am i making // something worthwhile // out of this chase

Buffy's Psychology & Personality
aka Five Things To Remember When Playing Buffy Summers

1.  This life chose Buffy, but she chooses to accept it.  No matter how much Buffy may feel trapped by her fate, it's a responsibility that she doesn't take lightly.  She recognizes fully well the consequences of not making use of her abilities.  This is what ultimately makes Buffy a good person - she doesn't see the option of just saying No, because it will result in good people getting hurt, while she stands by with the tools to stop it from happening.

2.  She's been there, done that.  By the end of the series, Buffy has dealt with Apocalypses (plural), died (twice), watched the people she loves die, trained girls to step into a life of destruction and death, loved and lost and loved and lost and loved and lost, and slayed fifty times more vampires and demons than she has pairs of shoes (impressive).  It takes a lot to really phase her, which is why she reacts to so much with dry wit. 

3.  What separates Buffy from Faith is her ability to connect to others, the network of positive support she's received, and the way she's able to appreciate this.  This is demonstrated beautifully in the body switching episode of S4.  At that time in her life, Buffy is in danger of forgetting that a lot of her strength comes from her friends and family.  They are what keep her grounded, keep her from becoming overly  focused on herself, give her something to fight for.

4.  Buffy is not your average girl, and she's never had a normal life.  If there's anything Buffy has missed out on, it's the experience of being a normal person.  In the past, this has been incredibly hard on her, and there are moments when she still views it with a touch of wistfulness.  But dwelling on that path leads to regretting the abilities that she has, which brings us back to point one.  Either way, it's still sometimes hard for Buffy to reconcile her own experiences with a 'normal persons' or to feel like a part of the world she fights to protect.

5.  Buffy kicks ass.  Sure, she cries sometimes over boys, same as any girl. Sure, she loves shopping and girly time with her Will.  Sure, she wants her hair and makeup to look nice.  But, in the end, Buffy's a strong female character, who's resourceful, tough as nails, focused, driven, physically adept, witty, and powerful.  She shouldn't spend more time angsting than she does pwning - even though she might use angst as fuel for slaying.  By the end of the series, having taken the Slayerettes in hand, she's much more mature, and has fully accepted her responsibilties.  

now you want to ask me 'how?' // it's like how does your heart beat // and why do you breathe?

RP Sample

Everything seemed sort of floaty, and not in a good way.  More like detached, like a balloon that a little kid let go of in the park on a sunny day.  It just floats up and up towards the bright blue sky, the sun streaming down on it, like nothing's wrong, or ever going to be wrong again.  But there's an achy look on that little kid's face as they watch the balloon leave them.  It's loss.  And it doesn't care how bright the sun is shining. 

It still feels like part of you is floating away with that balloon.

And the next part is when the kid's parental tugs on their hand and goes 'C'mon, little Tommy, let's go' and the little kid has to figure out what they're going to do now, because they're never getting that balloon back.

All these thoughts drifted through Buffy Summers' head now, as the bus rolled over rocks on the roads, small hills, leaving a bigger gap between everyone on the bus and the gaping hole that was back there.  Back where the balloon floated into the sun.

A light, talk about ironic, for him to go out in a ball of light.  She shook her head against the thought.  Wasn't light though, it was burning.  A lot more fitting, really.  Out in fire.  It conjured up the image of the balloon floating into the sun again.

She didn't want to look around, but her head moved involuntarily to survey the others, do a status check.  She didn't want to see it, knew there was pain all over the inside of this vehicle, people grieving, people still shocked.  But if she didn't bother to check on them, who would?

They were just girls.

Scratch that, she corrected herself, seeing the expressions on some of the faces gathered.  Not just girls anymore, if that's what they were going into this.

She waffled for a moment over whether to add that to the pile of victories or the running tally of losses.

Dawn caught her eye, on the other side of the aisle.  They held each other's gazes for a long moment, and then the corner of Dawn's mouth crooked up, and a smile of affection, of something like gratitude and relief, came into her eyes.

Definitely with the victory today, Buffy thought, as she returned the expression -- and the emotion.