Stories Instead of Stuff

It's the stories behind the stuff
we keep that matter most.

So claims Jill Gleeson in a recent Woman’s Day article entitled How I got Rid of My Parents’ Junk Without Throwing Out a Lifetime of Memories. I agree, with a twist she did not include.

Jill wrote a poignant article that speaks to most of us beyond a certain age, and perhaps to our children who will have to deal with our collected remains, sooner or later. She describes a sorting process she went through with her father to separated junk from treasure.

Still at the end of the article, it sounded like she had half a warehouse of old stuff still sitting around, waiting for her to find it a new home at some point.

Perhaps she missed a crucial point here. She seems to be talking about stories in her head, and she has made no provision for those stories to live on. Also, her future housing costs will be higher as she seeks space for tangible memories. Here’s a solution that would prevent her from needing a warehouse in the short term and allow those stories to live on to inform future generations:

Take pictures and write stories!

This is also a way to let family members share treasures without having physical custody. The stereo slide you see below is one example from my family.

It is one of a set of a dozen. This particular slide shows my father’s parents on a hill in western Oklahoma shortly after their marriage. Only one set of originals exists, but about ten years ago I scanned those originals, making digital copies that could be printed if anyone cared. My brother has the originals and lots of us have copies.

My siblings and I know the story of these slides. Our children might, but it’s less likely they’ll mean anything to later generations. That’s where Story comes in. In a  nutshell, that story begins with my grandfather’s early fascination with photography, both stereo and standard. The story threads its way down generations to several of  my grandchildren who are avid photographers today.

I’m now prompted to wrap those slides in a PDF story package about the history of photography in Ben Melton’s family.

This photography story spans generations. A picture of my mother’s favorite broach would be more specific. I might include details of how she wore it to church and how lovely it looked on her green crepe wool dress, and how thrilled I was when she let me wear it on a special date.

If you click the Stories tab on the menu bar above and select Grabbing Granny's Dishes, you can read a story with a picture of my grandmother’s ivy dishes that now live in my cabinet and the rest of the family can share via pictures. The story tells how I got them too, which makes me smile each time I lift them off the shelf and remember that event.

It’s also worth including pictures of ordinary objects like black Bakelite dial telephones or saddle oxfords. How about various cars your family drove? Your old bike? You can find these photos online to create a digital family museum archive.

Clean out your closets and attic, basement, or garage right now.  Celebrate your memories in photos and stories. Clog hard drives rather than closets and keep the memories alive as times change!

When Memories Morph

I’m gobsmacked. I pulled up this picture of my kid sister in that ancient stroller/ walker. I planned to stick it in an email to a cousin to illustrate a story snippet about our  grandfather and my dad the day they poured a big square concrete pad in that back corner. I was three at the time, and I remember that while he smoothed concrete, Granddaddy smelled like whiskey and cigarettes, the point of my story to Cuz. That pad served two doors, the one you see, and one you don’t. The second should be around the corner to the left. That second door opened into the dining area. Or so I’ve always thought. Until today.

I strained toward my screen in bewilderment. Where is that door!?  I KNOW it was there! Holy cow! How can this be? I mentally scramble inside that small dining room on a day before my mother and grandmother knocked a wall down while the men were out hunting. Before the wall came down, Mother had her sewing machine in that room along the soon-to-vanish wall. Until this very minute, I would’ve sworn to you that the door was behind her left shoulder as I sat facing her on the floor to her right, making tangles in thread while trying to sew.

Okay. I get it. The door was never there. I edit it out of memory and the picture still looks right. My earliest memories are in that Albuquerque house where we lived until I was six. This is not the first mind-shattering discovery about memories of that yard. Previous pictures have shown my sandbox was not where I remembered it being, and a willow tree did not have two of its four trunks amputated. What gives?

I have no idea why I remembered these things wrong, but neuroscience is no help here. This just happened. No need to explain. These morphed memories are not just a factor of my young age when they formed. Like most everyone, I’ve learned through the years that my memory often differs from what others remember, and I’ve seen evidence to back those others up more than once. The question is how that affects my story. I ask myself these two questions:

Does it matter? In the case of this house, yes. It matters to me to stick with the evidence and note that my memory was different. Since I have no emotional attachment to the earlier memory, it’s an easy switch. If no evidence is at hand when my sister and I remember a room color differently, I might flip a coin or stick with my version. If details change the truth of the story, they matter.

When it does matter . . . If I discovered I was wrong about something I was emotionally invested in, something that did change the truth of a story, things would become more complex. Using a hypothetical example, let’s say that while Nora was settling her father’s estate, she was stunned to discover documents proving that her mother was his second wife. He’d been married for several years and divorced before he met Nora’s mother, and furthermore, Nora has half-siblings she never knew about.

That extreme example would set off a hurricane of memories and emotions ─ and maybe research ─ leaving a new story in its wake. In stories about her father, Nora may choose to honor her original memories of her dad as a staunch church member and strong advocate of family values, then reflect back on them in the light of what she’s learned and what it all means to her. Perhaps her story would focus on how things changed. But if she wrote stories exclusively within the period before learning this fact, she may choose to write from the perspective of what she believed to be true at the time.

So whether you remember wrong or learn something new, memories morph. When you discover discrepancies, it’s your choice whether to make that discovery part of your story or the focus of your story, or to honor the truth of the memory that shaped your life and made you who you are. It’s your story. Write from your heart and be true to your Story.

The Gap Between Family Legend and Fact

With respect to family history, legends are those stories that survive through generations, like Grandfather Flynn was a Methodist circuit rider, or Uncle Roger fought with Pancho Villa, or Grandma Flowers single-handedly fought off Indians with an empty gun while her husband was out plowing.

The legends tend to be headline length and seldom have much substance. They contain the hook of a good story, but more often than not, the story has come off the hook. If you like the legend, you may prefer to keep the hook and forget the story, and that’s okay. Just know it’s a choice. If you’re a stickler for facts, you’ll check things out, and that’s getting easier to do.

The clipping above is related to a  legend about my maternal grandmother. I’ve known most of my life that she (not my grandfather, but she) was a delegate from New Mexico to the Republican National Convention in both 1952 and 1956. I was proud of her for that. Somewhere along the line I heard that she started the New Mexico Republican Women’s organization.

Last summer while visiting a cousin, I copied the clipping above. A couple of days ago I found the copy and took the time to read it. That clipping seemed to validate the fact that she really was head of Republican Women. Turning to Google, I discovered that Stockton ran for Governor in 1954, and the Republican State Convention took place the end of February that year. So the picture was surely from that Convention.

I flashed back to a memory of a thumbnail story my grandmother told me in 1987, 33 years after that picture was taken. We were talking about her involvement with the Republican Women and she said, “Ed Mechem (a long-time family friend who began his first term as governor in 1951) asked me to help him get them started and I said yes.” That’s not much of a story now that I think of it, and it has a lot of holes, but I didn’t notice that at the time and didn’t think to ask questions.

