For over a decade, I have been a player and overall fan of the tabletop roleplaying game (TTRPG) Dungeons & Dragons. I have DMed four campaigns, played nearly ever class and race, and run the D&D club at my school. While the game is fun in its own right, it has also served me a great deal in my skills as a writer and helped me better understand myself as a person. Now I’ll be going into the details of these writing skills in the YouTube video I’ll post Wednesday on my channel, so for this post I wanted to focus on how the game helped me understand some deep down parts of myself.

While D&D has something for everyone, if you are a storyteller and haven’t played D&D, or at least a similar TTRPG, then you are missing out on a great opportunity to grow. I have literally seen D&D change lives, and I think a big part of that has to do with how people are able to craft their characters and how they interact with the fictional world so closely to the inner parts of themselves.

Just to give a few examples from my own characters: I had a mountain dwarf barbarian (Redbeard) who wanted everyone to believe he was tough but he was really a big ol’ softy who loved tall women and was afraid of water; a human divination wizard (Sybil) who struggled with imposter syndrome and acted super cocky because she didn’t want anyone to know how insecure she was; a golden dragonborn paladin (Nessy) who was so over being the hero and just wanted to settle down and live a simple life but kept getting wrapped up into adventures; and a half-elf bard/druid (Valencia) who acted like a Disney princess but didn’t hold back in messing people up in semi-brutal ways, all while making up poems.

A common theme with my characters is they are pretending (whether they realize it or not) to be someone other than their true selves. They all have insecurities they mask and feel obligated to do certain things, either to win someone’s approval or because they just think they have to. Playing these characters and going through the growth of their character arcs has taught me a lot about myself. Even though all of these characters are a lot different from me (as well as each other), the deep down nuggets of truth they personify really hit home for me.

When creating these characters, there were things I wanted to do with them, like go into an unstoppable rage and throw fireballs at people, but I also put big chunks of myself in there. I have found that players actually have a really difficult time playing true to characters who don’t share persoanlity traits with them, someway somehow. You are going to be in the shoes of this character for months, possibly even years, so you need to let their truths speak through you.

Redbeard taught me my insecurities combine with whatever strengths I have to make me a whole person. Sybil taught me I should acknowledge my successes and be vulnerable when there is something I don’t understand. Nessy taught me I was feeling burned out in my career and needed to live more simply to be content. And, well, I’m not entirely sure what Valencia taught me, partially because I didn’t play her for long, but playing her in a campaign with my students helped me to bond more with them.

Whether you are playing a TTRPG, writing a story, or even playing a video game where you can create your own character, the characters we create will always find a way to speak to a part of us. It is one of the beautiful aspects of creating characters and something we should all appreciate more deeply. And if you don’t, well, maybe it’s because your too busy playing an edge lord or manic pixie dream girl. You should know all the other players at the table are annoyed with you, so stop it.