By and large, as writers we love the characters we write. For whatever their flaws, they're the people we're choosing to spend our time with. They've become our friends. This, I think, is a danger point.

As writers, we aren't writing happy stories about happy people. If we are, 99.9% chance we aren't selling it! "Nothing proceeds in the story except through conflict." (Robert McKee) No conflict = no story.

Conflict comes from wanting something and not getting it. All the ways of not getting it, all the failed plans and paths to trying to get it. This is overlaid with the personal belief system of whether getting it should happen.

If our character is our friend, we try to protect them. If we feel like the parents, we want to shield them. If we are Santa, then we give them space to act and reward them regardless. (Has anyone EVER gotten coal in his/her stocking?)

This thinking keeps stakes low and characters flabby.

In LOM, I knew Elize had to radically change in order to actually get the outcomes she wanted in her life. The only way that could happen would require short-term agony for long-term benefit. She had to break, in every way, before she could be remade, pliable and open. In this way the mythic Hero's Journey rings true to life: pain can birth redemption and a new start.