So I clicked over to Google and discovered that a huge movement was begun in 1952 to get women to vote for Ike. That muddied the water floating my legend. I felt stymied. After finding her contact info online, I shot off an email to Jo Mitchell, current president of the New Mexico Republican Women. I included the clipping and what I thought I knew about my grandmother, including that “fact” that she worked with Ed Mechem to found the NMRW.

Jo promptly sent a long and thoughtful reply explaining that the organization actually began in 1939 and that Rene Dinsmore’s name was not on the complete list of presidents. Furthermore, Jo pointed out, the article does not say what she was elected chairwoman of. Most likely she was the state chairwoman for the party. If she’d been in charge of Republican Women, she would have been elected president, and not by the State Committee. As state chairwoman, she would have gone to the convention. That makes sense.

I’m grateful to Jo for the time and effort she put into her reply. I love the helpful spirit I generally find when I ask for this sort of help. Her explanation makes total sense. Discovering the communication disconnect doesn’t damage the story. On the contrary, the revised version is more consistent with my perception of my grandmother, so I’m pleased she set things straight.

This small disconnect is a perfect example of how we hear through the filters of what we already know – or think we know. I thought Grandmother was involved with Republican Women, so I heard her explanation that way and read the news item from that perspective. We hear a tidbit and our imagination goes to work, embellishing or coloring in details. Over generations, these legends may shape shift like messages in the game of Telephone.

In the end, what does any of this matter? Not much. I enjoy untangling stories, and I enjoy writing and telling them. I like to tell my grandchildren about my grandparents and older ancestors to connect them with history and help them feel rooted in a sturdy tree. I want them to know that our family has survived, one way or another through thick (many ancestors were wealthy a few generations ago) and thin (the Civil War and the Great Depression depleted those fortunes). I want them to know that many of their ancestors started with nothing or less and went on to thrive and enjoy success. I want them to know that many of us, perhaps most, have dared to be different and march to our own drummers.

I like to stick as close to the facts as I can, but I do admit that I will let at least one family legend stand unchallenged. I love the legend too much to risk deflating it. So I explain that it may be fiction when I tell it, and include the evidence of why I think it could be true.

What about you? What family legends do you cherish? What about those you don’t? Have you hit the web to look for facts? Do tell! Jot a comment now and stories for your family.

Lessons from Old Acquaintances

In a post on the Daily OM website, Madisyn Taylor sets the stage for a magnificent writing opportunity:

. . . when fate brings old friends back into our lives, there is always a reason. They may act as messengers, reminding us of a part of ourselves we have forgotten to nurture. They might appear to give us a chance to react in a new way to an old situation. They may even bring up unresolved issues so that we may complete them, giving us the chance to move forward on our life path.

Write on Madisyn! She attributes the reappearance of old friends to fate. But who cares how we explain it? You don’t have to subscribe to any particular belief system to see that however they reappear and whatever the reason, they can indeed offer learning opportunities. In fact, so can casual acquaintances and arch enemies.

I have good news. You do not have to have direct contact with these people to learn from them. They don’t even have to be alive. Memory is enough, perhaps even better, because it reflects only your reaction and reality, and that’s something you can work with. You can safely meet anyone on the page.

Give it a try. Think of a stimulating or challenging relationship from your past. Spend a few minutes replaying memories. Then get out pen and paper and reconnect on the page using questions like these:

• How do I feel about this person and memory? Name the feeling(s)
• What happened to cause me to feel that way? Was it something I did or someone else?
• Would I feel the same way if it happened today?
• What do I know now that I didn’t know then? How have my attitudes and beliefs changed?
• How else can I look at the situation? About others involved, circumstances and/or self
• What would I do differently if a genie gave me do-overs?

Use the list as suggestions. Each situation is different. Chose your questions to fit the occasion. I do recommend writing by hand at this early stage. Research has shown that writing by hand activates most of your brain while keyboarding engages mainly the frontal part. Hooking in those extra brain cells is likely to trigger richer memory and detail and flesh out the heart of your story. Keyboarding is fine for the craft.

When you feel finished with questions, you’re ready to turn your responses into story, incorporating insights you gained from the list. For example, nail the original memory with something like, Trixie called me a coward. I turned and walked away so nobody would see me cry.

Then add insight and proposed do-over: Eventually I realized that she was a bully, and I should have stood my ground. Today I’d ask, “Trixie, I’ve never seen you do that. Go ahead. Do it. Show me how brave YOU are.” Or something like that. I’d speak calmly, but firmly. When you write your version, flesh out the scene with  more context and detail to give readers a full experience.

At least two powerful things are likely to result from this exercise. First, the new power response will be embedded in that memory, probably forever. Each time you recall that event, you’re going to feel stronger, some would say healed.

Then, assuming you share your story with your writing group, family members or friends (and that’s strictly voluntary), they are likely to benefit from your insight. They may remember and re-view a similar circumstance to their benefit. Or they may learn from your example and be better prepared to deal with a situation that has yet to arise.

Come to think of it, I feel ready now to write about a dysfunctional company I worked for twenty years ago. If I had written about it then, I would have done so primarily from a victim perspective. Today, after years of sporadic journaling, I realize how naïve I was at the time and see many things I could have done to improve at least my corner of that messy world. Twenty years ago I thought of writing an exposé, but I was afraid I’d sued by that major corporation. Writing from today’s more informed perspective, I’m certain I could safely publish a compelling, beneficial account. But the moment has passed. My memory of that time has dimmed, and other stories seem more compelling. I’ve learned what I need to know and that’s enough.

Lessons Learned about Lifestory Writing, Part 2

My previous post gave the background for lessons I’ve learned about lifestory writing since The Heart and Craft of Lifestory Writing was published ten years ago. This post continues the list.

5) Stories without shadows are flat — It’s not easy to share stories about embarrassing or hurtful memories. But these are precisely the stories that add heart and connect with readers. Shadows add the third dimension to stories.

6) When you change your perspective on life and the past, life changes – several years ago as I began writing about growing up in Los Alamos, I hesitated. How could I write about my chronic feelings of being outside the group, of not fitting in and being different? I did not want my classmates to know they had hurt me, and I didn’t want to make them feel bad or sound like a victim. Using tools I’ve described in previous posts and will include in my new book, I realized most of those feelings were in my head, based on my assumptions and perceptions. I felt like the door to a  prison cell opened and began discovering legions of others felt the same way.

7) Sharing our stories connects us with others – My term for daring to show emotional vulnerability in writing or daily life is “baring your belly” in the sense of exposing  a vulnerable body part. Baring your belly takes trust and guts. It is true that a few readers may sneer at perceived weakness or feel squeamish. Far more will relate and feel empowered to bare their own bellies in story.

8) Neuro-science based guidelines for connecting with readers – A growing body of research relevant to writers is rendered approachable by authors like Lisa Cron. In her book, Wired for Story she translates the technical into easily understood strategies. She provides clear, convincing strategies for grabbing readers by the eyeballs as mirror cells wake up in their brains. Active mirror cells create an effect much like total immersion in a holographic version of the author’s experience. Learning how this works and how to apply it is a work in progress.

