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You may not have known it, but by having your high fantasy character blow out birthday candles on their birthday or saying "bless you" after someone sneezes, you're creating a huge continuity problem. A lot of everyday actions or phrases have actually stemmed from religion. OUR real-world religions. Crossing your fingers for good luck came from CHRISTIANITY, because it symbolized the cross upon which Jesus was crucified, i.e., it's lucky. If you have you create a brand new world with its own people, histories, and religions, it makes NO sense for them to cross their fingers for luck, because Christianity doesn't exist in that world. That's just one example of many.

So when world building, not only should you come up with your own superstitions that link to the religions, customs, and histories of your made-up world, you have to be careful not to insert superstitions from our own real-world cultures into the story.

Watch the video in the sidebar for 32 superstition origins to get ideas for your own made-up superstitions and to see if you're being a little too real-world for your fantasy/paranormal/sci-fi/not-real-world world.

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