How To Spin Your Life Story

For many, life is a series of quiet adventures and most people have a story to tell. However, most of us have never really thought much about being a storyteller, about organizing our experience and really thinking through what we have learned about ourselves, about our families…about life. We think that unless there are great events with characters like Indiana Jones, no one is interested. Wrong. 

Many great stories are about ordinary people doing ordinary things, but written in interesting ways. When we write our own story, we really get a chance to look for meaning in small events and when we learn how to tell the story, it helps others think about their own lives, too. Start with the following:

1. Start with your day of birth. Remember what your parents told you of the circumstances around the event, data you have, pictures if you have them (memorable ones). Check the local newspaper for that day in the archives on the Internet. There might be highly significant events that happened that day.
2. If you are into astrology, look at your stars. Look at your animal sign in Chinese astrology. Whether you believe any of this stuff or not, it gives you a different perspective and may trigger some ideas.  If you are averse to this, just don’t touch it.
3. Research the meaning of your name. Your parents thought through your name very carefully. It embodies some navigation clues of what they thought your life should be. For many of us, it was chosen with great care. Were you named after someone? Why? Who was it and what was his or her journey like? Again…maybe some hints. All of these point to a navigation system to help with the plan ahead.
4. Recall significant events in your life. Write about them, i.e. your first bicycle, your first date, your first party, the prom, your first job, your wedding day, the birth of your children…whatever.. Include feelings, sensations, thoughts, people involved.
5. Remember people who have influenced you. Describe the role they have played in your own growth. Who were your heroes and why? Who were the devils and how did you cope? Think of conversations you had with friends, family, grandpa and grandma, schoolteachers and camp mates. What did they mean to you then?
6. Write about life changes. Describe the significant turns you took, i.e. a move to a new place, a new relationship or when a significant change took place. Describe it. Choose your own symbols as they speak to you of your own experience. Try to find descriptive words for your feelings then.
7. Insert some remembered moments. The first smile you got from your child, the hug of forgiveness from a long lost friend…
8. Include snippets of words people have said about you. Write about the impact of these words on you.

End this life story with a celebratory paragraph, rejoicing in a life that has been lived well and looking forward to greater things to come.