9) Writing is good for your health — After The Heart and Craft of Lifestory Writing was published, I learned of the work of James Pennebaker, whose pioneering research on the healing power of expressive writing has been replicated hundreds of times. These studies uniformly show that writing about traumatic, troubling memories, even for a short period of time, helps resolve those memories and improves physical and mental health in countless ways. My archived blog, Writing for the Health of It, includes dozens of posts on this topic.

10) Lifestory writing can be transformational for writer and readers alike – Wouldn’t it be awful if we had to learn every life lesson first hand? Who wouldn’t prefer to learn lots of the tough stuff by reading about someone else’s experience? Quite possibly the plethora of survivor memoirs today is due in large part to brave pioneers who began the trend of what several have called “writing themselves naked.” If someone else overcame (addiction, abuse, incest, deaths of dear ones, etc.), readers may be inspired to do likewise.

Note that this list does not include additional mastery of topics like writing dialogue or description or piecing stories together along a story arc. I’ve made no mention of creating eBooks, selling books, or other technical skills. Those are craft topics. I’ve stuck to the heart of lifestory writing in this list.

I would not have learned any of these lessons if I hadn’t gotten my fingers moving all those years ago. Writing, especially life writing, is a lifelong journey. If you haven’t begun yet, pick up a pencil or head for your keyboard NOW!

Preserve a Record of Life As It Was

Believe it or not, this post is not about politics. It’s about change. Regardless of your political position or beliefs, you’d have to be living in a deep jungle to be  unaware how fast things are changing. It’s too soon to say if life will be better for Americans in general or if some form of Armageddon is at hand as current headlines seem to suggest. Heavens above, collecting those headlines today for the collage you see above was an anxiety-laden task!

For better or worse, I’m betting on the end of life as we’ve known it. It’s already drastically changed from what I knew as a child.

In any case, it’s time to preserve memories of the past. WRITE ABOUT LIFE AS YOU HAVE KNOWN IT. You can’t count on history books to tell it like it was for you. History is always written through filters, and those filters change over time, subject to prevailing culture. If lifestyles in the future are an improvement, let your progeny know how much better it is.

On the other hand, if, as some fear, tyranny is at hand, preserve a picture of freedom. Keep its memory alive.

I am convinced that it’s important for families to create personal archives, and to keep print copies as well as backups in pdf format on DVD disks or thumb drives. What if the internet came tumbling down? What if libraries full of books were burned? What if …?

No, I do not anticipate a Doomsday scenario, but … what if?

In addition to preserving your memories of the past and what life was like, share your reflections about it. I’m not writing about politics and my personal beliefs here, but I am writing piles of journal entries and essays that aren’t public, but will be available for family. I want my grandchildren to know what I believe, what I feel, what actions I’m taking.

Writing prompts for preserving a picture of life in the past

• How much freedom did you have as a child? Did you freely roam the neighborhood? Ride your bike across town when you were 10 or 12? Play hide-and-seek with the neighborhood gang after dark in the summer?
• What did you do to pass the time before computers and electronic games? Did your family play cards or other games together? Do crafts?
• What was it like to cook real food from scratch without frozen entrees?
• Did you go to church? What were/are your beliefs?
• What political party did your parents support (if any)?
• Were you ever involved in any protests or demonstrations? Which ones? How and what did you do?
• Did you or your dad ever change the oil in the family car or fix a flat tire on t he road, or do other maintenance?
• What was medical care like? Were you ever in the hospital? How much did it cost when your children were born?
• How have your views changed over the years?
• What are your views on the corner our country seems to be turning right now? What was your position on the 2016 election? Keep a log of your thoughts as things unfold.

This mini-list should get your wheels turning.

Don’t put this off another minutes. Write fast. Write off the top of your head. You may edit it later, but get it on paper, write now!

Tell a Story, Change the World

Carmen Murasan changes hearts, and perhaps someday the world, by telling stories. She changed my heart as she spun stories about Romanian history, lacing them strongly with perspective and personal insight.

I met Carmen at the conclusion of a Vantage river boat tour of the Rhine and Danube that ended in Romania. She lives in Brasov and served as our local guide during the time we spent in Transylvania. Our local guide in Bucharest had painted a slightly cynical picture of Romania’s past and present, presumably also its future. She left me wondering why she’d chosen to return after living elsewhere for years.

Carmen was the perfect antidote. She’s passionate about life and passionate about Romania. She had our Orange Bus group howling like werewolves at every opportunity, baffling the Blue Bus group the first few times they heard us, and she punctuated her points with hugs and kisses for everyone at frequent intervals. She added brilliance and focus to the seductive beauty of Transylvania. How could we not listen to her stories and absorb her passion?

For example, consider the way she developed the story of Count Dracula, also known as Vlad, the Impaler. “It’s not fair to judge Vlad in light of twenty-first century values. You must understand conditions back then and the way he was brought up....” By the time she was finished, I got it. Not that she turned him into a saint, but I did understand his logic and the protective effect it had on Transylvania’s history.

During the course of the cruise from Bonn to Bucharest, we stopped in so many cities, towns and villages that they’ve begun to blur together, but especially as we cruised down the Danube from Vienna into former Eastern Bloc countries of Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia, Serbia, Bulgaria and Romania, our local guides’ stories became intense. We heard tales of millennia of invasions and the violence of World War II. Accounts of more recent Balkan conflict horrified us. We heard personal accounts of genocide and ever-present anxiety over possible attempts to form a new Ottoman Empire.

My hair stood on end as our Croatian guide told of suddenly being sent alone to a children’s camp in Germany for what turned out to be six months while most of his extended family was shot in a mass execution of Croatians. Fortunately his parents survived. Every guide after Vienna told a personal story of life under Communist rule and later liberation. Each story left an imprint on my heart.

Not all stories were verbal. Buildings stood as silent testimony. Great progress has been made toward restoring the damage caused by bombing and decades of neglect, but most notably in Bucharest, far too many stand like rotting teeth in a brilliant smile, constant reminders of the past and work yet to be done. How starkly eastern Europe contrasts with western cities rebuilt by the Marshall Plan. Taken together, the two halves of Europe bear testimony to the ability of the United States to implement the Marshall Plan to rebuild our former enemies while thriving ourselves.

Story is the operating system our human brains use to make sense of life and the world we live in. We’re constantly creating and editing stories to incorporate new information and experience. I’ve encountered a river full of small stories that beg to be woven into a larger one. My former view of the world has burst open like the shell of a growing lobster. A new view will take time to become clearn and solid. This blog post is one small step in achieving that end.

I'm endlessly grateful that Carmen Murasan’s stories were the last ones I heard. Her optimism and joy for life form a pillar for anchoring and focusing others.

Carmen shares her stories with legions of visitors to Romania from around the world, and I feel certain she changes each of their hearts. Hopefully as we each share our take on her stories, and I share mine on others I’ve heard, the ripple effect will kick in, and the world will become a better place. Perhaps, just maybe, one day she’ll begin writing those stories and touch even more people.

How has hearing new stories from others changed your heart, life and stories? Write about it! 

