushing, tight, squeezing, heavy
• Getting whipped or lashed by magic or a whip: whipping, searing, lashing, lacerating
• Getting burned by cold or hot things like fire or ice: scalding, burning, aching, tingling, freezing, numbing, scalding
• Getting attacked by some kind of magic or curse: cruel, vicious, torturing, twisting, writhing

Less is sometimes more

Remember above when we talked about how it can be a drag to read endless paragraphs about how much your character hurts? With that thought in mind, keep your descriptions tight and resist the urge to wax on for too long about it. 

Conversely, if your character just got shot or got a knife in the gut, don’t forget about the pain a moment later. A serious injury doesn’t just magically disappear (unless you’ve created your world that way) just because the action is picking up. Sprinkle in gentle reminders that the injury is still present and affecting your character’s ability to get to their goal. 

After the fact, don’t forget to also allude to it from time to time as they’re recovering. If they’ve been seriously injured, then they’re bound to feel pain as they heal, too. But as we’ve mentioned, keep it brief and treat it with a light hand. Just a mention here or there to weave it into the details with the rest of your story. 

Show, don’t tell

Oh man, not this again. But yes, with pain, this rule is even more important. Don’t tell us it hurts. Tell us what it feels like. If your character has just been stabbed, talk about how it feels like an iron hot poker has just been shoved through their gut. If they’re being crushed by a heavy object, talk about how they’re having trouble breathing. If they’re being tortured, talk about the way they’re trying to detach from the pain and send their mind into protection mode. 

Give your pain consequences

There should be a consequence for the pain, otherwise what’s the point of hurting your character? (There is one exception to this that I’ll talk about in a minute.) Think about what the pain prevents them from doing. If they’ve been stabbed, can they rescue the handsome prince from the tower? 

Think about how much you want pain to play a role in your story. Do you want your reader to believe your character might not make it? Using pain as a plot device is an effective way to drive up the stakes and is a great way to show that “end of the world” moment for your down-on-their luck character. 

Give your character chronic pain

Chronic pain is something many people live with and yet, we don’t tend to see it represented that often in books. Chronic pain can come in the form of a disease or disability, or something like chronic migraines. How you choose to portray that pain and what you do with it is up to you. 

I mentioned above that not all pain needs to serve a purpose, and this is where chronic pain comes in. It doesn’t need to stop the character from doing anything, but it can be used to show how it affects their life, simply because that’s how people sometimes live. And it definitely doesn’t need to be “cured.” In real life, it rarely is, so for a character to simply exist with this as a part of their day to day is perfectly fine.

In fact, the trope of “healing a disability” is one that’s fallen out of favor and can actually be considered problematic. If you do choose to write about chronic pain or disability, be sure to get yourself a sensitivity reader to ensure you aren’t leaning into negative stereotypes or harmful tropes. 

Research your ailments

Pain is one of those things you want to get right. While you can get away with a lot in fiction, especially if you write speculative fiction, pain and injury are pretty universal ideas. 

If one of your characters gets shot or knifed in the stomach in one scene and they’re making dinner plans and heading to the gym in the next, your readers are going to give you the side eye. 

Yes, it’s fiction and the pain tolerances of fictional characters can be different from real life people, but within limits. 

If you’re writing a fantasy creature that heals quickly, that might be one way to overcome an extreme injury. Or maybe you’re writing a thriller with a Jack Ryan-type hero who would never let a little bullet wound get in his way. 

But for most, breathing, living characters, getting their arm nearly hacked off is going to take them down. Make sure you’re exercising realistic limits of pain tolerance.

The blog Script Medic is a great place to start where a medical professional breaks down various injuries for writers. It’s a great way to get information without filling your search history with things the FBI might investigate you for.

Pain Descriptions

Here are some words and phrases to help you describe pain in writing. Obviously, this isn’t an exhaustive list, but this should help get you started:

• A pale complexion
• Arching of the back
• Avoiding others
• Begging to die
• Biting a bottom lip
• Blacking out
• Blotchy skin
• Blurred vision
• Body going into shock
• Calling for help or aid
• Clenched hands and limbs
• Clenching or grinding of teeth
• Dark hollows under the eyes
• Darkness in the corner of vision
• Dragging one foot
• Drinking excessive alcohol
• Drooping eyelids
• Eyes squeezed shut
• Flinching at contact
• Gingerly moving about
• Glassed over eyes
• Gripping another person for help
• Haggard expression
• Hands gripping clothing
• Hanging on to the wall or furniture for support
• Hunched shoulders
• Hyperventilation
• Impatient gestures
• Limp arms, legs, hands, or fingers
• Looking away
• Mouth hanging open
• Nostrils flaring
• Praying to gods of deities
• Repeating oneself
• Rocking or swaying back and forth
• Rubbing areas of pain
• Sawing breaths
• Short, panting breaths
• Shuddering breaths
• Standing still
• Starbursts or floaties in the eyes
• Stilted gait
• Sweat on the brow
• Taking medication
• Tapping the foot
• Taste of blood or copper in mouth
• Tears or wet eyes
• Tentative steps
• Tight muscles and limbs
• Walking stiffly
• Watering eyes

By now, you’re hopefully a bonafide expert on the art of writing pain. As with anything, make sure you’re reading lots of books where pain is described. It can help you see what works and, maybe more importantly, what doesn’t. If you’re reading a book and the character’s pain is starting to feel like a drag, then that’s a good sign the author has taken it too far. 

But if you find yourself aware of the pain, but not distracted by it, then that’s a sign they’ve done their job well. 

If you found this article useful, be sure to visit our growing database of articles at DabbleU . We’re adding new ones every week to help you become your best writing self. We even make it super easy for you and send you all our latest tips, advice, and tricks when you sign up for our weekly newsletter . 

Nisha J Tuli is a YA and adult fantasy and romance author who specializes in glitter-strewn settings and angst-filled kissing scenes. Give her a feisty heroine, a windswept castle, and a dash of true love and she’ll be lost in the pages forever. When Nisha isn’t writing, it’s probably because one of her two kids needs something (but she loves them anyway). After they’re finally asleep, she can be found curled up with her Kobo or knitting sweaters and scarves, perfect for surviving a Canadian winter.

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Whether you're trying to learn the craft of writing or find your way in the publishing business, it always helps to study those who have gone before. Here's how to do an author study that will inspire your own journey.

Kinda wish you didn't have to choose between genres when you write your next novel? Maybe you don't have to! Get to know hybrid genres and what it takes to write a great cross-genre story.

No matter how much we want to ignore it, successful authors need a website. But there's more to a good author website than just throwing up a few nice words and pictures of your book. If you do it right, it could be your most powerful marketing tool.

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• Dorian Martin
• Sep 17, 2020

Unconventional Tips for Writers in a Creative Crisis

Updated: Sep 12, 2022

A creative crisis, also known as a writer’s block , is a writer’s number one enemy. It can creep up in the worst moments, making it impossible to meet a deadline, hit your writing goals, or finish a piece of work. No matter what the reason is, it is always uncomfortable and hard to get out of.

A creative crisis is so damaging for writers because it increases the loudness of their inner critic. That’s a little voice inside their head that’s telling them they are not good enough and that their efforts are in vain. It’s very important to silence this voice so it doesn't become more deeply rooted in your writing process.

In this guide, we have prepared some of the most effective ways to beat the creative crisis and to get some of the best writing of your life done. But first, let’s take a look at common causes of a creative crisis among writers.

Inability to focus

If you have too many distractions, it might seem impossible to focus on a piece of paper or to let your mind float away to the world you're writing about. You might also have a specific issue that’s bothering you. Worrying about that one problem can be so overwhelming that you cannot focus on anything else. To tackle this, try focused meditation exercises. The goal is to take your mind off of current problems and learn to focus on one thing at a time.

Stress and burnout

This is the most common cause of a creative crisis. Unfortunately, in today’s world, it’s unavoidable. You will always have pressures and obligations from different sides and there will never be a “less stressful” time you should be waiting for. Rather, you should learn how to manage stress that happens on a daily basis.

