Having the a recurring set of tropes to tell one's stories is not in itself a bad thing. They are part of our mental vocabulary, our great metaphors for the big ideas we wrestle with or want to explore. Consider Stephen King. How many of his stories are built around some child/young person that has become the focus/incarnation of terror. Just off the top of my head…and I really don't read King: Firestarter, Carrie, Pet Cemetery, Cujo, Christine, etc. Think about all the movies made by Humphrey Bogart or John Wayne. With rare exception they played practically the same character in every movie…change the costumes, change the names, change the situation/time, but these guys were always essentially the same in every role.
Not that I am famous, but I see similar things in my own writing…certain character types and certain tropes are bound to reappear. With me there are a lot of youth/mentor, and "magic" tree tropes even in my more literary non magical non sf stuff…and without them the stories I want to tell just don't seem to gel, as a rule...at least in longer works.
So, I would say be aware of your own common tropes/character types, but be smart about them. Once they show up, put them to work…some you emphasize, some you deemphasize, some you hide and hint at, according to the needs of the story. Some you may even find a way to keep as part of your backstory that never makes it to the page of your short story.
And in other news: Two away. Here's to hoping.
