No readers, no matter—your life story benefits YOU

“A story is a map and we the mapmakers plotting the landscapes of our lives,” Mark Yaconelli writes in Between the Listening and the Telling.

Most people who approach me wanting to explore their personal history are motivated by a desire to create a legacy and pass something of value on to the next generation. Whether it’s a full family history or short vignettes from their own life they hope to capture, they’re usually thinking about an audience of their kids and grandkids, or a broader circle of friends and family—the point is, they’re aware of an audience, even if it’s small.

Without exception, though, every person I have guided on a life writing journey has discovered profound benefits for themselves. Even without a single other individual having read their words, those words have changed them.

There are myriad ways writing about one’s life is good, of course. But for now I want to share just two biggies.

2 profound benefits of writing about your life

RECOGNIZING AGENCY

I don’t mean to get all jargony on you when I say you will recognize the agency you have—I guess what I really want to say is that you are the writer of your own life: You make the decisions, pull the strings, choose the paths…but often we forget that simple fact. We (and I readily include myself in this collective ‘we’) can get caught up in the things that happen to us. “I lost my job.” “I can’t get pregnant.” “My father died.” 

Yes, things happen—and despite the conventional wisdom, not always for a reason. But one thing that becomes abundantly clear when writing about your experiences is that how we choose to respond is what defines us. 

You will see that you are an active participant in your life—you are not just a storyteller, but a story creator.

In fact, this insight is the foundation of narrative therapy. “With this perspective, individuals feel more empowered to make changes in their thought patterns and behavior and ‘rewrite’ their life story for a future that reflects who they really are, what they are capable of, and what their purpose is, separate from their problems” (Psychology Today). 

I bet you never imagined that writing about your life will empower you to rewrite your next chapters…but it will.

INFORMING IDENTITY

From beginning to end, life writing is an exploration that leads to meaning-making. The memoirist asks themselves questions such as: Which experiences are worth telling? Why did I behave a certain way? How is that part of my life a story?

Those questions may at first seem like mere steps toward completing your personal writing, but in truth they are foundational to understanding one’s own identity, as Phillip Lopate explains in this quote from To Show and To Tell:

“In attempting any autobiographical prose, the writer knows what has happened—that is the great relief, one is given the story to begin with—but not necessarily what to make of it…. Writing is one way of self-making.”

Through your writing, you will begin to understand the value in your experiences, to see them as pieces of a bigger puzzle rather than as isolated events. As the best memoirs mine individual experiences to get at a universal truth, so too will your writing bring your own world view into sharper focus.

The memories that come to the surface, and the stories you write about them, will be gifts to your family; the insights you discover along the way will be gifts to yourself.