Perfectionism and unrealistic expectations

This factor will make you cringe from even the thought of writing your first sentence. Once you actually write something, you will wildly edit and re-edit into infinity. This is a personality trait and it’s hard to say to someone to let go of it , but you definitely need to work on this issue if you want to solve a creative crisis.

Now, let’s take a look at some of the actions you can take to beat your creative crisis right now.

Reflection and meditation

If you’re avoiding facing the problem and you don’t want to think about what’s stopping you from writing, doing the exact opposite will actually be the most beneficial thing you can do. Avoidance is a very powerful coping mechanism. Once you start avoiding things, like writing, you will get a short-term sense of relief and relaxation, but your anxiety and stress will build up even more in the long run.

Online, you can find specialized guided meditations for writers who are stuck on a blank page:

Delilah Helton’s affirmations: use these daily affirmations videos to remind you why you write

Guided Hypnosis for Writer’s Block: we know, the word hypnosis sounds a little scary, but it’s actually just another term for extremely deep relaxation

Setting meditation: a visualization meditation for writers to help them imagine their story in a more vivid way

Start a reading journal

If you don’t already have a reading journal , it’s high time to start! This practice has a myriad of benefits for writers. While you’re reading the works of others, you are not only doing it for entertainment or to pass the time. You are doing it for your craft too. By writing down your thoughts and conclusions, you are learning about your reading materials much more deeply.

Melanie Sovann, writer and editor at BestWritingAdvisor , says “every writer should have a reading journal. Reading is just another component of writing. It teaches us what we like, what we can do better and differently.”

Do daily journaling

Personal journaling is another great way to get back into the habit of writing at times when you don’t really feel like it. Most of the time, in a creative crisis, we’re dreading approaching the text we are working on and thinking about. At the same time, we don’t have any issues writing messages to loved ones, creating short blog posts, or similar writing pieces. Journaling is the same.

If you are experiencing a creative crisis as a writer, pick up a personal journal and you will be amazed at how much you have to say. A self-esteem journal is another special piece of writing that will help you tackle your creative issues more easily in the long term. It helps to build confidence and reminds you why you love writing in the first place.

Try writing prompts

This is a well-known method for writers who are having a hard time starting their story. On the Internet, you can find lots of different creative writing prompts that can help you get those creative juices flowing.

If you don’t want a random prompt to meddle into your writing too much, just use it as an imagination and visualization technique. For example, you can use a random character name generator online to get you started. Then, you can begin imagining and writing down what they look like, how they behave, what they do, etc.

Use tools to help

In today’s times, it’s no shame to ask for help with a difficult situation. Creative blocks are no exceptions. In online discussions, you can find hundreds, if not thousands, of writers who are struggling with the same issue you are and find reassurance. At the same time, you can find tons of tools and services that aim to help struggling writers. Here are some you can try out:

This acronym stands for “National Novel Writing Month” and gathers thousands of writers who have a wish to finish their own novel. The trick is that they promise to do that in just one month. Luckily, there is a close-knit community there who is going through the very same struggles. If novel writing is your plan, NaNoWriMo will give you that much-needed boost.

Hemingway app

There are other grammar and spelling checkers available online, such as Grammarly and ProWritingAid, but Hemingway is much more writer-friendly. It focuses more on things that you might be interested in (readability, style, voice) and less in basic grammatical concepts. Hemingway feels like if you’ve given an English teacher your writing and you are listening to their feedback.

Writing Challenge

Writing Challenge is an awesome app designed specifically to help writers who are struggling with a creative crisis. Instead of a blank piece of paper, which can look horrifically scary when you’re amid a writer’s block, you will be able to gently tackle that issue in a game. Writing Challen give you prompts back-to-back with a time limit. Honestly, this is one of the best ways to start writing when you just want to go ahead and write anything.

The Brainstormer

This is another fantastic app that helps writers with story-building and world-building. This is perfect if you are feeling like writing, but don’t have satisfying material yet. This app will help you explore your ideas and associations, and really help you to reach the maximum highs of your creativity.

Change your environment

Routine can sometimes be a great help in writing regularly, but sometimes, it can hinder your creativity. When you are feeling stuck, bored, or in a rut, it’s a good idea to change your environment for a bit. You don’t have to go across the world to immerse yourself in a foreign culture, just take a short trip to get further away from the places and things you see every day.

Talking a simple walk around the block can also help tremendously.

There are other tiny aspects that can help. For example, if you're always writing from your work desk, try switching it up and writing from your kitchen table or the sofa in your living room. Even the slightest changes in environment can help you snap out of a creative crisis. Also, you should do this as often as possible, even before you start feeling an onset of a creative crisis.

Focus on organization and planning

In his famous bestseller When: The Scientific Secrets of Perfect Timing , Daniel Pink states the hypothesis that we all work on different internal clocks and that we should learn how to control these waves of energy and alertness to reach the optimal success in life.

In other words, he says that we should use our down-time (periods when we are not feeling especially motivated or inspired, like a creative crisis) to plan and organize our work. When you’re in the up-time, you should do the actual writing. Funnily enough, most of us use our highest energy times to make grandiose plans of what we are going to do later.

As you can see, there are lots of things you can do to boost your creativity and get out of your writing crisis. Initially, the first thing you should do is explore what is actually causing the problem. It is always much better to get to the root of the issue than to fix it as it comes – which will be increasingly frequent if you don’t explore what’s bothering you.

When you are going through a creative crisis with your writing, it’s best to step away from your primary work-in-progress (WIP) for a while. You don’t want to go deeper into resentment about that particular piece of writing and you want to be able to come back to it fresh and inspired. You can do this by taking a step back and doing some of the activities we talked about in this guide.

About the author: Dorian Martin is a writer, editor, and proofreader working with multiple companies. He provides dissertation help for PhD students who are struggling with their writing work. Dorian is interested in all components of the writing process, which is also something he frequently writes about.

• Mental Health
• Writing Career

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Conference Day 3

Conference Day 2

Conference Day 1

what would be the best way to describe being beaten? not exactly torture, but during the fight, and getting hit without just saying a punch to the stomach, and what would be the best reaction of that? i know some, like to your stomach can knock the breath out of you, but among other things?

How a character reacts to a hit to the stomach will depend on whether or not they had the presence of mind to tighten their abdominal muscles before the impact occurs. This is where the concept of the breath being knocked out of the body comes from, it’s a natural reaction to being hit. If you exhale all the air from your lungs, you’ll notice that your abdominal muscles automatically tighen and the body, particularly the shoulders, curl inwards pulling back. This is the concept behind the kihap, or the loud shout, that occurs in most martial arts when hitting the target. The kihap forces all the air from the lungs, making the muscles of the attackers body tighten at the key moments before impact with their victims body. The problem, of course, with the reaction is that it won’t really help to mitigate the effects of punch to the stomach if the exhalation occurs after the punch is thrown.

As with almost everything to do with combat, timing is key.

Basically, the character is going to feel like they want to throw up. They may actually throw up. A hit to the stomach will force it back into an unnatural position, one that is very uncomfortable. Dizziness, dropping the head as the body comes forward to protect the stomach, arms automatically moving to protect (i.e. wrap their arms around) the injured area. You can also expect a sudden flood of adrenaline if the victim is taken by surprise and sometimes even if they’re not as the body kicks over into fight or flight mode.

So, there could be a sudden increase in heart rate, a loss of fine motor control, a bitter taste in the mouth, etc. And of course, because all the air has suddenly left the body, they’ll be attempting to suck it down like there’s no tomorrow. The effects will be more immediate if the attack is unexpected, so: shock, surprise, anger, fear, panic, all these mental reactions can be used to stun lock the mind and leave the victim incapable of fighting back. If the person in question is unused to experiencing that kind of pain, the effects will be greater and the recovery much more slow. The more used to this particular variety of pain they are, the more hardened they will be to it.

Don’t think of it as an immunity, but rather something more easily ignored. It’s similar in concept to the idea of working out. In the beginning, your muscles are screaming and you feel like you’re going to die. But, as time passes and you keep working at it, it gets easier and the pain of your muscles doing things they don’t want to do becomes more familiar and more easily ignored. Taking a hit is relatively similar, though much more immediate and difficult to overcome.

