This people, is the main event. It's what everything has been leading up to. Finally you get to flesh out your character! What makes them tick? What makes them different from everyone else? That's what this section is for!

Like the title says, for this chapter we are going to finally get into the Personality of a character! This is really the most important part of the app, right next to the Background (or History). Authors usually use this section as the deciding factor for whether they choose your character or not, so there really is a lot riding on this.

I cannot emphasize enough how important the Personality is, I mean it even has its own chapter for petes sake!! So imagine my dismay when I receive apps that only have about 3 paragraphs that are each only two lines of text. Come on people, you are selling me your character. Tell me, why should I like your character? What makes your character stand out from all the other applicants I already received? If I can't decipher what it is you're trying to tell me about your character within the first paragraph you are obviously doing something wrong.  

Okay I think that's enough ranting, hopefully you get my point. So instead of focusing on the negatives, let's just get started on making a great Personality!

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What it Means:

I guess we should first figure out what the hell "Personality" even means. I know not everyone is fluent in the English language, but understanding this term is basically a must. So what does it mean anyway? 

In the simplest of terms it is basically what makes a person who they are. It's what seperates them and makes them special in a sea of seven billion people. A personality is created from the collection of physical, mental, emotional and social characteristics of a person. Things that a person likes, dislikes, does, etc. all come together to form their unique personality. 

Let's get started shall we?

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Rules to Remember: 

1) Do. Not. Rush. 
2) Brainstorm. Brainstorm. Brainstorm.

First things first, we need to figure out what kind of character we want to make. From what we've done in the previous sections of the application we only know that our characters name is Jennifer Park, she's multi-ethnic and she has a thing for cats. That's a start, and we already have a bit of the personality showing through! 

We need to have a clear picture of this character that we want to bring to life. If you want a one-dimensional character, the best bet is just going for one character trait and just enhacing upon that one trait. But what we want, what all authors want, is a character that feels like they could come out of the screen and shake your hand. For this we really need to think about what we want our character to be. 

I seem to be repeating myself dont I? It's on purpose. People tend to "rush" applications and then hand in half-assed attempts at a character then try to butter the author up by saying things like "Author-nim! I just finished my app! I hope you like him/her! Even if he/she doesn't get chosen I'll still support this story!" Now, while some of the people who write that may be telling the truth, most of the time, it's just empty words. As soon as the person finds out their character wasn't chosen, they unsubscribe. I'm not writing this to try to make anyone feel bad, no you have all the right in the world to unsubscribe, but try to see it from the authors perspective. They put in their hard work and effort to make a story people will want to apply to, that in itself is an extremelely difficult thing to do! But once they start receiving half-assed applications and those people decide to just unsubsribe after not being chosen, it kind of hurts. 

I guess what I'm trying to say is, the first step should be to think and think well. Brainstorm the overall picture of what you want your character  to be and act and you'll already be halfway done with this part. Finally figuring out what you want makes writing about it 10000x easier, trust me. 

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Different Ways to Get a Personality:

- Quirks and Habits

- Wish Fulfillment

- Existing Characters Expanded

So everyone has a different way of writing and what might work for some might not work for others. That's why I am going to give THREE (3!) different ways you can start your approach to the Personality section. 

The first one, "Quirks and Habits" is one that my dear friend Ara (tealcloud) uses to build her personality. And it is exactly what it sounds like, you take specific quirks and habits and build up from that. Like the title says, using this method starts off doing the likes, dislikes, habits and trivia portion of the personality portion of the application first. This method is kind of like establishing a tree diagram with the starting point being these quirks and habits. You have to keep in mind that there is a reason why your character does it. For example maybe your character tends to clean his or her nails. Why? Maybe they are perfectionist in the sense of appearance, maybe they have OCD or they just are a big believer of being clean. Whatever the reason, your personality is the one that establishes these habits and quirks. So you really need to keep in mind why your character is doing this or that and what in his or her personality is making this happen.

The second one, "Wish Fulfillment" is one that I actually tend to use a lot. It's where I create a character that I wish I could be. Again, it is what it sounds like. Writing is an awesome art form for this particular thing, so why not use it? Let me give an example: In real life, I live a pretty boring life. I go to school, come home, hang with friends, blah blah blah. Regular Jane Doe if you will. But the characters I make don't have to deal with "ordinary", no, they can be anything I want them to be. What if I always liked the idea of being a computer hacker but in real life it just never made sense to pursue it. Your character can be that without the hassle of real life getting in the way. With that in mind, what traits would fit being a computer hacker? Well for one, someone needs to have the patience for it. A person also really needs to like trial and error, so a good trait would be "experimental".  Also remember that you don't have to flat out state, "___ is patient, ___ is also very experimental". A good way to do this is to just WRITE about your character. "___ doesn't mind waiting around for results, ___ likes to see the outcome of different situations." Once you get an idea you can get a good flow going.

The third one and last one for now, "Existing Characters Expanded" is taking a personality from a character that already exists in either a show, movie, book, game whatever and turning them into your own. I suggest using this approach as an absolute last result. The best applications are the most original ones and taking personalities from established characters is anything but original. There isn't much to explain in this one, just think of a character you know and like and just adjust them as you see fit. 

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Finally Writing it All Out:

If you've finished all of the above you're pretty much already done. This section of the tutorial is just a word on how you actually WRITE it out on the application itself.

Like I said in "Different Ways to Get a Personality" you don't want to just blurt out a list of personality traits and call it a day. That's boring, unimaginative, and doesn't give any depth to your character. Think about it in the perspective of the author, if you just gave them a list of words, what are they supposed to do with that? "Great, yes I know 'lazy' is a word, so what?" For me, I tend to want to know WHY a character is lazy. I need to know the whys behind the traits and not just the whats. It gives me a better image of the character as a whole and seeing a person put that much more effort in their character makes it stand out from the other applications. So remember kiddies, don't just list the WHATS (e.g. lazy, experimental, patient) but also the WHYS (e.g. has low blood pressure that makes __ take things one step at a time, __ needs to know the outcome of events so he/she can understand a situation better/use for future reference, __ was taught at a young age that all good things are worth waiting for). 

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Things To Avoid:

So after seeing some new trends come to light in recent apps I think I'm going to add this little section in as a reminder of what authors don't really have patience for in applications. I will probably add in more later but right now this is number one on my list of "Things That Irk Me".

-No matter what genre of story you are applying for, whether it be paranormal, comedy to even girlgroup, please do not make your characters personality all about loving EXO. That is some serious lack of imagination and impossible to write about. Think about it, every chapter your character is in will just be about them fantasizing about EXO. The author will almost be writing about a sasaeng fan, and no one likes sasaengs. So please, DO NOT MAKE YOUR PERSONALITY REVOLVE AROUND EXO.

Last Note! Phew! Took me over a month to write this monster, and I'm still not sure I covered everything. This might remain a work in progress, so if I think of anything else to add, I may come and edit this chapter. But for now, I hope this helps people at least a bit when it comes to their applications.

And wow! I had no idea I gotten 12 subbies! It might not be a lot for some people, but for this being a pet project of mine I wasn't expecting any subscribers, so thanks guys! I hope you guys feel comforted in knowing you can ask me anything and I'll do my absolute best in answering any questions! Please let me know if I've been of any help! <3 감사합니다!