Why I turned down an offer to publish a memory prompts journal

The memory prompt journal my mother left me had more blank pages than memories. While I cherish the few pages with her handwriting and thoughts, I long for more. This entry ends with a comma—an unfulfilled promise of more to come…

A couple of years ago I was approached by a mainstream publisher to discuss authoring a journal filled with guided memory prompts for a grandparent. You know the type of book I’m talking about, right? Often beautifully printed, and stocked in the gift section at major bookstores and card shops, these types of books make for amazing impulse purchases—what better gift than the gift of telling someone you care about them enough to want to hear (and preserve!) their stories, after all?

I got fairly far in the contract process before I decided not to pursue the offer. It would have made me some money, yes. And it would have helped brand me as an expert in the memory-keeping landscape, for sure. Some of my colleagues were impressed, and my family was in favor of it as another way to boost my small business.

So why did I decide not to publish that journal that seemed so in line with my mission and values as a personal historian? Well, because I don’t fundamentally believe that they work.

Over the years I have had numerous potential clients approach me about capturing their stories in a book only after they failed to do so in other ways. Some had been given a journal filled with prompts supposedly written just for them (as a grandparent, say, or as a mother)—but they did not find the questions enticing enough to want to write answers. Others had gifted such a journal to a loved one as a gift, only to realize that the recipient was not finding (or making) the time to sit down to write.

I myself was thrilled to find two such journals on my mother’s bookshelves when I was going through her belongings after her death. I put them aside with an overwhelming sense of gratitude and anticipation—only to feel utter disappointment to find she had scrawled a few sentences in each, but nothing more. The blank pages mocked my early excitement, and I felt cheated.

Why do these books not work? In my opinion, they are filled with good intentions but they don’t always inspire action.

Often, good intentions aren’t enough. The recipient needs to be intentional about setting aside time to write, and too often, we think, I’ll get to it later. Usually, later never comes.

It can feel intimidating to write in a book that looks so precious. Of course we want a journal we are gifting to a loved one to be beautiful; I have seen gorgeously crafted journals with gold embossing on the cover and cute flourishes on the corners of each page. But the more precious they seem, the more scary it can feel to tarnish those pretty pages with our scratchy handwriting (and what if, God forbid, we need to cross something out?!). I speak from experience when I admit to having a few artisan-crafted, leather-covered blank journals in my closet that have, well, remained blank…while the cheaper notebooks I bought at a big-box store are overflowing with my writing.

Many questions simply don’t resonate. While these professionally edited and published memory prompt journals are indeed written by people who consider what questions should resonate, there is simply no one-size-fits-all memoir-in-a-box. A current client of mine whose granddaughter had gifted her a popular prompt-a-week email service told me she hasn’t answered a question in three months: “Honestly, sometimes they’re just silly. ‘How do you relax or unwind?’ Really? I’m 95. This is not what I want to be writing about,” she said. Among the skipped-over questions in my mother’s fairly blank journal were:

• “What scent or sound immediately takes you back to childhood.”

• “Tell me about your most memorable trip by plane, train, or ship.”

• “What summer games and activities did your family enjoy?”

These questions get my memories stirring, for sure—they are not inherently bad questions. Perhaps they simply didn’t resonate for my mom on the days she sat down to write, or perhaps she just never found the time to “keep at it.” Maybe she needed a listener—someone to receive her stories, to ask follow-up questions, to hold sacred space for her to share. All of these are valid reasons I have heard from clients who abandoned their memory journals despite their best early intentions.

What do I suggest instead of a memory-prompt journal?

How to write…

To ensure that your intentions to preserve your stories turn into a series of actions that DO preserve your stories, consider finding an accountability partner. That could amount to a friend or family member with whom you commit to write about your lives—perhaps you sit down together once a week to write, then share your stories out loud (hello, deepening connections!). Or you might find accountability in working with a memoir coach or personal historian who you pay to keep you on track—there are plenty of advantages to this arrangement beyond accountability. If you’d like to see how we could work together, please reach out.

Where to write…

I recommend buying an inexpensive blank journal to record your memories. If you’d like to pass on something that feels more substantial or beautiful, you can always edit your stories and add photos later, hiring a designer to polish and print everything or going the DIY route and making a scrapbook that showcases what you’ve written. This way you never have to feel guilty about skipping one or more pages, and you can cross out and rewrite to your heart’s content (no one writes a perfect sentence the first time, I assure you!!). If you prefer, you can also just open a new document on your computer and start typing (just remember to back it up occasionally so you don’t lose your writing!)

What to write about…

To ensure that you find questions that you want to respond to—that spark your memories and inspire your writing—look for open-ended questions (you can find a year’s worth of them in my Write Your Life annual subscription, for example, or discover evocative, literary prompts in Beth Kephart’s memoir writing workbook, which I reviewed here). Want to make your life as easy as possible when it comes to writing about your life? Use the same two-word prompt every day—I promise you’ll be surprised at what comes up for you!

Don’t get me wrong, if you have bought or are thinking about buying a memory prompt journal as a gift, you’re my kind of person! I just think there are better (more effective, more foolproof) ways to encourage story sharing. How about you?