My story probably thinks I'm a wuss

Ok, so, I've been plugging along at the whole "Ooh, I really want to be a writer, so I better come up with some good ideas" thing now for like 3 years (rull long, I know).
I have come up with literally 10's of good ideas, but the problem is, they usually get relegated into my "Maybe someday that'll fit with something else that will make it a whole story pile" because none of them have ever been complete.
My newest idea is my first one that I feel has all the necessary equipment available to turn it into a story, with one problem: it deals with religion, and the way that I am thinking about it, it is probably going to be basically antithetical to everything that I believe.
It's pretty much burned in my brain, and I'm pretty much going to write it, but I'd like to know, has this ever happened to anyone else, and if it has, how did you handle it?
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Modern, Minimal, Cluttered.

This has happened to me on a couple of occasions. I decided to try and write about it anyway even if it was against any/everything I believed in. It turned out to be a pretty good learning experience for me.
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"I think I'm falling in hate with you babe." -Me =]

My story, me wuss

That's kind of what I thought, thanks for replying. I figure if nothing else, it'll at least get me through the initial stages of story design thing. Plus, I figure fiction is supposed to be challenging anyway- otherwise, what's the point?
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Modern, Minimal, Cluttered.

Re: My story probably thinks I'm a wuss

ShopCartBandit wrote:

it deals with religion, and the way that I am thinking about it, it is probably going to be basically antithetical to everything that I believe.

Can one write without believing?
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Your religion, you miserable man, begins in your stomach and ends in a lavatory - Nodar Dumbadze

Re: My story probably thinks I'm a wuss

lisa wrote:

ShopCartBandit wrote: it deals with religion, and the way that I am thinking about it, it is probably going to be basically antithetical to everything that I believe. Can one write without believing?

Can one believe without writing? I think that's the real question.

The crux of the issue

I think that's the whole point of the question- can you write something without believing it?
I think what I was feeling when I first posted was, I have a story idea that is probably going to be challenging for me from a philosophical standpoint, mainly because I wasn't sure if I wanted to necessarily shoe horn myself into a camp of belief by writing something simply because I finally had a good idea.

When you write something, is that what happens? I know fiction is a reflection of it's writer, but what happens if you hold up the mirror and don't recognize what you see? Also, what happens if you see a giant robot chicken?
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Modern, Minimal, Cluttered.

Let's hope it's not really a mirror, if that's what you see...

I suppose it makes it easier to write what you believe
but you can probably wing it as long as it's not in direct opposition-
like the time my mother asked me to help her write an anti-abortion paper-
FYI, I refused...

There is some interesting research (my psychology side coming out) that suggests that if you want someone to be on certain side of something, have them defend that side.

So students in a debate class who are asked to defend an anti-abortion standpoint (as that was just mentioned) would have more positive feelings towards that standpoint after defending it. I can't recall the name of the phenomenon, but it is pretty interesting.

If you refuse to write from a point of view, or moral philosophy, that you do not subscribe to....how will you ever have believable antagonists? You can't just have everyone agreeing, and the only counter arguments are made of straw and easily dismissable - that's only half a story. Where's the conflict?

In terms of holding your book up to a mirror.....are you writing fiction or auto-biography? In my mind, in this case, a writer and an actor can be synonymous - you are not playing You, you are playing the character. And oftentimes, with acting, writing, playing music, etc.... it is that sense of vertigo, that strange queasiness of walking the tightrope, that brings out the best in you, and your characters. Some of the best performances come when the actor stretches - when Harrison Ford plays the bad guy, or when Charlize Theron plays ugly psychopathic white trash.