When getting hit in the face, such as the nose, expect rapid swelling and possibly blood. So, a warm, wet feeling on the face, a taste of copper in the mouth, a sharp stinging pain right between the eyes, it will interfere with vision. Tasting your own blood is a rather surreal experience. People, for the most part, do not react well to it. The head snaps back and will again, drop forward right into the next hit if the victim isn’t careful. Any hit to the face (or really at all) invites the possibility of biting the tongue, especially if the victim isn’t wearing a mouth guard. If that happens, there will be more blood in the mouth, pain, panic, and gagging. For a hit below the eye expect rapid swelling, stinging pain, and loss of vision. There will be visible bruises that will last for, oh, a good week or more afterward.

Bruises are common in all parts of the body when they get hit and they last a long time. If your character fights constantly, they will show that wear and tear in all it’s glory on their body. It can last for a month, depending on how deep the bruises go. When I was training it wasn’t uncommon for me to find small welts all over my body, so much so that when I see a bruise now I just shrug it off.

During my third degree test, I took a roundhouse to my forearm and it became one, big mass of a bruise. I had a matched set for about two weeks, because I’d used the other arm for brick breaking.

The hand of the attacker will also bruise and possibly cut the skin, both on the victim’s body and the attacker’s knuckles. It’s worth remembering that a proper punch is necessary to keep the hand from breaking many of the small bones on impact. But hitting someone else is going to sting. Attacking better protected places on the body, like the rib cage, or the face, will be more obvious as opposed to hitting in the soft places like the throat or the stomach, still the hands will show signs of being in a fight regardless.

This is why the concept of “I don’t want to hurt anyone” is a nice sentiment, but complete bull. Want has nothing to do with it. Combat is a choice. If you fight or fight back, you’re going to hurt someone even if that person is just yourself. The question is not really “do I hurt them at all” but how far do you go and can you live with the consequences.

In specific instances, there’s the possibility of friction burns from the clothes rubbing against the body.

And of course, the most important and long lasting effect on the mind: shame. Also, guilt.

There’s more to it, but at that point it’s a good idea to start looking through medical and forensics textbooks on the subject. This is a little morbid, but in order to generate the right kind of feeling, you may want to stop and look at images of people who have been battered. Hollywood is very clean and combat is ugly. If you want to know how to describe something, you need to know what it actually looks like and decide whether or not it’s something you want to bring into your story.

(Edit: I should also point out that there is no “best” way to do anything, just the best that you’re capable of while working with the scene and how the themes there fit within the overall narrative. Violence is an excellent way to evoke emotion, but readers do have a threshold. How realistic you are is going to depend a lot on what you want them to be seeing and feeling when they read that scene. A sequence that is too vicious and too raw without properly being set up by the narrative runs the risk of knocking the reader out of the moment. This isn’t me saying don’t do it, just make sure you’re balancing realism with the needs of your story. A brutal beating is a key moment for a character, but it shouldn’t happen on the page more than once in a book that’s not dealing with abuse and brutal beatings (and even sometimes when it is). Work with what you’re capable of writing and marry that to what your comfortable with, after you’ve assessed what those limits are, feel free to push away at them as needed.

In the end, you're the only one who can really figure out what your story needs to function.)

@ howtofightwrite / howtofightwrite.tumblr.com

Writing Powerful Emotion Beats in Fiction

An emotion beat is what makes the novel or short story distinctive—we can be inside a character, experiencing the emotion with her, and that makes the reading experience powerful. For it to work, the right emotion beats must be used in the right spots.

In Part 1 of my series 10 Keys to Writing Story Beats in Novels , I discussed the story beat, the beat sheet, and the pause or inaction beat. In Part 2 I discussed the action beat, the dialogue beat, and beat variation. In this post, with keys 7 through 10, I will discuss the emotion beat in depth.

Key 7: Use Emotion Beats to Connect Readers to the Characters

I heard someone say that we can’t really understand any of the people around us, and that is why we love reading. Only through reading can we can truly grasp the emotions, desires and perspective of someone other than ourselves. The emotion beat is what creates this connection between reader and character.

There are four basic types of emotional beats:

1. Internal Physical Sensations

“I didn’t get the job,” said Russ. Irene felt sick to her stomach. It was their last chance—they had needed that job desperately.

2. External Physical Sensations

“I didn’t get the job,” said Russ. Suddenly, the warm air blowing from the heater felt too hot, stifling even. Irene opened the window, letting in the cold of winter.

3. Physical Actions (including hand gestures, facial expressions, and larger physical movements)

“I didn’t get the job,” said Russ. Irene pressed her lips firmly together, trying not to say something she would regret later.

4. State the Emotion

“I didn’t get the job,” said Russ. Irene was frustrated. He could’ve at least visited the company’s website before going into an interview. But as always, he insisted on doing it blind.

A great resource for physical sensations and actions that show emotions is the book The Emotion Thesaurus . You’ll notice that there is overlap between emotion beats and action beats; I’d categorize something as an emotional beat if conveying emotion is the most important function. Stating the character’s emotion should always be the last resort, though it can be used effectively.

Key 8: Use Emotion Beats that are Distinctive to your Story World or Character

The four basic types of emotional beats start to feel repetitive if that’s all you use in your story. Another type of emotional beat that’s extremely effective is using actions or thought patterns that are distinctive to your character or story world. A wizard in Harry Potter might reach for a wand or use magic in certain emotional states. A motorcycle rider may convey his emotions through how he rides his bike.

All sorts of things can become an emotional beat that is carried throughout your story: habits or tics or possessions. How you vary them will then create a powerful emotional reaction for you reader.

“Maisie, you haven’t been… contenta lately.” She used the Spanish word for content or happy, as if it were too stark, too uncomfortable to say it in English. I hadn’t realized that she’d noticed. “Are you now? How do you feel?”

This emotional beat is distinctive to Maisie, her relationship with her mother, and her cultural heritage.

One of the other characters in Dangerous , GT, often chews gum. The way he unwraps it or the way he chews it is a point of emotional control for GT, and so the description of his gum (or other taste metaphors) it is often used as an emotional beat in connection with his character.

At one point in the novel, GT is holding another Maisie’s father hostage. He has set demands for Maisie, and a time for when her father will be killed if she doesn’t agree. Maisie asks how she can know if GT will keep his word.

“You don’t know,” GT said, snapping on his gum as if we were chitchatting about the weather. “But you have no other choice. Two minutes, ten seconds.”

If at all possible, use emotional beats that are distinctive to your character and storyworld. It will make all the difference in your storytelling.

Key 9: Use Advanced Emotional Beats to Better Convey Your Character’s Feelings

In addition to beat distinctive to your character and story world, there are a handful of other advanced emotional beats that can powerfully convey feelings:

1. Setting:  Use what your character notices about the setting to convey emotion.

Example of using a setting that parallels emotion:

“I didn’t get the job,” said Russ. Irene forced her eyes away from him, out the window. The last leaf that had hung onto the tree all winter long fluttered to the ground.

2. Metaphor or Simile

Example of using a setting that contrasts emotion + a simile:

“I didn’t get the job,” said Russ. Irene forced her eyes away from Russ, out the window. The green on the tree was oversaturated, like a poorly-made Technicolor film, mocking her with its cheeriness.

3. Mini Flashback

“I didn’t get the job,” said Russ. Irene had known this could happen, yet his words still shook her, the way the doctor’s words had shook her when IVF had failed for the third time. She knew what would happen now—the sinking despair, the gradual recovery, and all the while the knowledge that this had been the last chance.

4. Mini Flashforward

“I didn’t get the job,” said Russ. Irene looked at the floor. One of these days she would leave him, take her terry coat and walk right out the front door.

5. Surreal Images

“I didn’t get the job,” said Russ. She had expected this, but that did not stop the rush of despair. The couch swallowed Irene whole.

Using these techniques well will create a distinctive style and voice, in addition to conveying emotion. Of course if you overuse any one of these types it will probably backfire.

