Share Your Stories and Memories
Trials, triumphs and simple pleasures – your memories are yours to share! / Photo by Gabriela Palai via Pexels
Choose from a variety of formats to tell your stories, your way. Consider these options to a full memoir. How about short stories or voice-memos to share your experiences?
Each of us has a story – or stories – to tell. There are plenty of reasons to share, and many ways to tell stories from your life. It’s not an all-or-nothing choice – there’s a lot of ground between a Facebook post and a memoir.
Journals and Diaries
A journal or diary can be a good way to record your memories, thoughts, and events in your life. Even if you keep it private, you can look back to remind yourself of details. Later, this would help you write memories, stories or a memoir for others to read.
Types of journals or diaries for life stories include:
a journal – of your thoughts and feelings, to help work through life’s challenges and make note of happy times
a daily activity log – perhaps to share with others at some point
a trip diary – to capture the sights, sounds and your experiences while traveling
an agenda book – or calendar of appointments, social engagements and significant dates
Journals can be on paper, in digital form, or as voice recordings. They don’t need to be only in words. You can include doodles and sketches and add photos. A travel diary might be in the form of blogposts, a video-log, or social media posts.
Your journal can be for just you, to share one day, or to collect the seeds of stories. / Photo by Thom Holmes via Unsplash
When you write in a diary, make note of your senses – sight, sound, smell, touch and taste. Just one or two, on occasion. Reading these later will take you back to a given moment. Later, you might include such sensory experiences in a story, to help your reader imagine being there too.
Bio or Profile
You may think of a ‘bio’ (e.g. one-paragraph biography) or profile as being about someone else. But there are times you may write one about yourself, such as:
to highlight your experience for a job, scholarship, award, or speech
in a school yearbook or directory, for an artist’s statement when you display your work, or inside the cover of a book you write!
on your own blogsite, or a company website
on social media
notes for your own obituary or memorial (some people are choosing to do this for themselves)
Show your personality along with your achievements. What’s something you like to do in your spare time? Will you share your nickname or one of your quirks? Do you have a fun-fact about yourself?
You could put a by-line to start your profile, with four words to describe your roles, qualities, or likes. One of these might be funny or unexpected. Such as: father, golfer, businessman, knitter. Or: grandmother, shopper, motorbike enthusiast. Only if it’s true!
Posts, Blogs and Vlogs
Many people like to share parts of their life online, such as in:
social media posts on Facebook, Instagram and other platforms
personal or family blogsites
video-logs about trips
Shine light on memorable moments by telling the story behind your photo. / Photo by Rachel Claire via Pexels
Facebook has ‘Your Story’, where you collect your memorable moments, aside from your ‘News Feed’ of posts and comments from you and others. Part of why I created this site is to encourage people to share stories and memories from their life, beyond ‘what they ate for lunch’. That said, a lunchtime get-together may be a memorable story in itself!
“There’s a lot of ground between a Facebook post and a memoir.”
Short Stories
You can tell individual stories from your life, whether in writing or as a voice-recording. Each story can remain as a separate piece, or you could compile them into a collection. You might draw from these stories if you make a book of memories, prepare your life story, or write a memoir.
For each tale, choose an event, challenge or other scenario in your life. Tell it like you’re the hero of the story, as you face obstacles (people or circumstances) while you try to achieve your goal. It doesn’t mean you need to be heroic, or on a big adventure or quest. It might be a small situation that means a lot to you at the time. Storytelling methods will help engage your audience, and there are ways to craft a real-life story without making stuff up.
Short stories are my favourite format for telling true tales from my life. You might like to read some in my stories blog.
Poems
A poem is a great way to express emotion, get at the essence of an experience, or describe your impressions of a moment. You can bring forth something from your life without specific details, more so than through prose (full sentences, essays, and stories). Think of the lyrics of a song.
You don’t have to see yourself as a poet, nor follow a particular format. Although there are precise forms in poetry (e.g. sonnet, haiku – even limerick), ‘free verse’ can be whatever you like. Long or short, rhyming or not. A narrative poem tells a story, such as about something that happened to you. A descriptive poem describes a scene, sensation, person etc.
Essays
Writing an essay may sound like homework, but it can be rewarding and enjoyable.
