Character Motivation Entry: Protecting One’s Home or Property

What does your character want? This is an important question to answer because it determines what your protagonist hopes to achieve by the story’s end. If the goal, or outer motivation, is written well, readers will identify fairly quickly what the overall story goal’s going to be and they’ll know what to root for. But how do you know what outer motivation to choose?

If you read enough books, you’ll see the same goals being used for different characters in new scenarios. This thesaurus explores common outer motivations so you can see your options and what those goals might look like on a deeper level.

Goal (Outer Motivation):
Protecting One’s Home or Property

Forms This Might Take: The character protecting their…

• Home against the elements (a forest fire, a tropical storm)
• Community during a civil war or attack
• Farm from those wishing to seize their property and assets
• Property from animals or creatures intent on doing harm
• Business from rivals seeking to steal trade secrets, patents, or other information…

Human Need Driving the Goal (Inner Motivation): Safety and Security

How the Character May Prepare for This Goal:

• Investigating the enemy to better understand their strengths and weaknesses
• Attempting to work with those who represent the danger by offering something they need (supplies, information, access to resources, etc.) in exchange for not interfering
• Gathering resources (food, water, medicine, etc.) so the character can operate independently for a period of time if necessary
• Fortifying the home (boarding windows, barring doors, installing shutters, etc.)
• Installing safes, panic rooms, or other fortified areas in case the home or building is breached…

Possible Sacrifices or Costs Associated With This Goal:

• Damaged relationships with family members or neighbors who don’t see eye to eye on the path forward
• Destruction of the character’s property during an assault
• A loved one being injured or killed by intruders…

Roadblocks Which Could Prevent This Goal from Being Achieved:

• A traitor who flips and secretly helps those who are seeking to overtake the character’s home
• An well-equipped and well-manned enemy
• An patient enemy who’s willing to wait until the character is forced to give up— when resources run out or a critical need emerges, for instance …

Talents & Skills That Will Help the Character Achieve This Goal: A Knack for Languages, Archery, Astral Projection, Basic First Aid, Good Listening Skills, …

Possible Fallout For the Protagonist if This Goal Is Not Met:

• The loss of wealth, status, power, and property
• Making an enemy that puts the character in even greater danger
• The character losing their livelihood due to forfeiting their home or property…

We hope you’ve found this sample useful. To access the complete entry and our full range of thesauruses, head over to One Stop for Writers.

What does your character want, and how far will they go to achieve it?

On the surface, the protagonist’s goal seems to be the most important, but the inner motivation driving your character toward this goal (despite pain, suffering, fear, setbacks, and sacrifice) is what really draws readers in. Understanding the four cornerstones of character arc and how they frame a story is paramount for today’s writers. To help with this, we have integrated this Character Motivation Thesaurus into our online library at One Stop For Writers.

Each entry has been enhanced to provide even more information about your character’s motivation and is cross-referenced with our other thesauruses for easy searchability. We’ve also included a must-see tutorial on Character Motivation.

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