Memoir Writing Lesson from Fiction

Fiction can offer powerful insights for memoir writers. I just began reading a classic historical novel, Divine Average, first published in 1952 by Elith Hamilton Kirkland. Like many novels, it’s written in memoir format, in this case an end-of-life memoir. It’s set in 1838-1858 in “that period of Texas history when ‘cow boy’ was a phrase with a controversial meaning and ‘Texians’ a nationality.

The second paragraph stopped me in my tracks:

I feel compelled at this time by the Spirit of the Holy Mother and the force of God to leave an account of the things that have happened to me and mine. It all lies on my heart like a confession that must be made before I can die in peace . . . a confession not only for myself, but for my husband, Range Templeton, who despises me now after loving me for twenty years, for my daughter Laska, lost to us and to herself, a companion to outlaws in the wilds of Mexico, and for my son, Luke Templeton, so bold of mind and pure in heart.

I know right away that Luvisa Templeton, “a consumptive, soon to die,” is confessing all for peaceful death, which she’s looking forward to “as deliverance.” This compelling reason to write creates a compelling reason to read. What juicy secrets is she about to divulge? What better way to hook my attention?

She immediately goes on to explain her time frame – the twenty years of her marriage to Rage Templeton – and her frustration at never being able to understand him. That sounds like a rich topic.

She then explains that she’s not penning this tome herself. She’s dictating it all to Mr. Bryson, a “very close friend to every member of the Templeton family,” which relationship she’ll explain in due course. Bryson is literate, articulate, better able than she to find the right words for her thoughts and feelings. Bryson has promised to place the completed manuscript “in the proper hands with instructions that it be preserved until such time as it might seem fitting to give it out for reading, in a book perhaps.” She continues:

Is it too much to hope that in some future generation these events may stir the minds and warm the hearts of men and women destined to know more and see further than those of us here now? Perhaps I attach too much importance to the life I have lived and the lives of which my living has played a part. But I yield completely to the compulsion that I must leave such a documentation. 

Like Luvisa, many of us write because we’re compelled to do so. In heeding that compulsion, we’ll do well to follow her fictitious example on several counts:

• Be clear about why you are writing and
• Who you are writing for.
• Be clear about the frame for your story, in her case a twenty year marriage and
• The story focus or theme, in her case what happened to her and hers. 
• Have a strong, compelling opening. 
• Get the tension/conflict going right away, in her case her husband who loved her for twenty years despises her now. Why? How did her daughter come to be in Mexico with outlaws?
• Seek help when you need it. Luvisa used Mr. Bryson, a sort of ghost writer. You may choose to use an editor, beta readers, reading groups, friends, even family to help you on your way. 
• Have a strong, compelling opening. 
• Postpone distribution if you feel it unwise to disclose it all now. 

Points to Ponder: Do you have a story you’re compelled to tell? Can you identify the frame and focus? What help might you need to get it written? 

I’m in Love with Volya Rinpoche

I never expected to fall in love with Volya Rinpoche, a bald, squarely-built Russian quasi-Buddhist monk who dresses in gold-trimmed maroon robes and sandals, has skin the color of acorns, and is a world-renowned spiritual leader and author. Neither did Otto Ringling, the narrator of Breakfast with Buddha, Lunch with Buddha and Dinner with Buddha, a trilogy of mind-bending, possibly life-changing novels by Roland Merulo . But who could resist that heart-melting smile, that endless compassion and infectious laugh? His naïve observations and whiplash fast “wessons?”

But wait. Nothing kinky here.As the story begins, Otto’s whacko, forever hippie sister tricks him into taking a road trip alone with this monk, her latest love interest. As miles and days pass, their relationship grows and Otto decides the Rimpoche is “the real deal.” Between volumes, monk marries sister, plots thicken, and Otto evolves. The novels are poignant in places, hilarious in others, always thought-provoking, and sublimely well-written. Otto’s acute observations on history, geography, philosophy and food are meticulously detailed.

I’ve always encouraged students of lifestory or memoir writing to read widely, to read like a writer, to find authors whose style they admire and immerse themselves in their work. Roland Merullo is my new hero behind the page. These digital volumes are full of pink highlights for exquisite description and gold ones for powerful points.

Although these volumes are clearly fiction, drawn from Merullo’s fertile imagination, they read like memoir. They are among those remarkable titles I occasionally find that convey Truth in concentrated form, more potent than most actual life experience could support. I consider them a prime example of the power of the fiction alternative.

The Buddha books came into my life at the perfect time (who believes in coincidence?). Over the last few months our nearly completed move from Pittsburgh to Austin has become unexpectedly complex and stressful, full of fretting and fear and second-guessing. I was convinced I had neither time nor the concentration to read. In spite of these self-imposed barriers, a book with a Buddha title slipped through the cracks.

I didn’t have time to not read these books. They reminded me of wisdom I’ve accrued over at least forty years, much of which I’ve ignored for the last many. They reminded me that I’ve largely fallen away from soul-enriching practice. They reminded me we can choose our reactions, our thoughts. Along the way, they altered and added perspective. I feel better now, stronger, and ready to forge ahead! Thank you Roland Merullo!

This is not the first time books have restored or enriched my soul and nudged me around corners. Should I include any of these time periods in a memoir, for example this move, it could not be complete without mention of these three books and their influence. I could take things further. Pat Conroy, perhaps best known for his novel, The Great Santini, wrote My Reading Life, a themed memoir devoted to books that have molded and shaped him.

What better time to snuggle down and read than these days of early darkness, of golden leaves and frosty mornings? Find an author you love and read ‘til your eyeballs cave in. Make highlights in ebooks. Put sticky tags in print ones. Collect heart-stopping phrases and notable elements of structure.

Write on: start a list of books that have affected your life and thinking. Write about these in your journal and develop your thoughts into an essay. Add a few of your favorite titles to a comment, as a tribute to the author and a beacon to fellow writers.

What Is TRUTH?

Nine years ago as I pulled together the material that became The Heart and Craft of Lifestory Writing, I thought I knew the answer to that question, what is truth: It's what really happened, or what you really think. It's basic honesty, plain and simple. Everybody knows that, right?

That's a good starting point, but as I've learned since then, that's both incomplete and misleading. Some of my increased understanding is old news, things I knew that had not integrated into my cluster of life writing neurons. Meanwhile, advances in the study of memory continue to deepen understanding. These discoveries have profound  relevance for life writers. Here's a list of a few evolving insights worth sharing:

Memory is fallible. Contrary to what you probably heard in psychology class, self-help seminars, and various other places, you do not remember every minute detail of every sensation that ever entered your brain. Recent evidence shows that incoming data is filtered, scrubbed and consolidated. Irrelevant material is unlikely to be retained. Furthermore, our brains often mistake vivid mental images for fact, embedding them as memory.

Memory morphs. Research shows that each time you recall an event or thought, current circumstances and thought become enmeshed in the memory, and the initial memory may become buried in debris over time. Compare this to your story files on disk. You may save your initial draft. Then you edit and save again. You may repeat that process twenty times, perhaps changing only a word or two each time you read. Five years later, if you had a copy of that original draft, you may not recognize it as the same story. But you didn't save the original, so there's now way to know.

