“Show don’t tell” does not mean replace telling with simple action. The best use of “show don’t tell” has a nuance that most writers have never realized before. #showdonttell #showinginfiction #howtowriteshowdonttell #howtoshowinfiction #writingtips

Writers showing only works when psychology is attached because without it your actions are just repetitive descriptions. That matters because nobody likes being told how to feel. If I walk up to you and I tell you feel sad right now, nothing is going to happen. But if I walk up to you and I show you something sad, if I show you a video of a pet sitting at the door for an owner who's never going to come home, chances are you're probably going to feel sad. That is what psychology attached to action does, it doesn't tell you to feel sad, it gives you something to feel that sadness through. And that is when your reader is going to lean in. Most writers think showing just means writing action instead of telling. But action on its own is just a body moving through space. It describes what is happening but it doesn't tell you anything about who is doing it or why it even matters. Showing is something that is more specific than that. It's when the action and the psychology are so tangled together you can't separate one from the other. The movement itself is carrying a person's feelings. And the reader absorbs all of it without ever needing a single word of redundant narration. Let's say our character just found out that her husband is having enough fear. She's not looking for resolution and she's not looking for confrontation. She's converted that pain into a project and she's looking for justice. She pays to have the house locks changed using his money. She reports his car stolen so he'll get pulled over. She prints out his text messages the ones that are complaining about his boss and she hand delivers them to the boss's secretary. On the way home she starts by the other woman's apartment. She hands him his medications, his documents, his lists of appointments. And she looks her in the eyes and says he's your problem now. Then she goes home. This specific character's anger is not causing her to fall apart. It is driving her to dismantle. It is rage that just never gets violent. That is how this specific character shows their rage through their behavior. We could have used internal monologue to tell you exactly how you're supposed to feel about that betrayal. We could have labored that point over and over through internal monologue or internal spiraling. But that is the equivalent of me walking up to you and telling you you need to feel angry right now. Explaining to you why you're supposed to be angry. Instead we showed you something. We gave you observational information about this character's behavior and the emotion that she's feeling inside came out of that. That is only possible because we gave you something to feel it through. That is the difference between telling your reader how they're supposed to feel. Micromanaging their experience of your characters and actually giving them something to feel. When the action is carrying the psychology, the reader doesn't need a narrator to tell them anything. They are already inside the character's head and the behavior opens that door for them to come in and feel it. So before you write any action, you can ask one question. Who's psychology is this specific to? If any character in this same situation could do the same things that is not showing, attach the psychology and watch what actions arise from that.