Here’s a passage from Darkness at Noon by Arthur Koestler that uses almost of almost all of these emotional beats. The main character has spent his life working for a totalitarian regime. Now he is a political prisoner for that same regime. Here is his emotional reaction when he finds out that one of the other prisoners has been tortured by steambath:

He lit his last cigarette and with a clear head began to work out the line to take when he would be brought up for cross-examination. He was filled by the same quiet and serene self-confidence as he had felt as a student before a particularly difficult examination. He called to memory every particular he knew about the subject “steambath.” He imagined the situation in detail and tried to analyse the physical sensations to be expected, in order to rid them of their uncanniness. The important thing was not to let oneself be caught unprepared. He now knew for certain that they would not succeed in doing so, any more than had the others over there; he knew he would not say anything he did not want to say. He only wished they would start soon. His dream came to his mind: Richard and the old taxi-driver pursuing him, because they felt themselves cheated and betrayed by him. I will pay my fare, he thought with an awkward smile.

Note: credit for coming up with these categories of emotion beats needs to go to author Janci Patterson , whose new book Everything’s Fine is an excellent example of emotion beats.

Key 10: When Something Important or Shocking Happens, Use a Complex Reaction Beat to Show the POV Character’s Interpretation of Events

Most of the time you can follow an action beat with another action beat, or a line of dialogue with another line of dialogue. Yet that’s not always enough.

If there’s an action beat or a dialogue beat that is shocking to the viewpoint character, then to take advantage of the moment we have to follow this with a fleshed out reaction beat, that includes a feeling/thought, a physical action, and speech. Otherwise something like this happens:

“I quit my job,” said Russ. “I’m sure it will all work out,” said Irene.

We have no idea how Russ or Irene feel about the situation. This could be devastating to them. This could be an everyday thing. This could be the breaking point for Irene, yet she’s trying to put on a hopeful face. We have no idea, and because there aren’t any emotional beats, we feel disconnected from the characters. And if the dialogue or the action is truly shocking or important to the characters, a one sentence emotion beat is probably not enough.

Shocking action or dialogue must be followed by a series of beats that create the reaction—a standard way to do this is use a physical reaction beat, an emotion/thought reaction beat, and then a dialogue reaction beat.

“I quit my job,” said Russ. Irene coughed her coffee out of her mouth, sending flecks of brown liquid across the table. She sucked in a deep breath, stood, and wiped off the table. Worry gripped her. This could not have happened at a worse time. Finally she found the courage to speak. “I’m sure it will all work out,” said Irene, putting on a brave face.

We now understand this dialogue and what it means to the characters because a fleshed-out, complex reaction beat has been used.

Authors Janci Patterson and Heather Clark provide this formula for complex reaction beats:

In describing what he calls “ Motivation-Reaction Units ” Dwight V. Swain thinks the order should be reversed, with the feeling or thought coming before the physical reaction. (Also see Heather Clark ’s and Janci Patterson ’s posts on the subject.) Regardless of the order, if it’s a key emotional reaction, you probably need thought/feeling, action, dialogue, and potentially another powerful emotion beat.

In the classic novel Howards End by E. M. Forster, a character named Helen becomes engaged to a man, Mr. Wilcox, that she has only known for a few days. Her Aunt Juley goes to try to break off the engagement. Unfortunately she broaches the subject with the wrong Mr. Wilcox.

Writing Exercises

Complex Reaction Beats Exercise

Here’s a passage of dialogue without any emotional reactions to accompany some rather big statements:

“I’m having a baby,” said Tessa. “You should’ve told me earlier,” said Mark. “Would it have made a difference?” asked Tessa.

Now rewrite this dialogue from Mark’s POV, with physical reactions and internal reactions.

“I’m having a baby,” said Tessa. (non-POV character)

[Write Mark’s physical reaction] [Write Mark’s internal feeling/reaction]

“You should’ve told me earlier,” said Mark. (POV character)

[Write Tessa’s physical reaction] [Write Mark’s interpretation of her reaction]

“Would it have made a difference?” Tessa asked.

If you need to, you can switch the order of the beats, sub out an emotional beat, or add additional emotional beats. My writing group did this exercise and came up with a wide variety of reactions for the characters.

Beat Mania Exercise

Take the line of dialogue “It won’t be ready in time.” (Or you can choose a sentence from one of your stories.)

Now write ten different possible emotional beats, using each type of emotion beat discussed in this post:

• Internal Physical Sensations
• External Physical Sensations
• Physical Action
• State the Emotion
• Emotion Beat Particular to Character/Story World
• Setting-related Emotion Beat
• Metaphor or Simile
• Mini-Flashback
• Mini-Flashforward
• Surreal Imagery

(This should turn out like the “I didn’t get the job” example used throughout this blog post.)

Of your results, which emotion beat do you like best and why?

Print out several pages from your novel. Highlight and label each of your beats (physical sensation, setting, flashback, stating the emotion, internal sensation, physical action, etc). Are you doing all one type? Ignoring one type altogether? Skipping places that need beats? Now that you’ve analyzed, revise!

Check out my new novel!

If you enjoyed this post, please consider learning about my new spy novel, The Secret Life of Miss Mary Bennet , coming in April 2021 from Tule Publishing.

Original drumming at the beach image by  Jason Turgeon , Creative Commons license

My god in heaven, you have single-handedly cleared up ALL my confusion about what beats are. The precision of your comparison to shots in a movie rings truer than anything else I have ever heard about beats. Thanks you. Thank you with every fiber of gratitude I can muster.

I’m glad it was helpful!

A HUGE THANK YOU!

This is one of the most helpful articles I’ve stumbled across so far. A million thank-you’s, Katherine. I thoroughly enjoyed this blog post.

This series has been immensely helpful. Thank you for writing it with such detailed examples!

Brilliant series on beats! I have been struggling with the rewrite of my first novel, and you have set me on the right track and restored sanity to my writing.

I finally feel I have an excellent chance at doing a decent job at rewriting my first screenplay and more importantly to understanding fully how beats should/can be used and their role in all writing. I have read, I am ashamed to say, about action/reaction; and then; and what if– so many times without understanding fully how to incorporate them into writing until stumbling today onto your blog. I truly thank you for taking the time to share this information with all who may be trapped in the prison of writers’ block, etc. You, Katherine, have surely given us a vital key to the pathway of freedom!

This is one of the best pieces of advice that I ever read. It really helps me to finish my books. Thanks!

If words are the atoms of fiction, then story beats are the molecules, the building blocks that create a narrative. There are five main types of story beats–action beats, description beats, pause inaction beats, dialogue beats, and emotion beats.

This 3-part series on beats was fantastic. I’d always just assumed a beat was a “moment.” I like how you laid out the basic types of beats and then detailed variants of each kind. The examples were clear, and the exercises were extremely helpful. This gives me great insight into improving my dialogue-heavy scenes as well as pacing in general. Thank you!

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A Letter to My Creative-Writing Class

By Lucas Gardner

To my creative-writing classmates,

I am submitting this letter to you in lieu of a short story, which was the assignment for this week. When I enrolled in this creative-writing course, I knew to expect some criticism, but I'm still a little shaken up about what happened last time we met. I think there's a lot to clear up regarding the overwhelmingly negative feedback I received for my short story "Creative-Writing Beatdown," about a guy who beats up the other students in his creative-writing class after they are overly critical of his work.

First off, a lot of you said that you felt uncomfortable reading "Creative-Writing Beatdown," because it was, in your words, "clearly autobiographical." This could not be further from the truth. Yes, the main character and I have the same name, and, yes, both he and I are in a creative-writing class, and, YES, we both have received some very harsh criticism from our creative-writing classmates. But that's where the parallels end. "Creative-Writing Beatdown" is purely a work of fiction, and not at all based on the events of my life. It is a simple redemption tale, featuring a classic anti-hero.

I suppose that I should address the fact that the protagonist's classmates in "Creative-Writing Beatdown" all have the same names as you. A lot of you were upset by that, but I assure you that it was entirely coincidental. I guess when I was coming up with names for the people in the fictional creative-writing class, I subconsciously drew from my experience in this creative-writing class. That was not deliberate. I was just as surprised as you when I realized that the beatdown victims in the story shared your names, and your general physical descriptions.

