Technique Tuesday: "Thought" Verbs

Nuts and Bolts: "Thought" Verbs

In six seconds, you'll hate me. But in six months, you'll be a better writer. From this point forward - at least for the next half year - you may not use "thought" verbs. These include: Thinks, Knows, Understands, Realizes, Believes, Wants, Remembers, Imagines, Desires, and a hundred others you love to use.

litreactor.com

Thinking is abstract. Knowing and believing are intangible. Your story will always be stronger if you just show the physical actions and details of your characters and allow your reader to do the thinking and knowing. And loving and hating.

I'm a big fan of Chuck Palahniuk, so I found this essay to be very valuable, even if I don't always apply it to what I'm writing (Palahniuk can be very over the top, but that's his style; it's important to find wiggle room for your own voice when taking writing advice from anyone, and he'd probably be the first to remind you of that). It's an excellent explanation of how to apply "Show, Don't Tell" to your writing, and how to inject emotion and personality into actions. I think even if you end up not wanting to use this technique exactly as it's shown, it will still change the way you look at your writing (and reading, and probably editing), and might help in the long run.