Revision, Not Reinvention

Designing ourselves with intention and care

Last week, we talked about the quiet realization that many of us are living inside a rough draft we didn’t consciously author. That awareness alone can be disorienting… and liberating. If this is a draft, then revision is possible.

But revision doesn’t begin with grand declarations. That’s what New Year resolutions are for.

Our New Year revolution begins with design.

As writers, we know the difference between a character who wants something and a character who is constructed to move through the story in a particular way. Want alone doesn’t carry a narrative. A character can want many things and still remain inert on the page.

Construction is what gives desire traction. It’s the combination of values, limitations, habits, fears, and boundaries that determine how a character responds when the story applies pressure. Craft is what decides whether a character hesitates or acts, bends or breaks, compromises or holds the line.

One is aspiration. The other is architecture.

When we talk about intention in our own lives, we often borrow the language of motivation and goals. We say things like: I want to be more confident, more disciplined, more visible, more balanced. These aren’t wrong, but they’re too vague. It’s how the character behaves on the page that communicates who they are.

Values Are Character Traits

In fiction, values aren’t affirmations. They’re observable. They show up in what a character tolerates, what they protect, and what they refuse to trade away, even under pressure.

The same is true for us.

A value is not what we admire. It’s what consistently shapes our choices, especially when there is a cost. If kindness is a value, it shows up as a boundary. If curiosity is a value, it shows up as experimentation. If integrity is a value, it shows up as friction.

Designing ourselves like characters means asking different questions than we’re used to asking:

• What does this version of me prioritize when time is scarce?

• What do they refuse to do, even if it would be easier?

• What do they protect fiercely?

• What do they no longer apologize for?

These aren’t aspirational fantasies. They’re structural decisions.

Stakes, Flaws, Tone, and Boundaries

Well-crafted characters are defined as much by constraint as by desire. A story without stakes is weightless. A character without flaws is unconvincing. Tone matters. So do limits.

If we’re designing the next version of ourselves as a protagonist, we don’t need to start with perfection. Perfection is an unrealistic and boring character. We start with stakes. What matters enough to risk discomfort for?

Then come what stories often label as flaws, not as defects, but as evidence of being human. Without them, characters feel hollow. With them, they feel alive. These traits introduce tension, resistance, and consequence. These are the very things that give a story weight.

We’re not trying to eliminate these qualities. We’re learning how they function. What tendencies complicate our progress? What patterns are we learning to work with rather than eradicate?

Next is the tone. Not branding, but energy. Is this chapter of our life written in urgency, steadiness, playfulness, devotion, rebellion, repair?

And finally, boundaries. Every compelling character has lines they will not cross. Boundaries aren’t walls; they’re genre markers. They tell the story what kind of book this is.

The Next Version of Us Already Exists

This is the part that often surprises us. We don’t design the next version of ourselves from nothing. We excavate them.

Our best selves already show up in moments when we feel unusually aligned, when we say no without guilt, when our body relaxes because we’re telling the truth. When a choice costs us something but feels right.

Design, in this sense, is not invention. It’s recognition followed by commitment. This is why the work isn’t performance. It’s care. We’re not trying to become someone impressive. We already are. We’re shaping our lives so the most honest version of ourselves has room to act.

Michelangelo is attributed with saying “I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free.” Michelangelo believed the figure already existed within the stone, and the sculptor’s task was not to invent it, but to remove what was not the figure. Sculpture, for him, was an act of revelation rather than imposition.

As the authors of our own story, all we need to do is edit out the parts that are not true to us.

Intention, Rewritten Through Craft

Traditional intention-setting asks: What do I want to achieve?

Craft-based intention asks: What kind of character am I writing and what choices would make them believable?

One chases outcomes. The other establishes coherence. And coherence is what sustains us when motivation fails.

We don’t need a vision board for this. We don’t need more classes, more books, or color-coded clutter in matching bins. We need to unearth ourselves.

We need a few clear design choices. A handful of values we’re willing to protect and some boundaries we’re finally ready to stop negotiating away.

That’s how characters become real. That’s how we begin to live the story we imagine for ourselves.

Next week, we’ll talk about how to support this character structurally through environment, rhythm, and constraint so they don’t have to rely on willpower to exist.

For now, this is a design session, not a demand. We are not behind. We are not broken. We are mid-revision, holding the pen, learning how to write ourselves with intention and care.

We have a lifetime to work with.

Of interest…

• Live Workshop: Revision, Not Reinvention · January 31 · 7:30 pm (UTC-3 / local time) I’ll be hosting a one-hour guided workshop to help turn January’s posts into practical, personal revisions. Included free for paid subscribers—no action needed. If you’re currently a free subscriber, upgrading will give you immediate access. Replay included. The Google Meet link and all workshop details will be available in the paid-subscriber section of the January 31 post.

• January 2026 Makers Challenge The votes are in, and it’s a tie. For the rest of the month, find your Challenge card here.

• And as always, your Authortunities Calendar Every opportunity in this calendar is vetted for clarity, fairness, and accessibility. If it’s here, it’s something I’d feel good about recommending to a writer I care about. Find this week’s calendar here.

• Authortunities is a global newsletter with subscribers in in all 50 US states and 76 countries full of high-value, low- or no-fee opportunities that welcome writers everywhere.