Perception is personal and situational. In 1978 I grew sick of my long, hippie hair. I was enrolled in an off-campus graduate program at Central Washington U at the time, and made the hundred mile drive to the Ellensburg campus every couple of weeks. One day I left early and stopped at a hair salon before a lunch date with my mentor. Although I felt foxy as heck with my sleek new bob, I could barely see beyond a new fringe of bangs invading my view. My next stop was the library. When I stepped up to the checkout desk, I heard a man say, "Oh, my GOD!" A bomb exploded in my self-absorbed brain. Could my hair be that bad? I swung around and saw him gaping at a document.

Truth is relative. This perspective is based on the one above. In my essay, Mayhem at Camp RYLA, I cite the example of a young woman who worked as a bank teller and was held up at gunpoint a few months earlier. Shots were fired, though not at her. During a simulated crime at Camp RYLA, she saw an object held at arms' length, pointed in her direction. Not only did she tearfully swear under oath at the mock trial that a gun had been pointed at her, but that she'd heard a shot. That belief was so strong and true for her that she went into near meltdown at the revelation the "gun" had been a plastic water pistol.

Truth is situational and sometimes inconsistent. Victims of abuse often testify to this. "I loved him," they claim, years after they got brave enough to leave. "I really loved him. And I hated him when he beat me. Sometimes I wished he was dead." Those feelings, those truths, can exist side-by-side for decades.

So, you see, although I don't deny the existence of universal truths like the power of love, story truth is fuzzy, fleeting and personal.Write your story the way you see it, the way it's real and true to you. If you find truth changing as you write, consider yourself blessed.

Write now: Make a list of beliefs about what you hold true. Jot down a few examples of each. Then ask yourself Byron Katie's question, "Is this really, really true?" and "How do I know it's true?" You may be surprised by what you learn.

“I Could Write About My Sex Life”

Soon after I began teaching lifestory writing, I met with a man I knew only slightly, I’ll call him Sam. Sam wanted my advice on how to write his lifestory. I was several years short of sixty,  and this crumpling man in his late eighties. As usual, I suggested he start with a story idea list and asked him what he might want to write about. I sat patiently for what seemed like an hour while he sat silently, slumped in his chair and lost in thought.

Suddenly he seemed suffused with high noon sunshine as his head lifted. A huge smile spread across his pallid, wrinkled face. “I could write about my sex life!” he said, sounding like a child who just spotted the carnival’s cotton candy stand.

I’m embarrassed to admit this – I remember recoiling in shock. I hope that  reaction was confined to my mind and didn’t show on the surface. Age difference was definitely a factor. It’s true that I would have been stunned to hear anyone say this, male or female, but I would have pursued the topic with someone my age. Generational differences made it unthinkable to pursue it with Sam. I knew that I would absolutely not, under any circumstances, want to read about my parents’ sex life, and he was older than my father. I assumed his children would feel the same way. I’m sure a psychologist could have a ball with my reaction.

“You could …” I demurred. “It might be a little hard for your children to read ….” I swallowed and took another breath. “Is there anything else you might write about?” He visibly deflated. 

The meeting was short. I never saw or heard from Sam again.

I’d answer him differently today. I’d return his radiant smile, maybe wink, and encourage him to write about those lovely memories that obviously gave him great pleasure. He could celebrate the good times and perhaps grieve their decline. I would still alert him to the fact that his children may not want to read those accounts and remind him that he should discuss things with his wife before sharing with anyone else. But I would definitely encourage him to write for himself.

I have no idea how deeply Sam was thinking of delving into those memories or how much detail he might have included. Although I’ve never had a student or writing group member focus a story specifically on sex, some stories do call for at least a mention of the topic. In such cases, observing good taste and privacy while still providing enough detail to retain authenticity can be a challenge. I’ll save that discussion for another time.

For now, suffice it to say that writing about your sex life will bomb if you aren’t comfortable doing so. Freewriting and journaling are the best way to come to grips with your memories and feelings and the heart of your story and message, whatever the topic. Write for yourself first, then make decisions about what, if anything, to share with whom.

Write now: Not everyone has or had a delightful sex life. If you do or did, write about the joy it’s brought you. Tell how it made your life fuller and better. If you don’t or didn’t, write about that. In either case, write privately. In a journal. On scrap paper. On a keyboard. Write freely, bravely. Try lots of points of view. Write about love and lovers. Write about fantasies and spurned pursuits. Write about how and when you learned the facts of life and all you know now. Explore what turns you on and anything else that comes to mind. I guarantee you’ll learn something, and it may be downright pleasurable and fun.

If you wish your writing would spontaneously ignite when you’re done and it doesn’t, head for a fireplace or shredder. If a piece passes the blush test, consider sharing, with trusted friends or your writing group first, then openly.

Boring or Brilliant?

The cliché of watching someone else’s home movies has always been “It’s always just a saddening bore.” What’s surprising is that the farther we find ourselves removed in time and place, the more these old films have the capacity to move us, to entertain us, or simply to remind us of life as it once was.

From My Private Italy, Steve McCurdy

Ask around and you’re bound to hear this sentiment about boredom expressed with regard to reading life stories written by “ordinary” people, especially strangers. You even hear it expressed by people about their own stories: “My life is so ordinary. Nobody would be interested enough to read it.”

Hold the phone! Notice that McCurdy goes on to state that with time and distance things change. He went on to explain that old home videos have become hot properties now selling to strangers for premium prices on eBay. Various organizations are building archives for documentary purposes.

The same thing can happen with life stories. Some memories or stories, especially those without compelling drama or even a plot, may seem boring today, but brilliant fifty years from now. Ideally you will find a way to add drama and interest to any story, but don’t be deterred if all you can do is describe how you did things.

In fifty years, people are likely to be fascinated with how things were done “back in the olden days." For example, children today may be blown away to read simple descriptions of how kids amused themselves in the 1950s with no computers, video games, or cell phones, limited TV, and freedom to roam. Accounts of using a standard manual typewriter may sound as arcane as whittling quill pens out of goose feathers. Given the current pace of change, by 2050, what seems cutting edge today may have been supplanted by something far more advanced and they’ll wonder how we got along.

So, you see, even stories that are primarily documentary and lacking drama are worth writing, if only for the fun of remembering and creating a legacy of family history. Let McCurdy’s observations guide your purpose and path as you plan how to approach this adventure, or where to go next if you’ve already begun. Who knows? Your descendants could make a mint selling the collection of stories you couldn’t get anyone to read today.

Write now: Write a simple documentary story about some area of your daily life that has changed dramatically over time, for example how you helped hang laundry on the clothesline before you or your family had a clothes dryer, or how your family spent Sunday evenings playing canasta in the days before TV. Include details of how you did things and add reflections on differences between then and now if you wish.

Image credit: Jose Izquierdo, Creative Commons license

New Years Resolutions

Happy New Year!

I spent considerable time crafting general writing resolutions (in no particular order) that I feel able to keep, but will also push me a bit. I invite you to shamelessly steal any or all that appeal to you.