Now that I think about it, I can see why you were particularly upset by the part in the story when, after beating up his entire creative-writing class, the main character says, "THAT'S for criticizing my use of em dashes," which is something that you guys have criticized me for. But, please, my friends—listen—that was another coincidence—and I was not offended by your notes about my "misuse of the em dash"—.

The fact is that you were excessively critical of "Creative-Writing Beatdown" when you called it "obnoxious" and "childish." Like I said, I can handle constructive criticism. For example, you had not-such-nice things to say about my first short story, "Fish Cop," a drama about a cop who switches bodies with a fish and uses his cop experience to fight crime in the sea. But I took your notes, let them marinate, and ultimately learned from them.

I think that if you all were able to shake the delusion that "Creative-Writing Beatdown" was supposed to be about me beating you up, you could focus on what is successful about the story. For example, I believe that the main character is superbly complex—on the one hand, he is a skilled and sensitive writer, but, on the other, he is misunderstood by his peers and also very strong, so he's driven to do things like beat up his entire creative-writing class. There is a certain duality of character at play there that I think is beautiful and tragic. Also, I think the imagery in the scenes where he beats up his creative-writing class is quite vivid.

Re-read the main character's final monologue with fresh eyes and tell me that you're not moved:

Wow, it looks like my creative-writing class sure learned a valuable lesson about being mean, and I think it's safe to say that the other students were wrong about "Fish Cop." Justice was served here today, but, even though I know I did the right thing, I would hate to have to beat up my creative-writing class again . . .

All that being said, I will accept some of your feedback. I do agree with you that it's weird that the story occasionally changes from the third-person to the first-person perspective. Also, I guess the end, when the main character has sex with the teacher and then they get married, was a little tacked on. Mrs. Weissman, I'm sorry that you, in particular, were so underwhelmed by that conclusion. Endings can be very hard.

Please give "Creative-Writing Beatdown" another chance, because I think you will appreciate it more now, and also because you should refamiliarize yourself with it before next class, when I'll be presenting "Creative-Writing Beatdown, Part Two."

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How to Describe Anger In Writing

When I was working on The Phoenix Codex , I sometimes took way too much time thinking about ways to describe anger in writing. If my main character, Cassie, got angry enough, wild animals attacked whoever pissed her off, so she became very aware of how her anger feels. 

I know lots of writers also get stuck on how to describe frustration in writing—or annoyance, or flat-out rage. Even when you’re just looking for a few words or a phrase, you can get bogged down. With that in mind, here are ways to write anger descriptions in a more vivid way than “he felt angry.”

Here’s something I can’t stress enough, though. When you’re writing about anger, there are a lot of ways to show the emotion…through what they say, how loudly they say it, what they’re thinking, and their actions (such as aggressively loading the dishwasher.)

My list of ways to describe facial expressions  and my list of body language and gestures can both help in showing the emotion.

But once in a while, you want to describe your point of view character’s internal feelings of anger.

Obviously, this isn’t a comprehensive list. There are one hundred phrases here. A few of them hint at physiological reactions to the emotion of anger, and some employ similes. You can adapt them or mix them up a little, and they’ll probably make you think of more.

The ones that contain a verb can be turned into a phrase. For instance, “she was breathless with anger” can be used in a sentence like, “Breathless with anger, she stood up and walked out.’ Oh, and you can probably change some of these to describe hatred or loathing. And as long as the context is clear, you don’t need to name the emotion at all—a physiological reaction is often enough!

Be sure to pin the article to a Pinterest board or bookmark it for future reference!

he smoldered with resentment

rage flowed through her like lava

molten anger rolled through him

rage gripped her

anger poured through her

her temper sparked

anger stirred within her

his fury sprang to life

rage nearly consumed her

raw anger shot through him

rage pulsed through his veins

anger thrummed through her veins

anger flooded his veins

rage quickened her blood

she felt a flash of irritation

he felt a flicker of irritation

his anger spiked

anger rushed through her

anger overpowered her

rage overtook him

fury overcame her

he swallowed down his frustration

she tamped down her irritation

he mastered his anger

he kept his frustration in check

fury roared through her mind

a fresh swell of rage rose in her

anger rose in him like a tide

anger welled up in his chest

fury vibrated through her being

he burned with anger

irritation pricked at him

inwardly, she was seething

he trembled with rage

she shook with fury

he was quivering with anger

her resentment grew inside her like a tumor

his resentment festered in him

anger spread through him

rage filled her

his irritation flared

it roused her anger

it woke her anger

his edge of irritation had returned

fury surged through her

he went cold with fury

she was breathless with anger

he was wordless with rage

he was almost choking on his rage

nearly suffocating on her fury

she was simmering with anger

he was boiling with anger

a wave of fury crashed through her

he was running on sheer anger

her frustration kicked in

fury twisted inside of her

she was a ball of pure anger

she was about to explode with rage

he felt about to burst from rage

she was in a red rage

rage ran red through his brain

he stoked his anger

a vortex of anger swirled inside him

she fought the chaos of her rage

he tried to still his rage

he pressed down his anger

she struggled against her anger

he bit back his anger

anger heated her blood

rage seared through him

anger swept over her

resentment clouded her thoughts

he was blind with rage

she felt a jolt of anger

anger hardened her heart

rage beat at her heart

rage churned inside of him

he felt drunk on his rage

anger ripped through him

anger rippled through her

fury tore through her

inside, he was smoking with anger

his anger was mounting

her anger coiled in her stomach

he felt a stab of anger

she felt the anger building

he could taste blood

her irritation crackled

she was immobilized by fury

he was brimming with hostility

anger settled over her

rage throbbed in her like a heartbeat

rage pounded in him like a drumbeat

flames of anger licked through him

rage seized her

resentment blossomed within her

his anger felt good

she felt a cleansing anger

he felt a sick anger

he marinated in resentment

It actually took me a really long time to think about all of these! 🙂 I hope it’s a helpful list! I’m going to make a few more for other emotions. If you don’t want to miss those, be sure to follow the blog, if you aren’t already — there’s a place to sign up on the lefthand side of this website.

And in my book Master Lists for Writers , you can find a lot more lists. Take a look!

Thanks for reading, and happy writing!

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40 thoughts on “ how to describe anger in writing ”.

Thank you, these alternatives to anger are excellent. xxx

So glad you like them, Adele! And nice to see you. 🙂

Thank you. x

Writing a Behavior Support Plan for an individual in crisis and I needed to find ways to capture the person’s state-of-being. Thanks for the inspiration and descriptions as some of these are helpful even though what I am doing is not creative writing. Thanks!

I really like those ways of showing anger without mentioning the word but it’s also great to have a hundred examples of how to use it with such variety.

Thanks, Maria! (Great last name, by the way. 😉 )

It is! Do people ever spell yours Donavon? Is there in the whole world anyone who spells their own name that way? Bryn is also good. A good Welsh word.

They do spell it that way! Haha!

Nice, thank you. Some of those, very evocative!!

Thanks so much, friend!

Thanks, Bryn. This long list is stimulating. So often expressing emotions, especially anger, is quite difficult. It is probably easiest to express anger through physical violence – but it is more challenging for a character who is angry and yet wants to/needs to express it in a non-violent way.

Hi, Keith! Thanks. And you bring up such a good point! I think it can be really powerful when a character is angry and _not_ really showing it, or else showing it in more understated ways.

Great list!! I’ve had many times when I wanted something other than ‘She wanted to punch something–preferably his nose.’ Or something similar to that. 🙂

Thanks Bunches!! I’m sure I’ll be referring to this list A Lot for my stories. Romances need to be full of conflict, and anger is certainly a product of that, especially in close relationships. Now that I have this list to refer to, I won’t need to burn up all my brain power trying to come up with a way to describe this emotion, so Thanks Again for burning up your brain for all of us. LOL 🙂

I might just start printing out these addendums and paste them into my copy of MLfW 🙂 These are super helpful, Bryn. Thanks for thinking them up! <3

🙂 Thanks, friend!

Thanks for sharing, Bryn! These are helpful. I reblogged your post on my blog for Write it Wednesday. (I also wrote a 2,218-word short fic today!) Write away!

I always say this, but it’s true: you are so prolific! Thank you so much for sharing…it means a lot, always!

