Understanding Your Story
If you were to write a memoir, what would the title be?
It sounds like a lot of work, doesn’t it? And the question is most certainly premature, but bear with me because the idea of the exercise of writing your memoir- even if it never sees the light of day - can be incredibly enlightening in that it gives you a great deal of insight into who you are and allows you to make decisions and lean into a better story of you moving forward. I’ll explain, but for now, let’s return to the question.
It’s a question that essentially asks you to summarize your life in a few words. Never easy. How would you even begin to know what words to choose? Here are some more specific questions that may help, or may make it more confusing. You have to make it messy before you can clean it up.
What patterns in your life have replayed that you’ve not so much overcome but changed your relationship with? (Or maybe you did overcome them. That’s OK too.)
Could you reduce your life to a metaphor? I used to think mine was about leaps. That’s why I named my practice Big Leap Creative back in 2004. My memoir might have been Take a Big Leap - (and I have not overcome the fear of leaps. It’s just something I’ve changed my relationship to)
What’s something - an emotion, a state - that you’ve achieved and others might want? This is the aspirational title.
I like to start with this question, as premature as it may seem, to see where your instinct takes you. I began our Pause in Provence retreat last month with this question. Once participants began sharing initial ideas, more ideas flowed, and everyone had at least a few to choose from.
These are gut reactions- instinctual and high-quality- yet consider them working titles and something you’ll revisit.
We’re talking about a memoir, not an autobiography. An autobiography is a comprehensive account of your life in chronological order, whereas a memoir is a curation. It’s your narrative based on a particular theme, emotional journey, or period in your life. Huge distinction there, and all too often, we lean towards telling our autobiography which, by the way, is not that interesting to the listener.
Writing a memoir lets you decide what you want to tell and how you want to tell it. Not to distort the truth or paint a rosy picture, but to take events that happened and make sense of them the way you think they deserve to be treated. This activity gives you control of your narrative and gives your life meaning and clarity. You are literally authoring your own story.
Naming the events in your life and giving them meaning with the benefit of time gives you clarity. Let’s say, for example, in college, you hated going out to parties on the weekends, but you went anyway because you thought something was wrong with you and that you were a loser for not wanting to go out. Now you can look back and notice you weren’t a loser at all; you were and are an introvert. And it would have been perfectly acceptable to say, “I’m staying in tonight. You guys go have a blast.”
In 2003, Rebecca Solnit was mansplained to before anyone knew what mansplaining was. She wrote an essay about the experience without ever using the word “mansplaining,” and the word was coined from that essay, which went viral.
Naming it gives you a nonjudgmental standard you can use to make decisions that make sense for you.
When we have the experience but not the language, it’s difficult to process. Once a thing is named, it's easier to understand, and it's easier to make decisions and behave in ways that serve us. That’s where the memoir activity takes place. You can take control of your narrative and then live into your next chapter.
So, what might your title be? And the chapters? Some of my favorite memoirs that might inspire you to work on yours:
Ari Shapiro: The Best Strangers in the World: Stories from a Life Spent Listening - If nothing else, read the introduction. A perfect distillation of his life that reframes difficult experiences into superpowers.
Abby Wambach: Forward - a great metaphor for leadership. Read this and ask yourself what is your version of each of the chapters?
What are your favorites of late? I’m doing a memoir deep dive.
*Photo: taken from Pause in Provence, which took place in September, where participants had the opportunity to work on their stories and write their next chapter.
Take care out there.
