07 The Writer’s GMC: Goal, Motivation, Conflict (and Strengths) for Creative Projects

Today Beth Barany shares about the writer’s GMC—goal, motivation, and conflict—adapted from Deb Dixon’s book "GMC: Goal, Motivation, Conflict" as a self-coaching tool for writing and other creative projects.

She describes choosing a specific, challenging “hard goal,” then explores motivations by digging beyond external outcomes to deeper reasons such as satisfaction, legacy, message, service, or recognition.

For the focus of conflict, Beth recommends inventorying internal and external obstacles like time limits, negative self-talk, judgment, overcommitment, work and family obligations, and hobbies without trying to fix them yet.

She add a fourth element, strengths, including resources, personal traits, and supports, and suggests timed brainstorming to refocus when stuck or overwhelmed.

00:00 What Is Writers GMC 

01:44 Define Your Big Goal 

03:42 Find Your Motivation 

05:25 Motivation Example - Refreshing A Book 

06:53 Name The Conflicts 

09:00 Add Strengths To The Mix 

10:35 How To Use GMC When Stuck 

11:06 Wrap Up And Next Steps

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Transcript

Speaker 0:00

Today I'm gonna talk about the writer's GMC. What does GMC stand for? That stands for goal, motivation, conflict, and I pulled that right from a book called GMC: Goal, Motivation, Conflict by Deb Dixon. Why is this important? As a writer, you are designing characters. You need to know their char- your character's goal, your character's motivation, and your character's conflict or conflicts for storytelling. Now, years ago, I took that idea and I was like, "Aha, this is great if we apply it to ourselves, to the creative process." So I wrote a book actually using that tool and many other tools, specifically the hero's journey, and I wrote The Writer's Adventure Guide: 12 Stages to Writing Your Book. This is a self-coaching guide for the creative process. So this book is still available. You can check it out. It's got a lot of great exercises in there. I today wanna explain to you what is the writer's GMC and how you can apply it to your writing as well as any creative project that you're doing. So let's go through it step at a time, and I even have an article that is a companion to this if you wanna check that out, in the show notes. I'm gonna go a little bit more in depth than what this article does because, hey, I wrote this article, gosh, nearly 20 years ago. and I've updated it. Okay, so In your writer's GMC, you can use this as a rubric, a template, a checklist for any creative project. We're gonna focus here today on your creative writing, but if you, have a creative business, I work with also with creative entrepreneurs, you could use it for that, and you could use it for small projects, bi- big projects, in between size, medium sized projects So the first thing, goal. And when I speak of goal, I mean the hard goal, the goal that is a little bit of like, ah, difficult. Not the one that's easy. Write the big goal that you're working on that feels meaty, that feels challenging, that feels, like you're up against a big, tall mountain, and you're like, "Ah, I'm not really sure going straight up, that seems awfully hard, but I need to do it," that kind of goal. So be specific. What are you working on right now? What is the shape of it? But also, what is the end goal? There you are, you're at the end of this project, where would you like to be? Or if you wanna cut it down to size, it doesn't have to be the whole project. Like a book, you don't have to put, "I wanna be publishing my book." That's great, but let's bring it down to, what is it that you're trying to accomplish today, tomorrow, this week, next week, next month? The next big chunk. Okay? So write that down. What is your goal? And What you want is to be able to look at your goal, what you've written down, and have a really clear picture for what that looks like. Like, uh, I might say I wanna finish my copy edits by, gosh, at this rate, I think I could, I could finish my copy edits in two weeks. So if I'm diligent at it. To give myself some room, I'm gonna say my goal is to get it done by the end of the month. Or I could say, if I'm writing on a first draft, which I am, also, I'll say, "Okay, my, my goal is to have a first draft ready to show my critique partners by the end of the year," for example. That project personally, I don't have a deadline on, but I do know what I'm working on. All right, next Next, motivation. M for motivation. You want to understand what is driving you. Just like we wanna know why our characters do what they do and we need to hint at that in our stories so that our readers can relate to our characters, you need to know what is fueling you, what is driving you to work on and accomplish this goal. And then what are your secondary motivations? And maybe there's even a deeper reason and another deeper reason below that. When we want to accomplish something, it's not just for the externals of it. There's a deeper reason. I've talked to a lot of writers, and they talk about satisfaction, a sense of accomplishment, leaving a legacy. All of these are, are deeper goals. So see if y- when you explore your motivation for your goal, how deep can you go? Go as deep as you can. For some, it might be about communicating a dream, a message to the world. For others, uh, they want to teach, they want to serve. Even for others, they want recognition, and they want