I love all of your alternatives for anything. I’ll be sure to take note of these as well. Your book Master List for writers has become my bible. I even add my own twist on them sometimes to suit whatever’s going on in the scene at the time.

Hi, Nicole! Oh, that means a lot to me. I’m so glad the book is helpful! And I thought people could put their own spin on things, just like you’re doing. 🙂

I’ll be sure to leave a bibliographical reference to you when I’ve completed my book. Thank you so much Bryn. Xx

Oh my gosh, you don’t have to do that, of course! (Even though that would be amazing 😀 ) I hope the book is going well!

Awesome list. Thanks Bryn.

You’re welcome, Dalton! Thanks for stopping by!

I was scouring the internet for a compendious list of expressions to aid my essays. Growing restless by the minute I shuddered at the thought of exams creeping in the corner when I came across your blog. Very helpful. You’re a true lifesaver.:)

Thank you is an understatement Thanks though Thanks a great deal

Hair-trigger temper is another good description.

Just wanted to say thanks trying to make my own book right now and I always struggle with expressing anger

wow. these phrases are extremely useful and really realistic. thank u so much for compiling it

You are so welcome!

These are so good! Thanks so much xx

thx for the phrases

thanks you helped me a lot

Thank you so much! This is great!

Oh yay! So glad you liked it! 🙂

Very good writing resources!!! This is one of the best website I have ever been! There is just a bountiful amount of phrases that I need when writing a composition. Thank so much!! Much appreciated.

Hi bryn donovan , thank you for this list! I was actually quite stressed out as i am going to have my english composition tomorrow and i also didn’t know a lot of good phrases for anger. Upon stumbling on your website, i saw MANY good phrases! so if i write about a character being angry tomorrow , i would definitely hv good marks!UwU THANKS again!!! 🙂

Btw my name is isabel oops i forgot to include it! UwU

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What Is a Beat, Anyway?

If you read about writing craft, you’re going to come across the word “beat” on occasion. But this is a term that even within the realm of creative writing has at least three different meanings. Let’s break them down here.

Beats in Dialogue

On the smallest scale, a beat refers to narration that occurs between or among lines of dialogue. And there are sort of two senses of the term at this level, actually. Sometimes you’ll hear the phrase “action beat” to refer to the action being narrated as dialogue is delivered. This is also known as stage business. The action beat below is in red:

“Hey, Handsome,” she said. She tipped her hat up so I could see her face. She winked.  “Hi, Mom.”

But that action also gives a rhythmic pause, and that’s the other sense of the term “beat” within dialogue. Sometimes, you want to allow time for characters to process something before they reply. In a first draft of a story, you might even pencil in something like “[pause]” or “[beat]” and return to it later to flesh the scene out with something that accomplishes more than just pausing.

So, at the smallest scale, a beat is a narrational interruption within a dialogue exchange . Some of those interruptions are actions; some might be descriptions or thoughts or any other type of narration that happens to supply a rhythmic pause within the scene. 

For some ideas on how to create meaningful beats within dialogue, check out my article on Triangulating Dialogue .

Beat within Scenes

The next definition of a beat is the smallest unit of story. And that’s a little abstract, so I’ll explain. A scene is comprised of several moment-to-moment actions and reactions. There’s a stimulus and response.

A person walks into a bar, looks around, sees an empty stool and walks over to it. That’s a beat. 

Another person sitting next to our new arrival says, “Hey! You come here often?” And our protagonist scoffs, says no, and turns away. That’s a beat. 

And we go on and on like this to build an entire scene. 

We could define these beats as units of action/reaction, and they deliver tiny moments of change.

For more on how you can think about beats in a productive way to help you craft scenes, check out my article on Using Beats to Move Characters within Scenes .

Storywide Beats

The third definition of beat is at the largest scale, and it refers to the most consequential events within a story . It’s sort of like an itinerary for a story. If you travel with an itinerary, it won’t tell you everything you’ll do on a daily basis, but it will list the highlights: breakfast at hotel; museum; lunch in cafe; trolley ride; lighthouse tour, etc.

You sometimes hear people talk of “beat sheets,” which are basically that itinerary. They’re templates for the major landmarks a story should visit along the way. 

For more on storywide beats, see my articles on Creating a Moving Character Arc and Novel Structure .

The Summation

So those are your three definitions of “beat.” 

• Narrated action or narration that otherwise provides a rhythmic pause between lines of dialogue. 
• A small unit of story that is comprised of an action and reaction and delivers a small change. 
• A significant development within a story that one might list in a beat sheet, giving an outline of the whole story.  

Want to watch the video version of this article? Check it out below:

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This excellent article answers the question: how shall I improve my writing over the weekend? Many thanks, Tim. 🙂

The concept of beats has always puzzled me, perhaps because I’m not sure why the concept is so important, and I gather that it is very important because EVERY writing teacher, coach, and accomplished author, mentions them. Does it have to do with dead wood? meaningless text that doesn’t further the story? I both read and watched the video, and in the video caught something I glossed over in the reading — that bit about about actors — that actors pay attention to beats to help them interpret a character. That makes sense, little chunks of characterization that bring that character and the action to life. So analyzing beats would be a way to edit out text that doesn’t comprise a beat?

The concept is important for varying reasons, depending on what kind of beat we’re talking about. Those links I supplied at the end of each section above should address the importance of each. If you’re talking about beats within a scene, the value of analyzing them is to assess the character’s movement within a scene. Let’s say you have a character at the beginning of a scene being excited about meeting a romantic partner but at the end of the scene leaving in disgust. How do you move the character from point A to point B? Beats can help make that progression causal and authentic.

Only in the language of the English, could we have a term of art spelled exactly the same, sounding exactly alike, but as varied in meaning as milk and cheese. I suppose, we could just call these dairy words . . . you know, some are the freshest essence(milk) of the story, others are a more pronounced, or solid, iteration(your cheese), and then the in the broadest of terms, the nutritious and satisfying element–eggs. Thank you for rendering these three concepts into a quick “beat”. But you had me at Lighthouse Tours, anyway.

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Delight: The Secondary Source of Reader Engagement

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Freytag’s Pyramid Doesn’t Deserve the Hate

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How and Why to Write Your Back-Cover Synopsis Early

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Irony is Central to Storytelling

Juggle External Action and Interiority

Narrating Deep or Shallow: The Spectrum of Psychic Distance

Novel Structure: An Aggregate Paradigm

Page-level Storytelling: Four Ways to Break Down Your Narration

Prepping for Beta Reading

Readers to Help You Write Your Book

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Scene vs. Summary

Should You Use Dialogue Tags Other Than “Said”?

Show, Don’t Tell Disambiguation

Story Consumption: How to Read Like a Writer

Stretch Tension to Maximize Suspense

Subjective Conflict

The Case for Messy Character Motivation

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The Character Mixing Board

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The Storm Writing School Mission

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Theme Is Not Optional

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To Filter or Not to Filter

Tools for Big Picture Editing of Your Novel

Triangulate Dialogue

Turning Points Propel Your Story

Two Conflicts: Problems vs. Obstacles

Use “Urgent Story Questions” to Create Tension

Use Beats to Move Characters within Scenes

Varieties of Omniscience

Verisimilitude: What it is and how it works

What Does the Inciting Incident Actually Do?

Why Most Writing Rules Can Be Broken

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Injuries you can get from getting beat up

Discussion in ' Research ' started by Emma.ch , Mar 27, 2019 .

big soft moose An Admoostrator Admin Staff Supporter Contributor Community Volunteer

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_86ad0c63223f950f4526c56a63b87275'); }); That's not terribly helpful or true .. beatings vary dramatically depending on the health and fitness of both assailants and victim - you could easily write an assault where someone gets beaten down and kicked on the ground and hes hospitalised for a couple of weeks. I've seen that happen during a riot in NI and the guy concerned was walking around the next day. I also knew a guy who took one punch to the jaw and died of a cerebral haemorage  

Alan Aspie Banned Contributor

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_86ad0c63223f950f4526c56a63b87275'); }); Emma.ch said: ↑ Realistically.. I'm hoping having his arms up in front of his face will be enough to protect him in that way. Click to expand...

