Choosing a talent or skill that fits with your character’s personality, lifestyle, and values can go a long way to helping them break free of the common stereotypes seen so often in fiction. This thesaurus will help you find the perfect quality or two that will show readers your character’s uniqueness while also acting as an asset when it comes to goal achievement.
When choosing a talent or skill, think about the personality of your character, his range of experiences and who his role models might have been. Some talents might be genetically imparted while others are created through exposure (such as a character talented at fixing watches from growing up in his father’s watch shop) or grow out of interest (archery, wakeboarding, or magic). Don’t be afraid to be creative and make sure the skill or talent is something that works with the scope of the story.
Psychokinesis
Description: the ability to move objects using only the power of one’s mind
Beneficial Strengths or Abilities: having control of one’s emotions, being able to enter and keep a meditative state even when there are distractions, being highly knowledgeable in chakras (nodes of life force energy in the body) and how to manipulate that energy…
Character Traits Suited for this Skill or Talent: focused, open-minded, determined, centered, spiritual…
Required Resources and Training: training exercises with a paper psi wheel (using it as a focus center to visualize being one with it and then using one’s psychic energy to move the psi wheel), being mentored by a teacher who has mastered the chakra healing…
Associated Stereotypes and Perceptions:
- in real life, many believe that people who claim to have psychokinetic abilities are simply sleight-of-hand masters
Scenarios Where this Skill Might be Useful:
- In situations where one must collect or gather something beyond reach (jail cell keys, pickpocketing for one’s survival, stealing food to eat, pulling a weapon toward oneself for defense, etc.)
- When something requires maintenance or fixing but it is too dangerous to be close to (a machine within range of a radiation leak, drawing blood from a patient who is under quarantine, working with toxic chemicals or bio hazards in the lab
- Working with animals that are dangerous, untamed or simply just afraid (being able to slip a noose over a rabid dog’s head without being bitten as a dog catcher, etc.)…
Choose a talent or skill that makes your character memorable and helps them achieve their goals.
If this is something you’d like to learn more about, you might find these resources helpful. You can also see the full collection of talent and skill entries in their entirety at One Stop For Writers, where all our thesauruses are cross-referenced and linked for easy navigation. If you’re interested in seeing a free sampling of the Talent and Skill Thesaurus and our other descriptive collections, head on over and register at One Stop!
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.
:Donna Marie says
I’m with Traci—there’s definitely a fear factor when thinking about this trait, but it can be really useful in fantasy and sci-fi 🙂
ANGELA ACKERMAN says
Yes, definitely this one is a talent that could do harm and good, making it a good choice for a protagonist or a villain. 🙂
Traci Kenworth says
This is a scary but useful trait to give a character.
Michelle says
Great reminder to make sure your character’s trait fits within your story.