Some of my underlying thoughts:

PRIMARY INTENTION: I want the concept of lighting a candle in the darkness to underlie everything I write. This is the first year I’ve stated a primary intention. It feels right write.

Write what I want when I am ready. The emphasis here is on when. 2015 promises to be a challenging year of transition, and more than ever, I shall follow whatever schedule works, for writing in general and for writing blog posts. You may see large gaps this year, but no problem. I don’t flatter myself that you can’t face a week without reading a post from me.

Take as long as it takes to write it right. I’ve seen too many people make themselves crazy and produce less than their best work because they set an unrealistic deadline to publish, whether for the public or private distribution. I have that t-shirt in my drawer. Honor your writing and don’t do this to yourself.

Write something every day. No, grocery lists do not count, but a carefully crafted email with more than a paragraph does. Speaking of which, email is a good chance to practice being articulate and organized in presenting your thoughts. While it’s true that urgency may rule at times, take care that you’ve made yourself clear and fix egregious errors, especially those introduced by autocorrect.

Play with words. I’ve written so much about this. Write yourself out of your rut. Constantly think of new and fun ways to express yourself. This resolution links to Write it colorful and considering every angle.

Gorge on rich reading. Let everything you read serve as a self-directed writing workshop. Read once for the story and review to explore structure behind the magic. Make notes to nail those insights, then review the book, for your benefit as well as the author’s.

Share lots of stories informally. Gather a group of people who appreciate your writing and send stories around. Encourage their comments, good, bad and indifferent. You’ll learn a lot and they’ll enjoy the reads. Don’t limit yourself to just writers. All readers count.

Write it real. This thought goes beyond sticking to the facts. I’m reminding myself to include sensory detail, character quirks, self-talk, and those other elements that breathe life into scenes, real or imagined.

Check everything five times. This advice goes beyond checking spelling and grammar. My inbox overflows with emails describing sign bloopers, i.e. “Persons are prevented from picking flowers from any but their own graves.”

 Consider every angle. This advice is especially helpful for lifestory writers. You may be amazed when you consider how others may have viewed a situation or why they may have done what they did. These insights can be life changers.

Sign your name! to cement ownership and intention.

I wish for you a year filled with gratifying results from your writing, whenever, however you do it, with whomever you share.

Write now: make your own list of writing resolutions if you haven’t yet done so. I strongly urge you to do this on paper – pixels are okay if you use a stylus as I did. I’m partial to the Papyrus android app for such projects, partly because my markers have dried up and I like to use lots of color. The idea is to involve brain centers and muscles that add personal value to the writing process.

What Makes YOU Happy?

This question, “What makes you happy?” is so simple, but who ever stops to consider it? I hope you will, as I have been doing the last couple of days. It could change your life.

I found this question in the draft of a book I’m beta-reading for a friend. The book will soon be published, and you’ll learn more about it before long. Meanwhile, although answers to this happiness  question could easily fill a book, my initial list has helped me find a focus to reboot this blog.

Let’s take a look at my list. In addition to obvious things like laughing with family and friends, blowing dandelion fluff, piles of freshly washed and folded clothing, having someone else fix my breakfast and that sort of thing, I listed

• meaningful connection with people who share my interests and values
• discovering something wonderful
• sharing wonderful discoveries with those who will appreciate them
• the satisfaction of polishing a piece of writing – or doing any job well
• reading masterful writing
• playfulness in writing and life
• writing true to myself and my voice

No real surprise here. Involvement in the global writing community makes ME happy! For over sixteen years I’ve been studying and practicing different aspects of life writing and sharing what I’ve learned with others in classes, writing groups and privately. I love that!

But as with other things, it’s easy to go along with the crowd, to be swept up in trends, to keep telling people what you think they want to hear. It’s easy to stick with the same old same old, the tried and true, to say and write what others are saying and writing.

That’s a recipe for burnout.

Recognizing that I was drifting into serious burnout with writing and teaching, I’ve taken an extended break. For a month I didn’t even write email. My husband and I flew to Rome for a few days before boarding the Celebrity Silhouette cruise ship to loop around the Mediterranean for two weeks. We visited Malta, the Greek island of Kephalos, Ashdod (nearest port to Jerusalem), Haifa, Ephesus in Turkey, Athens, Sicily and Naples before returning to Rome. We stayed on the ship for two more weeks, visiting Toulon in Provence, the Spanish island of Palma de Mallorca, Barcelona and Tenerife in the Canary Islands before heading across the Atlantic to Ft. Lauderdale.

We had a great time with without email and Internet for a month, opting for digital detox. I took this one step further and wrote nothing other than a few trip notes. I did read. Between constant Trivia games I read mysteries and memoir and most of a book about writing. But I didn’t write.

By the end of the month I felt alone in a crowd of 3500 people. I met dozens of interesting people, but no writers. Nobody I met gave a hoot about writing, and few even read. Only one was more than marginally digitally literate. I felt like I was on the wrong planet.

Compiling that list of things that make me happy has brought me home to my keyboard, refreshed and ready to write. In playful new ways. With new focus. I’ll fill you in more on that focus in future posts.

Write now: pull out a piece of paper – the back of an envelope or piece of junk mail will do. Make a list of things that make YOU happy. Aim for 100. Hang onto this list. We’ll work with it more later. When you finish, pick one simple thing from the list and do it. Then do a quick Happy Dance.

Make New Friends: Writing Layers of Meaning

Make new friends, but keep the old,
One is silver and the other gold.

This classic friendship song began endlessly looping on brain radio the other day. Inspired by Kathy Pooler’s blog post, A Tribute to My Girlfriends, I sat down to pen a post about friendship. What emerged is far from what I set out to write.

I began writing about the fact unlike Kathy, who has remained close with numerous friends for decades, my friends are more situational, coming and going as our respective interests change, and … that paragraph was never finished. Something about the thought didn’t quite ring true, and a recent memory displaced it. A memory of a brief encounter I recently had with four friends I’ve been out of contact with for over fifteen years. How do those friendships fit in the silver and gold category, I wondered.

They don’t! As I wrote, I realized those categories don’t work for me. I realized how limiting categories and labels are, how they inherently imply boundaries and barriers. Degrees of closeness? No barriers there. But what about gaps? Nobody can stay constantly connected with every friend.

The longer I wrote, the more confused I became. Finally I had a breakthrough. My thoughts compressed into something manageable that I could get my mind around:

Each of my friends, local, online or far away, is unique. Each brings a warm glow of general pleasure, and each fills a different niche in my heart. As time goes by, our mutual interests may wax and wane, perhaps remaining on hold for years or decades. But that bond remains like an unlit burner, waiting for a mere spark to rekindle its warmth.

Maybe Kathy and I aren’t so different after all. And maybe it’s time to rewrite that song: 

Make new friends, but keep the old,
One will warm you while the other’s cold.

Far or near, good friends will bring cheer,
All that’s needed is a phone to hear.

Skype or text, an email now and then,
Friends will be there, though we don’t know when.