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_86ad0c63223f950f4526c56a63b87275'); }); I have to say Alan I'm not convinced you know much about real life violence either - watching youtube videos is no substitute for being on the receiving (or sometimes giving ) end. Ive been in a lot of fights in my life, some winning some losing, and experience doesn't bear out what you are saying here To say the first 3 seconds resolves who wins or loses is just abject rubbish - The first blows don't determine anything - it depends what happens next and on the characters and physique, reaction, training etc of both fighters. Its also complete rubbish that a victim would be unable to curl up or defend themselves after 15 seconds unless weaponry is in play You are sort of right that most fights are over fast - but in a street confrontation the first 30 seconds are often taken up with threats and pushing and shoving before the first punch is thrown. The sort of Blitz attack you are talking about above is pretty rare (and irrelevant to the OP where Emma is talking about four guys with a grievance not a random attack on a stranger) Also in regard of that video its pretty clear that its part of a larger confrontation - you can see that the guy is already injured when he goes over the barrier, and the violence shown is nothing much, so if he sustained life threatening injuries the chances are it was off camera. And it takes fractions of a second to put your arms up to protect your face and head, and its a natural reaction which most people will do without thinking. In regard to the OP so much depends on factors that the author can determine (physique, training , fitness of participants etc) that it is perfectly realistic that someone could get kicked on the ground for a couple of minutes and be out of hospital in a couple of weeks... two minutes from guys with a grievance wouldn't be solid kicking it would be blows interspersed with abuse, so he could easily actually sustain only the same number of blows that you'd take in a ten second blitz As i said above i once saw a soldier go down in a riot situation and he was on the ground being kicked and stamped on by a mob for at least a minute until we fought through to him - the guy concerned was walking around the next day with some interesting bruises and some road rash. In a mob like that people get in each others way so the actual harm sustained can be less than in a targetted attack  

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_86ad0c63223f950f4526c56a63b87275'); }); big soft moose said: ↑ 1. I have to say Alan I'm not convinced you know much about real life violence either 2. To say the first 3 seconds resolves who wins or loses is just abject rubbish 3. You are sort of right that most fights are over fast - but in a street confrontation the first 30 seconds are often taken up with threats and pushing and shoving before the first punch is thrown. 4. The sort of Blitz attack you are talking about above is pretty rare 5. in regard of that video its pretty clear that its part of a larger confrontation - you can see that the guy is already injured when he goes over the barrier, and the violence shown is nothing much, so if he sustained life threatening injuries the chances are it was off camera. Click to expand...

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_86ad0c63223f950f4526c56a63b87275'); }); How many fights have you been in in your life Alan - I mean serious could have wound up in hospital fights not school yard stuff ? I'm guessing the answer is zero - but i'm happy for you to prove me wrong. I used to a be a soldier, then I worked bar security, more recently i was a park ranger in a city - The number of serious confrontations i've been involved in is in double figures easily (hospitalised twice, with a bunch of other visits to the MO or casualty) - so when I talk about what a fight involves i've been there, done that and got blood all over the tee shirt. The reason I was so uncompromising in my description of your advice is that you are stating things as if they are facts based on virtually nothing other than watching some videos. When you say stuff like "whoever gets the upper hand, can make that hand heavier" it betrays that you've never actually been there. You do it again when you say "the first hit leaves the victim disorientated for 1-3 seconds" that simply isn't true in every case (it might be true if you were hit with no warning that anything was about to kick off and you were completely unprepared but for someone actually engaged in a fight it just isn't) Also the head isn't a good target the opponent only has to move slightly and you miss, so when you say most fights start with a blow to the head you are again saying stuff that just isnt true. If I was going to aim to put someone down i'd land the first strike in the stomach (or a boot through the knee) then as they double up you grab the head and accelerate it downwards and give them a knee in the face. Then they are on the floor damaged and bleeding and if you're so inclined you can kick the shit out of them (I hasten to add that I didnt since I'm not a psycho) Conversely if you are on the receiving end, trying not to double up is a good plan, and if you do wind up on the floor curling into a ball is your natural reaction but its defensive only. One on one i'd try to grab the kickers leg and bring him down too, multiples on one your going to get hurt unless help comes so thats where you roll up and hope for the best The OP was was talking about four guys with a greivance jumping another guy, so they corner him, there's some threats and then the fighting starts - she said he was quite a hard guy so hes probably been in a few fights and knows how to handle himself. If they are taking turns hitting him that means that one or more of them are restraining him because otherwise it would be a lot more disorganised - so at this point its not a fight, its a punishment beating and could easily go on for several minutes, and he isn't going to be putting his hands up in front of his face because those holding him won't let him.But you aren't talking about a frenetic blitz attack you're talking about threat, punch, threat, punch, change assailants, bit more verbal, punch.. because the point of a punishment beating is that the guy on the receiving end needs to know what hes done wrong. "You've been talking to the police" punch "betraying your brothers "smack "I thought you were my friend" , punch, "but all the time you were grassing to the pigs", smack. Like that (In ulster the IRA used to shoot people through the kneecap from the back of the leg with a low calibre weapon to reinforce the point, the protestant terrorists preferred to use a power drill - which shows that these things weren't over in ten seconds) While on his feet being held and hit he'd likely suffer some facial damage - nose, lips, teeth, black eye, may be cheek bones, and possibly some ribs - it does also depend on how experienced his attackers are because some people punch like kids and give you a lot of noise but no serious damage - then whenhe's released he goes to the floor, curls up and takes a kicking - again some people kick like kids so damage is variable, but you'd expect ribs and arm damage at least and possibly worse... however its down to the author so if they want him relatively undamaged you could have the assailants disturbed by something and to run off. He'll also suffer more damage if they take turns, if they are all kicking him mob handed they get in each others way and the blows are unaimed and have less force behind them.  

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_86ad0c63223f950f4526c56a63b87275'); }); big soft moose said: ↑ How... ... Alan.. ...I'm guessing... i'm happy for you to prove me wrong. I used to a be... you are stating things as if they are facts based on virtually nothing other... Click to expand...

BayView Huh. Interesting. Contributor

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_86ad0c63223f950f4526c56a63b87275'); }); Alan Aspie said: ↑ 1. I'm still not the topic of this thread. No matter how obsessively you try to pull me in some sick pig wrestling I will not enter. 2. Your tendency to "guess" seems to be very hostile. 3. There is one reason why I put someone under ignore button. When a person starts to invent total BS about me and puts it online, it's time to ignore him or her. But you are a mode. I don't know what board rules say about ignoring some moderator so I will not do it. But I don't find you both as a virtual person and as a board writer not worth my time after this. I will read things you focus to me, but that's all. I will ignore you as a person and as a writer but not as a moderator. 4. I could answer your question if I trusted you. But I don't. And you do everything you can to show why I should not. So thank you about that information. And it seems that you have decided how things are about me before knowing or observing them with any kind of realism. So good luck with your imagination. Have fun with it. And here we might get some kind of hint why you "guess” so hostile way. Something You think You are an expert, an alfa male and someone does not agree. Ooohhh.... That war! What a luck you have a moderator status. It means you'll be right even when you imagine total BS about someone. Click to expand...

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_86ad0c63223f950f4526c56a63b87275'); }); Hi Alan Speaking personally - not as a moderator/volunteer I'm sorry you feel challenged -that was not my intention - I merely pointed out that the information you were giving another member did not jibe with my experience. I'm also not interested in making up anything about you - my point was that when you state facts on a thread like this it is helpful to the OP to state the experience that validates those facts You have just sent me a PM saying you want to pull me into a side topic in a hostile way, ( I will not 'guess' at the motivation for doing that) but that isn't something I'm willing to engage with. I would never use any official status in a topic in which I am personally involved, but I would suggest one member to another that we agree to differ and leave Emma's thread on topic  

XRD_author Banned

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_86ad0c63223f950f4526c56a63b87275'); }); BayView said: ↑ But there is value in everyone explaining their credentials for making the proclamations they do. He's explained his in this area ... his voice is likely more valuable. Click to expand...

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_86ad0c63223f950f4526c56a63b87275'); }); XRD_author said: ↑ Except on the Internet, no one can tell you're not a dog. Accordingly, the asserted credentials of anonymous posters shouldn't be given much weight. . Click to expand...

