A friend recently told me about the concepts of “default future” and “linguistic clutter”. Default future is a psychiatric term that posits that there was some “event” or series of events that occurred in your life that created a host of habits/attitudes/actions that makes you either feel safe or that you believe will keep you “safe.”

These are similar to a character’s Strongest Traits in the Character Map.  The Character’s Strongest Traits are:

– The traits the character believes are his or her salvation.

– The traits the character relies on to get out of trouble or “fix” problems.

– The traits the character leans on and uses as a crutch instead of making the Leap of Faith and facing his or her fear.

– The traits the character has to a fault.

– The traits the character must surrender.

These emotions/habits/attitudes/actions can keep you from experiencing your true self and separates you from otherwise healthy emotions. For example, if you feel “pleasing others is more important than your own happinesss” then you may resist getting appropriately angry with someone or taking healthy action because you fear that you will make another unhappy or upset.

In the example: Strong good qualities like being diplomatic or conciliatory can easily revert to Trouble Traits of being a people pleaser, swallowing anger and until resentment boils over or being passive agressive.  A character’s greatest strengths are always his or her greatest weaknesses.

Continuing the example:  The ways the character tries to appease or compensate for his or her fear only feeds the fear and makes it grow stronger and more powerful.  When the character surrenders the Strongest Traits the traits don’t just disappear. They simply operate more appropriately in the background. The character won’t cling to these traits (walking on egg shells or being overly diplomatic and conciliatory) as a crutch to try to fend off or deflect the fear. Instead, he or she will turn and face the full force of the fear head-on and realize developing healthy attitudes and acting on appropriate boundaries can make others angry or unhappy.

One way to break the pattern and spot your own “default future” is the same situation/pattern keeps coming up again and again. You end up in the same set of circumstances facing the same kind of difficulties. Do you have a mini “GROUNDHOG DAY” in your own experience?

A character goes round and round the Character Map repeating troublesome behavior and masking or denying his or her fear and until the character either falls to the Dark Side or Makes a Leap of Faith and flies in the face of fear.

One of the ways to understand and in some case identify default future thinking in yourself is through an exercise called clearing “linguistic clutter.

Here’s the process:  Take 5 minutes and without stopping write down everything that comes to mind. Write about everything makes you feel or believe that you are safe as well as everything that makes you feel unsafe.  The trick is– you can’t stop! This process is analogous to “clearing the mind of clutter” so that new ideas, attitudes, habits, patterns have a chance to emerge.  This is a really revealing exercise.  Do it everytime you feel stuck.

“In Disney Pixar’s new movie, “Wall-E,” the female heroine is a shiny all-white robot with no seams or overt buttons showing. Remind you of anything? Actually, it brings to mind most of the Apple product line.  Could this be the product-placement model of the future?”  This is a quote from an interesting newsletter article from Ad Age.

What does this have to do with screenwriters?  There is a really important lesson here.

The article goes on to say:

“The idea is that your logo isn’t going to be featured or your product isn’t going to be shown … but your essence runs through the whole thing instead… ‘How many companies could do that?’ Not too many, I think.”

A strong brand is crucial for marketers.  Apple has such a strong brand it doesn’t even need to be mentioned by name in the hit film, Wall-E. The MAC start up tone and the sleek design is all you need to say “Apple.”

Essence is defined as: the intrinsic nature or indispensable quality of something.  Synonyms are: soul, spirit, nature; core, heart, crux, fundamental quality

Every pitch you write, every character in your story and every script you finish should have an equally strong brand.  What is the soul or spirit of what you are trying to convey?  Is there an iconic image that captures this  perfectly for your script and your character?  If not, find one.

In a few seconds the audience (or executive in a pitch session) should be able to get the essential core of your story and character. One of my favorite quotes is by Albert Einstein:  “If you can’t say it simply and briefly you probably don’t understand it well enough.”

Do your understand your story and character well enough to distill them down to their most fundamental quality?  Can you convey that briefly and simply?  Do you have an iconic image that sums everything up?  What I am asking is incredibly hard.  It requires immense effort and a bit of creative genius.  You must care enough about your script to go that extra mile, if you want it to succeed.

The Nine Character Types helps distill the essence of a character and story instantly.  It helps you understand the fundamental principles at the core of your script.