Since writing that essay, I’m seeing friends in new ways. Some are soft and fuzzy, while others have organized edges, maybe with a sharp spots to make allowances for. The state of our relationship may vary from red hot to vacationing violet. Friends light up my life, though we may have spells of darkness between us now and then.

My hour of writing that essay was priceless. It exemplifies William Faulkner’s immortal quote: ''I never know what I think about something until I read what I've written on it.”

Write now: Pick a topic like friendship or love, or God, or something else big and grand. Start writing and see where the topic takes you. Polish the essay, or leave it raw. The purpose is self-discovery. Leave a comment or send me an email about your surprising discovery.

Photo credits: top: Arkansas Shutterbug. bottom: Francesco. Both altered and used under Creative Commons license.

You Can’t Go Home Again

Few people talk about the dangers posed to your memory when you return to places you used to live. Depending on how long you’ve been gone, changes are likely to be huge, and the shock of the new may overwrite or change what you recall of the past. At the very least, for better or worse, your past memories will carry the stamp of the new. Sometimes changes may be better than you recall.

That’s how memory works. Each time we replay a memory, we embed a fragment of the present to what we recall from before. This fragment may be comprised of things like feelings evoked by the memory, further evaluation and insight, comparison with current conditions, or all of the above.

Sometimes, particularly if you haven’t been gone long, or you return to a spot in nature, you may find things more or less as you left them and you will feel an exciting sense of reconnection. But you may be disappointed.

I’ve experienced shocking disappointment a few times over the last several years, especially in my hometown of Los Alamos where fire destroyed trees on the mountains forming the backdrop for the town. The business district has been changed almost totally, to the extent of running a street through the middle of the pedestrian area. My high school has been torn down and replaced with a shiny new facility more like a college campus than high school as I remember it. Even the canyon where I spent vast amounts of girlhood time has been pruned, thinned, and otherwise fireproofed. I hardly recognize it.

Right now I’m in Richland, Washington where  my husband and I lived for nineteen years when our children were young. We’re here to visit my father, not revive memories, but still, change is apparent. Yesterday we drove past “our” house, the one we designed and built over forty years ago. That was a  pleasant surprise. It looks even better than it did when we lived there, at least from the outside. I took two granddaughters to play on the bank of the Columbia river their mommy enjoyed. That was sublime.

But the school our kids attended is almost entirely changed. My daughter was shocked, as I was in Los Alamos. The old ferry landing is gone. Egad! That was my place of solace. The river is still there, overflowing with spring run-off. The view is much the same. The basics of the old business district remain intact, though the inhabitants of stores come and go. But it's no longer home.

Part of the difference is people. At 93, although still proudly self-sufficient, my father is really old. My mother is gone. My best friend here died a year ago, and I have not stayed in touch with others. I'm a stranger in town.

When I return to my current Pittsburgh home after a trip like this, my old memories do resurface, only slightly marred by recent developments. But at least for me, physically returning to past locations has never enhanced old memories. I'm better off looking at photos, listening to old music, or talking to people who were there.

However, after all the above, I do journal my thoughts about changes, and may include some of that in a story or two.

Write now: contribute to a conversation on this topic by leaving a comment about your experience in this regard. How has it worked for you to "go home" or return to places from your past? This may include both fondly remembered places and those where you've held traumatic memories.

Adventures of a Chilehead — Formal Debut

Today is the official debut of Adventures of a Chilehead. It’s a quiet affair. No big party – it’s too cold and icy right now. No champagne – but I will celebrate and toast the book with a bowl of chile, complete with guacamole topping  and a beer.

Books are much like debutantes —  when they make their formal debut, the whole community has watched them grow up and mature. Likewise, regular followers of this blog have read a number of posts about this book's progress.

You know, for example, that it began as a simple anthology and grew organically into a true memoir. You know that I learned many lessons along the way, and one that’s seldom discussed is the matter of length. People often ask how long a memoir should be. As with any story, a memoir should be as long as it needs to be to tell the story.

This book is short. You can read the stories in a couple of hours. And yet it does have all the components of a formal memoir:

• It has a story thread or theme, my love of hot chile, that runs through and ties individual scenes together.
• It remains tightly focused on that theme.
• It has a story arc, progressing from my first public involvement with surprisingly hot chile to the present, demonstrating change of perspective along the way.
• It is comprised of scenes, with a new adventure in each one.
• It hits the highlights without becoming mired in the mundane.

The book is short because it does remain focused tightly on its topic. If I’d wanted to make it longer, I could have pulled in other stories, or broadened the topic to food or cooking in general. But that was not my purpose. This is a tribute to  my beloved chile, and to the goddess Capsacia, who revealed herself in the process of writing. I said all I had to say on that topic. Thus I coined the term, “mini-memoir.

I think of this term as the memoir equivalent of a novella, a written, fictional, prose narrative normally longer than a short story but shorter than a novel. Novellas have no specific word count. They are generally more highly characterized than a simple short story, but less layered and complex than a full-length novel.

Although I had not heard the term “mini-memoir” before, I found it a delight to work with. Like a novella, it’s long enough to sink your teeth into, but short enough to avoid becoming bogged down. Especially with the advent of eBooks, mimi-memoir offers great potential. I chose to do a print version of this one, primarily because several people asked for one. They want to have the recipes handy in the kitchen. But a series of short eBooks would work just fine.

If you have several minis, you may eventually want to bundle two or three into a single print volume. The possibilities are limited only by your imagination. If you haven’t already read it, pop over to Amazon and order a copy. If you order print, the Kindle version is included for free.

Write now: look through your pile of finished stories and find a cluster of related ones. Consider ways of organizing them into a mini-memoir, using the “Story Album to Memoir” post as guidelines to help you organize your thoughts. If you don’t have more than a couple of finished stories, think of a theme, make a list of story ideas, and start writing, one story at a time. Don’t fret about weaving them together until you have them all finished.

The Value of Rethinking

Last week I learned the value of suspending judgment and listening with an open heart. “Hey,” you say. “You are within a few million breaths of completing seven decades of a passingly happy and successful life and you just figured this out?”

To that I can only say, “Yes and no.” Of course I’ve known this most of those nearly seventy years. But a few days ago my eight-year-old granddaughter inadvertently put new spin on the concept.

Let me back up. Compare this picture featured in a blog post on September 1, 2009

with this picture from last week.

Both pictures feature clothespin dolls. I made the dolls in the top picture four years ago for my daughter’s girls. Sarah, the oldest, was four at the time. When they came for a visit last week, Sarah, who is now eight, wanted to make clothespin dolls. My mind whirled at the thought of teaching her to sew the tiny seams along the sides of the dresses, but Sarah immediately took charge of the situation.

She selected a rust-colored pipe cleaner from a pile on my desk. “What can I cut this with?” “Why do you need to cut it?” “To make hair!” Huh, what? Hair made from pipe cleaner? Why not? I pulled out my stash of craft pliers, and Sarah snipped a couple of pieces and twisted them into hair that I hot-glued on. To my surprise, it looked great.

