Mr. Miyagi bowed. His student followed. The old teacher slapped his young student behind the head. “Look eye! Always look eye.” Daniel-san bowed with eyes glue on his teacher.

Sticky.

My favorite thing about women are their eyes. Every time I meet an attractive woman, I’ll see if I can read anything in their eyes. Is there anything stirring behind them? Any depth that’ll make them interesting? Hoping that I’ll connect to that intangible thing that sparks love at first sight.

In writing, is there anything wrong with using the eyes?

‘His eyes dropped to the floor when he learned of his daughter’s late night activities.’

Must have hurt!

‘She snapped her eyes away when she opened the bedroom door to her parents’ copious play.’

Whiplash!

‘Her clothes dropped to the floor. His eyes burned with desire.’

Smoky!

I’d read an article about using the words eye and look. The author was editing a manuscript where the word look was used every single paragraph.

I laughed out loud. “What an amateur,” I said in a British accent.

I turned to my completed manuscript, did a search for the word look, and found over 400. “Whatever!” I said in a valley girl voice. That was nothing. My word count was around 130,000.

Then I searched for more related words–glance, stare, gaze, watch, glimpse, eye, gander, squint, peek, peep, and all of the conjugated versions. Let’s just say I felt very amateurish as I squinted my eyes in anger. Fire blazed from my eyeballs to my screen.

So how do we say that someone is looking at something wihout saying he’s looking at something. Maybe like this:

He hid behind the curtain. His wife undressed. Her lover lit a candle. She giggled like a dirty girl. The strange man with a perfectly manicured five o’clock shadow unbuttoned his shirt. Two slabs of muscle bounced when he removed it.

So instead of saying he saw all this, just describe the scene. This was a huge revelation, freeing me of the looking words.

We’re so inundated with TV and movies and great actors using their eyes to communicate their lines. It’s no wonder that writers fall into the trap of having our characters glance and look at everything.

Using them is totally fine. Just don’t over use.

When I was a kid, I loved movies.  But there were certain ones that I’ve always connected to but never knew why.  Now, as I’m wiser, not necessarily more mature, I know why I loved certain movies, why I kept watching them over and over.

One day I was rummaging through a fantasy book store and came across The Neverending Story, by Michael Ende.  The book was first published in 1979 in German.  Ralph Manheim translated it to English.  I must have seen the movie dozens of times.  I loved the characters, I loved the story within the story, and I totally loved the soundtrack.  So when I saw the hardcover, I bought it.

For parents and children, this is totally appropriate.  It’s an allegory on life, and if you watch the movie with your kids, ask them what the movie means.  It’s the one thing that I don’t see parents doing is asking their kids what things mean to them.  Do it and you’ll be surprised by what you find out.

When I mentor students, I always ask what things mean, or how they feel about the experiences they’re going through.  It’s also my main tool in getting them to open up.  Eventually, they spill the beans about anything that I ask.  I need to know what they’re thinking, feeling in order to help them out.  Click here if you want to read more on talking to your children.

If you read to your kids, read The Neverending Story.  If not, then watch the movie.  Don’t have the money to rent movies, well the whole movie is on youtube:  Part 1.

While I was perusing youtube at work, don’t tell my boss, I came across the Karate Kid.  This is an interesting movie.  Not because of the awesome cat-like choreography.  To me the hero is interesting.

A normal underdog story goes something like this:  hero enters new world (town, school, wizard school), is overwhelmed by bad dude (love interest’s ex, bully, the most evilest powerfulest wizard), gets a gift (learns the way of love, learns how to fight, learns he’s a great wizard), and, voila, hero wins.

Most of the times, the bad buy is an actual bad guy.  Not in The Neverending Story or Karate Kid.  The antagonist is the hero’s disbelief in themselves.

When we look at Neverending, Bastian, the hero, must follow his inspiration, his love for books, fantasy, and story.  It isn’t until he fully gives in does he overcome the antagonist, self-doubt.  In Kid, Daniel must believe in himself.  He never got stronger, faster, or learned more karate then the bully.  The bully was never the obstacle, just the opportunity.  His teacher guided him to trust in his ability, to let go of his self-proclaimed weaknesses.  In doing so, Daniel prevailed, or what I like to term kicked ass.

I’ve always loved stories that have this undertone.  When I look at the characters I’ve written in my book, all of them at some level must deal with self-belief.  It’s the one thing I hone in on when I mentor people.   I use stories to open conversations with children, to guide them toward their passions in life, their truth.