IDENTIFY THE CONFLICT Writing a conflict statement is the most effective technique to identify a dispute. A "conflict statement" is a sentence that expresses concisely what the main character desires and what is keeping him or her from achieving that objective. It should not explain how the conflict was resolved, but rather simply state that it was resolved. 5. CLASSIFY THE CONFLICTS According to Aristotle, there are three types of conflicts: internal, external, and ambiguous. Internal conflicts involve disputes between two characters in the story; examples include husband/wife, parent/child. External conflicts involve disputes between one character and another group or individual outside of the story's fictional world; examples include feuds, wars. Ambiguous conflicts are those that can be interpreted as either internal or external; for example, a character may believe that she is acting in her best interest by doing something that appears wrong to others. There are many ways to classify conflicts, but these are the most common ones. 6. DECIDE HOW THE CONFLICT WILL BE RESOLVED By ending the story with the character still unable to resolve the conflict, we indicate that the conflict will never be resolved within the boundaries of the story. 7. DESCRIBE THE CHARACTERS IN THE CONFLICT It is important to understand who the characters are before describing their conflict.