You and I, we do not see the world through perfect eyes. Our eyes are not virginal to passion, fear, hatred, happiness, seduction nor pain. To insist that we see the world in a perfect light would be only to insist that we have never truly lived. 

As humans who are flawed ourselves, there is a certain amount of respect that is given to the writers who take advantage of the dangerous ability to create characters who share in the same relative flaws that we ourselves are designed with. For this reason, it is imperative that you do not develop characters that are too perfect. It is the beautifully flawed characters that readers love to indulge in. It is the the ability to relate to imperfection that keep them returning for more. 

Essentially, it boils down to the simple fact that perfection is boring. You want your readers to be able to relate to imperfections that are existing in every day life. In reality, there are constant obstacles to overcome, wisdom to be gained and mistakes to be made; it should be no different for your characters. 

The ways in which you can bring your characters to life with imperfections are endless and limited only by your imagination. Portray your character with anger problems, as a hopeless romantic, as a cashier who despises her job, a man who is often taken advantage of because he is too kind or as someone who recently lost a loved one. It doesn’t matter how you do it as long as you do it. Your readers want to see a character who is overcoming his or her own obstacles, learning their own lessons out of life and making the same mistakes that they, too, have made themselves. You can take an entirely different route and create a character who is so deeply flawed that your readers despise him, just so long as they love to hate him. 

In the end, your characters should be real, above anything else. Readers, as well as ourselves as writers, are constantly plagued with situations that we must push through and overcome. Having that opportunity to escape from our own flaws and indulge in the flaws of another is ultimately a source of understanding that can often assist us in gaining insight to our own lives.