John Calligan Contributor Contributor

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_86ad0c63223f950f4526c56a63b87275'); }); https://www.mmamania.com/ufc-medical-suspensions-and-injuries  

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_86ad0c63223f950f4526c56a63b87275'); }); XRD_author said: ↑ ...asserted credentials of anonymous posters shouldn't be given much weight. Click to expand...

frigocc Contributor Contributor

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_86ad0c63223f950f4526c56a63b87275'); }); Depends on your genre. If it's comedy, could have a pelvic injury cause priopism (an erection).  

matwoolf Banned Contributor

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_86ad0c63223f950f4526c56a63b87275'); }); I’ve had erections in fights and it’s still not funny.  

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_86ad0c63223f950f4526c56a63b87275'); }); matwoolf said: ↑ I’ve had erections in fights and it’s still not funny. Click to expand...

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_86ad0c63223f950f4526c56a63b87275'); }); Mm, I’m on a bus. Maybe talk about this when I get home.  

Maverick_nc Contributor Contributor

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_86ad0c63223f950f4526c56a63b87275'); }); frigocc said: ↑ No. But putting some random unconscious dude with an erection on YouTube? Slightly. Click to expand...

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_86ad0c63223f950f4526c56a63b87275'); }); Maverick_nc said: ↑ I once had a fight start while slap bang in the middle of sex. The girl hadn't told me she had a boyfriend and I was too busy enjoying myself to hear him enter the room. My erection disappeared fairly quickly but I retained the nickname 'cock fighter' for many years. Of course, the exaggerations soon (also) amped up incredibly and these days the story is told that both the boyfriend and I were wearing glow in the dark condoms and engaged in a few rounds of penis light-saber fencing. Ahhh good times. Ill probably leave this one out of my memoir. Click to expand...

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_86ad0c63223f950f4526c56a63b87275'); }); frigocc said: ↑ I think it'd MAKE the memoir. Click to expand...

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_86ad0c63223f950f4526c56a63b87275'); }); It is a most difficult scene to write, or even to regale without coming off as a jock-schmuck/bottom-feeder. @MC, or you, never looks good in this [probably common] situation. The other guy, the loser, is the hero, a tragic figure. For me it is a memory of great shame. Making love & the next moment the ex-boyfriend is at the bedroom door, and his best friend stands at his back. It was gross and terrible for him, and I beat him with my dick. I never recovered.  

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_86ad0c63223f950f4526c56a63b87275'); }); Maverick_nc said: ↑ I once had a fight start while slap bang in the middle of sex.. ..nickname 'cock fighter' for many years. Click to expand...

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How to Use Creative Writing to Beat Addiction

Writing is highly personal and writers get to choose to share or not share work. Lots of exercises can be structured about recovery but don’t have to be. Sometimes it is helpful to write about recovery yet others will struggle. Creative writing is tough at first but once you get into the swing of it, you may find it really helps recovery.

Become a List Person

The best way to start writing is to get into a group setting like a class. Get a list together as a warm-up for your brain. With lists, there is no need to write in full sentences or use grammar that is perfect. Lists can be less intimidating for beginner writers or those in detox with trouble focusing. Lists can later become essays or poems. Topics may include:

• Things that are green
• Things that remind you of home
• Things you enjoy
• Parts of your body that are unique or interesting to you (long fingers, dimpled cheek)

Many of these revolve around objects. Getting imagery in your head is important to start with to evoke the senses. Anyone can write memories of things they’ve seen, felt, smelled, or tasted.

Free Writing

The idea behind free writing, or stream of consciousness writing, is to write continuously without lifting pen from paper. It is okay if not all the words on the page are brilliant and in alignment. The writer may also go back and revise. Writers should not be too hard on themselves and you can always go back and edit later when you have time. Free writing is about free expression without overthinking.

Repeating a phrase is important. If you get stuck or cannot think of what to say, it may help get words and ideas going again. The goal is to get writing and generating ideas. Try:

• I love it when…
• I hate it when…
• I’m trying to say…
• I’m thankful for…
• I will never…
• To me, it means…

Letter Writing

A holistic approach to recovery is focused on helping people write their feelings down and sharing those feelings with others. Writing down things in a letter explaining addiction and apologizing is one of the steps in recovery many do in support of recovery. The process of it can be cathartic and healing from the standpoint of owning up to your mistakes. Another approach is to imagine a loved one has written advice in a letter. Think about what you might say to support someone else in need.

The Springboard Center’s addiction treatment programs are tailored to meet the needs of each client. We use approaches like creative writing in therapy programs to support recovery. We utilize a group approach to support individual and overall recovery in a safe environment. Call us to find out more information: 432-620-0255

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Luma AI debuts ‘Dream Machine’ for realistic video generation, heating up AI media race

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Luma AI , a San Francisco artificial intelligence startup, today announced the release of Dream Machine , a powerful new AI system capable of generating high-quality videos from simple text descriptions. The technology opens the door for a wide range of creators and companies to produce original video content at unprecedented speed and scale. The best part? You can start using Luma Dream Machine today.

Dream Machine allows users to enter a descriptive prompt like “a corgi puppy chasing a ball on a beach at sunset” and in about two minutes generates a realistic five-second video clip matching that scene. Early beta testers have praised the system’s ability to faithfully render specified objects, characters, actions and environments while maintaining fluid motion and coherent storytelling.

The launch of Dream Machine represents a major milestone in the democratization of AI-powered video generation. While rival systems like OpenAI’s Sora and Kuaishou’s Kling have showcased impressive capabilities, they remain accessible only to a select group of partners. In contrast, Luma AI has made Dream Machine available for anyone to experiment with for free on its website, with plans to release APIs and plugins for popular creative software.

This open approach could give Luma AI a head start in building a vibrant community of creators and developers around its platform. By lowering the barriers to entry, Dream Machine has the potential to spark a wave of innovation and creativity as users explore the possibilities of AI-generated video.

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This is wild. Luma AI just dropped Dream Machine that generates AI video from text and image. Unlike Sora, it's open to public today. The quality is insane. 1. @KakuDrop pic.twitter.com/2nimleuKY4 — Min Choi (@minchoi) June 12, 2024

The generative AI arms race heats up

Dream Machine’s launch comes amid a flurry of activity in the generative AI space, as startups and tech giants alike race to develop increasingly sophisticated tools for synthesizing realistic images, audio, and video from text inputs. The technology holds immense promise for transforming industries ranging from entertainment and advertising to education and beyond.

However, the field remains in its early stages, and even the most advanced systems like Dream Machine, Sora, and Kling can struggle with certain prompts or produce outputs that are nonsensical or problematic. Improving the quality, consistency, and reliability of these models will be crucial for unlocking their full commercial potential.

First there was Sora, then Kling, and now Luma. The best part is that you can access Luma RIGHT NOW for FREE Here are 15 insane examples from the latest AI video generator and how to get access right now: pic.twitter.com/6FahFTogBh — Mark Gadala-Maria (@markgadala) June 12, 2024

As the generative AI arms race heats up, a key question is whether the immense computing power and training data required to build state-of-the-art models will lead to a concentration of capabilities among a few industry leaders, or whether an open ecosystem of creators and developers can flourish. Luma AI’s approach with Dream Machine suggests that it is betting on the latter.

Navigating the ethical minefield of synthetic media

As tools like Dream Machine make it easier than ever to generate realistic video content, they also raise a host of thorny ethical and legal questions that have yet to be fully addressed. The potential for misuse is significant, from the creation of deepfakes and misinformation to the infringement of intellectual property rights.

Lawmakers and regulators are starting to grapple with these issues, but the pace of technological change is fast outpacing the development of governance frameworks. As generative AI systems become more powerful and accessible, finding the right balance between innovation and responsibility will be a defining challenge for the industry and society as a whole.

Despite these challenges, the launch of Dream Machine is a testament to the incredible progress that has been made in AI-powered video generation in recent years. As the technology continues to mature and evolve, it has the potential to unlock new forms of creativity and expression that were once the stuff of science fiction. The age of AI-generated media is upon us, and its implications are only beginning to come into focus.

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