to find... have a place in their community. So there's no right answer to this part about motivation. It's really what is the truest thing for you. So we talked about goal. What is your goal? Be as specific as possible. We talked about motivation. Be as truthful as possible, and see if you can go deep, deep into your soul and really answer the question, why is this important to you? Why is this goal, this very specific goal, important to you? Let me give you just one example. I am working on copy edits for a book that's already published. Why would I even do that? And it's not easy. Copy edits aren't easy for me, but they're necessary. So I have learned a ton, since I first published that book, and I want this book to still... I wanna be really proud of this book today. the version of me who published it years ago, that was the best I could make it. So now I wanna make it the best I can make it today, this week, this month. And really, so I can stand proud beside it because it's also a foundational piece of a larger storytelling universe that I'm involved in, and I really wanna feel like I put my best foot forward today. So I'm giving it a refresh, and I feel like I'm reconnecting and recommitting to this story world, and to the characters, and all the bigger things that are, I plan to have coming from this book, like a TV show, maybe a film, who knows? it's a big, ambitious project. So why not? I'm an independent author. I get to do this, and I'm gonna do it, and I am doing it. So it, there's a sense of bonding deeper, a recommitment ceremony, if you will, with this whole vast project and what I wanna do with it. It's my Henrietta the Dragon Slayer series. All right. So we talked about goal. We talked about motivation. Let's talk about conflict. Our characters encounter challenges on the way to their goal. That's what makes their goal hard. Same with us. We are going after our goal, and it's not easy. That's why we're doing this exercise. What is in the way? What are the challenges? What are the conflicts? There's gonna be two main categories. There's gonna be the internal, conflicts, and there's gonna be the external conflicts. Time, for example, is often feels like an external conflict, a limitation, if you will, another way of putting it, conflict, challenge, limitation. So also, self-talk. Self-talk is often a challenge. We often put ourselves down. I notice I'm constantly berating myself. Not very helpful. And I also have complainy voice inside. "Oh, this is so hard." Yes, it is hard. Okay. I'm gonna lift, li- list that down as one of my conflicts. Judgment from any quarter, judgment from within, judgment from without. Those are all conflicts. We're not trying to, we're not trying to fix anything right now. We're just noticing, acknowledging, writing it down. Also being overly busy, having a lot of commitments that maybe you're like, "Hey, I really wanna work on my book, but I have these other commitments," and it's like, and it's clashing. That's a real, a real conflict Our work obligations, our family obligations. Also hobbies. Maybe we have a lot of hobbies and writing is just, takes up some of that time, but other things take up that time. Those are real things. We're not gonna I'm not gonna judge you for that. What we're doing here is we're just taking an inventory of conflicts. We're not solving any problems right now. Because once we know, what our internal and external challenges, limitations, conflicts are, then we can take action. We can make choices. So this is a moment for taking inventory. So now we've done the goal, the motivation, the conflicts. Now what? I am not leaving you hanging. I invented a fourth component, S for strengths. Because, our characters, they need to confront their challenges to get to their goal, and we hopefully create characters that transform and grow, so by the time they are facing their biggest challenge toward the end of your story, they have also grown and transformed and gained, gained strengths and allies and the ability to do something they couldn't do at the beginning. Well, same with us. Except we're gonna harness your strengths right now. So let's take an inventory of your strengths, and Uh, the fact that you have tools, computer, phone, typewriter, pen, paper, desk, chair. These are all, I consider them strengths. they're gifts. They're parts of our life that allow us to do what we can do as writers, as creative people. Other, uh, strengths can be humor, curiosity, intelligence. I'm looking at the article, things I wrote in there. Drive. Also, another outer strength that, that you might have is the ability to schedule time to write and the ability to go and write. another one of my strengths is I have a long playlist that helps me write and that I put together. So I would call that an external strength. So there you have it. I just went through the writer's GMC, goal, motivation, conflict, and the bonus one, strengths. I recommend that you do a short brainstorm on these elements. Give yourself five, 10 minutes, or set the timer for 20 minutes, which is one of my favorite, things to do for timed writing, and just brainstorm on this. Now, any time you are stuck, confused, overwhelmed, forget, wait, where am I? Maybe you've taken a break from your writing and you're like, "What? Wait, what am I doing?" Use the writer's GMC to refocus yourself, reorient yourself, find your North Star, and take your next step. All right, everyone, that's it for this week. Write long and prosper.