With barely a pause, she chose fabric for the dress, and before I realized what she was doing, she had snipped a ragged rectangle from one corner, wrapped it around the doll and taped it shut. “I want to use this ribbon for a belt.”

Heckuva deal, I thought. So much for me teaching Sarah how to make these things. “Do you want to learn to sew dresses like the ones I made?” I asked. “No! I know how to sew, but that’s not what I want them to look like.” Oh! KAY! New page, new doll story.

Sarah eagerly accepted a sparkly silver hair suggestion for her next doll (third from the left). A taped scrap of “silky” black lining fabric formed the perfect dress, adorned by a snip of lacy fabric and slinky silver spandex cape.

I quickly realized that my job was to provide resources and explain the advantages of hot (faster than white) glue instead of tape (doesn’t stick well to fabric). Based on her whims, I found strands of yarn for hair, and Sarah did the rest, cranking out dolls at warp speed, intuitively mixing snips of this with scraps of that. She never paused to cogitate, and in an hour or two she had exhausted my clothespin supply .

I admit I was stunned at the results. Her dolls have panache! They sizzle with character. When I made the initial batch, I was thinking inside the nostalgia box, making dolls recalled from the past. Dolls that look like real people. With no limiting beliefs, Sarah was drawing on unbridled imagination and fairy tales. My dolls are dressed to milk cows and bake gingerbread. Her dolls cast spells and eat poison apples. My dolls are for playing house. Hers are for populating fantasy worlds.

My post four years ago was titled “Memories I Wish I’d Had.” If you read that post closely, you’ll notice that the memories I longed for would have been about making things, making dolls for playing house with classic roles. I wanted to capture the past.

Sarah took a version of this concept to a new level. Her focus was on making things, but she was future oriented. She wanted dolls, but not for playing house. Sarah was creating adventure stories. She selected, snipped and wrapped her emerging characters, creating her story bit by bit.

Did I remember to tell her these awesome glam scraps are left over from her great-grandmother’s doll-making days? Maybe not. But Sarah’s dolls capture the spirit of stuffed fairy and mermaid art dolls Mother made near the end of her life. Did Mother imagine stories as she stitched her dolls? I bet she did. Mother and I both made traditional dolls for playthings early in life. Mother got wild and crazy much later. She rethought what dolls were about.

Sarah is skipping the traditional phase. By suspending judgment and giving her free reign to follow her muse, I gave her space to follow her dreams, and in doing so, she unwittingly cracked open a limiting shell around my creativity that I had not realized was there. That drawer of glimmer and glam has been patiently waiting in my physical work room for nearly twenty years. Sarah began pulling it into her stories. Now it’s time for me to follow her lead into that larger space, making new use of old materials, both manifest and remembered.

Write now: recall a time if you can when you showed someone how to do something (formally or otherwise) and learned something yourself in the process. If you can’t remember such a time, teach someone something soon and write about it. That something may be as simple as using a new seasoning in a favorite recipe or as complex as designing a web page. Teach, then write, including an account of how your thinking changed in the process.

Living to Write the Tale

A novel concept came across my radar lately in the form of a guest post request – the idea of planning to live a life worth writing about. Although I saluted the basic idea, my initial reaction was that such a post belongs in inspirational blogs, and does not fit the focus of this life writing blog. At first glance, it seems to contradict what I’ve said many times, that any life is worth writing about. I also failed to see the connection between establishing visions and goals and writing about life.

The second time I received a proposal about this, something clicked. The idea of taking charge of your life, however many days or years you have left is nothing new. I recognized that people like Elizabeth Gilbert did just that in her best-selling memoir, Eat Pray Love. She planned the sort of adventures she wanted to experience and write about and negotiated a book contract before she bought her plane ticket. A few purists felt that was contrived and perhaps a tad beyond the pale for memoir. But the vast majority applauded her spunk.

What was new this second time was realizing that life writing has powerful tools for making that planning effective, and they’ll work for any age.

These tools work because writing makes thinking visible. Once you see something on the page, whatever form it’s in, it’s easier to understand and manage. Use these tools to explore your hopes and dreams and develop ways to bring them about.

1) Journal: Use your journal to write about hopes and dreams.

• Make a bucket list of 100 things you want to do, visit, see, or experience before you die.
• Journal or freewrite about possible ways of doing these things.
• Explore reasons why you believe you can or cannot do any given one
• Dig into your beliefs and values.
• Record your dreams and explore desires hidden in them.

2) Write stories about things you’ve already done that felt especially fulfilling. Dig more deeply into these stories to explore what elements made them exciting or fulfilling and journal about ways to add more of this element to your life.

3) Write stories about things you dream of doing. Include yourself as the main character and give yourself all sorts of exciting challenges you’d live to have. Live your dreams on the page. Even if you never set foot out of your house, you’ll have much the same sense of fulfillment that you would gain from actually doing whatever it was.

Although it seems a bit eerie, visionaries have known for ages that vividly imagining something tricks the brain into believing it is real or really happened. If you write vividly about doing something, your brain will respond as if you have, and make it easier to “do it again.”

So whatever your age, finances or other perceived limitations, write yourself a life worth writing about, then live it to the fullest and go on to to write the tale.

Write now: pull out paper and pen and write yourself into an adventure you'd love to have in real time. Make it vivid, with full detail and emotion. Write a lot about how you feel as you “live in the story.”. Be exotic and daring. Write it in present or past tense, not future, and avoid any form or thought of “if.” Write this real. Polish the story and cherish it. Then put it away and see what happens.

Image credit: Coolcal2011

Mouse Shoulder Break

I call it mouse shoulder. Doctors and physical therapists  talk about ulnar nerves. Whatever the technical term, it means I’ve been spending way too much time at my computer than is good for my body. My little finger tingles all the time. My shoulder hurts.

The good news is that I caught this early and it’s treatable, but not with pills. Pills can help, but they aren’t the answer. If I just take pills and power on through, it will continue to get worse. The bad news is that along with exercises, massage, and so forth, the treatment involves severely curtailing my time at the keyboard. That means cutting way back on blogging, Facebook, Forums, email, and all those things that have come to seem such necessary aspects of daily life.

Sometimes, wise people tell us, our bodies send us signals when change is needed. Those wise people urge us to pull out pen and paper and begin to dialogue with our affected parts. Oddly enough, writing by hand on a lap desk is still okay. This seems a clear message to spend extra time with my journal.

It’s a good time to plan, to make lists, to outline and organize, to do the creative parts of writing that are easy to overlook. It’s time to get out of a rut that’s beginning to wear deep. Raking leaves is good therapy. Painting walls. Going to the gym. Reading books.

So I’m taking a break for a week or few, and shall return when the time and shoulder feel write. Please get in touch with questions. I will check comments and email now and then.

Write now: pull out your journal and spend twenty minutes or more writing, by hand, on paper, about some physical symptom that annoys you. Let your body dictate the words as they flow freely onto the page. You may shift into dialogue. But don’t try to talk down the messages. These are jewels, as powerful as dreams. Listen and heed.

Image credit: Gray’s Anatomy via Wikipedia.