In a personal essay, you describe your personal experience of something that others face too. Some readers will see themselves in your story. Others become more aware of what someone may go through in your situation. For example, if you have a story of being an immigrant, others who didn’t share the exact same experience may still relate. Even people who haven’t relocated to a new country might understand the feeling of being a newcomer or an outsider. Tell about your experience, and reflect a bit on the bigger picture. It helps to add some humour!
It's a pleasure to reflect, concentrate, and choose how to tell your own story. / Photo by Ron Lach via Pexels
An autobiographical essay focuses on facts from your life, which you can lay out in chronological or some other order. No need to try to sum up your whole life to date, choose one aspect and write about that.
Letters
You can share slices of your life in letters (or emails) to friends and family. These can be a way to tell your stories and share memories.
You might choose to write a legacy letter to your family and next generations. This is a way to express key lessons you’ve learned in life, what you appreciate about your relatives, and your wishes for them in the future. Of course you can include anything you like.
If you wish to share your perspective on an issue in society, or write your points or opinion to a public figure, you could write an open letter to publish.
Memory Book
One way to bring together various memories from your life is via a memory book.
You might like to prepare one so that your children (and their children?) can see key parts of your life in a brief format. It’s something you could make by hand, like a life-story scrapbook or story-book. Or you can use an online service to self-publish your memory book, in print or digital format. Many apps and services are available to help.
Include what you wish, and arrange it how you like. It helps if you have categories and a structure, such as:
phases of your life from childhood and youth to adulthood (and elder years?)
different places you’ve lived, worked, and gone to school
family members (and pets?)
family history
friends, mentors and other significant people in your life
interests, passions and pastimes
favourites: music, books, food, places
It’s good to include photos. You might write captions and notes, stories and essays, or questions and answers.
Girls outside 17-19 Prince St., Jamaica Plain MA, 1950. / Photo by Leon Abdalian at Boston Public Library via Digital Commonwealth
If your main focus is your personal perspective, it could be what I call a mini-memoir. Most likely, you’d combine elements of autobiography (your life facts), memories (of any kind) and memoir (reflections on your experience).
Life Story Maps
A fun and engaging way to share some of your life experiences and stories is with a personalized interactive map. You can do this via GoogleMyMaps or other free map software.
Choose about a dozen key locations, place a marker on each, and add one or more related photos. Briefly describe the place and its significance to you. Tell it so that your experiences at each place add up to an overall story.
Types of maps to share your life stories may be:
life places ‘then and now’ including: where you lived, worked, and went to school
favourite places that you like to visit
a map of a trip you took, with key stops on the way to your destination
See visual storytelling methods for more ideas.
Memoir
To write a memoir, reflect on a phase or theme in your life, and write about your related experiences and thoughts. A memoir helps you make sense of events and patterns in your life – and share these with others.
Your family and friends might like to read and keep a memoir you self-publish. On their blog, Blurb provides basic starter-tips on writing a memoir, and lists 10 famous examples.
If you place your memoir for sale, others could take interest in your particular experiences (e.g. in a military family, as an athlete, an adoptee, overseas volunteer… whatever is your path). Future generations may delight to find it and learn more about you than they could otherwise know.
If you’re not ready (if ever) to write a book-length memoir, consider what I call a mini-memoir. You could write a shorter piece of just 30 pages or so. Or perhaps write a series of personal essays and include them in a collection. You could even ‘interview yourself’ by writing questions and answers to reflect on certain aspects of your life.
Autobiography
If you’d like to stick to the facts of your life’s story, without writing about your thoughts and feelings along the way, you could write an autobiography. While it’s about your real life and true events, it’s a good idea to write it in the style of a novel – i.e. to tell a story.
A publishing house will tend to publish an autobiography of a famous person who led a fascinating life – as they know this will sell. But self-publishing is a way anyone can put forth their life stories.
Life Story
You can share the story of your life in a book or audio-book form. A life story is a blend of memoir and autobiography – the facts of your life over time, along with your memories and perspective about your experiences to date.
Whatever ways suit you best, go ahead and share your stories! / Photo by Suzy Hazelwood via Pexels
An option is to hire a life story writer to interview you, make notes, and do the writing.
Your Choice
It doesn’t matter what the types and formats of life storytelling are called – I name and describe them to show you options. Any length or mix will do – especially if it’s for yourself, family or friends.
The main thing is that you share, and tell your stories in ways that suit you and your audience.
written by Barbara L Campbell, 2024