When writing your story or novel, you will need conflict to make it more interesting. Here are some different types of conflict that you can use:
- External Conflict is a struggle with some force outside the character
- Internal Conflict is a struggle with the character's own personality, a mental struggle to overcome his or her own bad habits, to make a tough decision, to handle hardship, or some other difficult internal battle.
Once you decide which of these types of conflict you want to use - or both! - you can move on to thinking about several general categories:
- Man vs. Circumstances (the classical struggle) - the characters struggle to overcome outside circumstances in their lives, fate, destiny, etc.
- Man vs. Himself (the psychological struggle) - the characters struggle to overcome their own natures, physical limitations, moral choices, ideas of right vs. wrong, etc.
- Man vs. Man (the physical struggle) - the characters struggle to overcome a villain of some sort, a force of nature, or animals.
- Man vs. Society (the social struggle) - the characters struggle against customs and ideas of the culture they live in.
