How to Write Your Own Life Story

How to Write Your Own Life Story by Lois Daniel

I borrowed this book from the library. Great book. Break it down by subjects. With good samples. Must have for the non professional writer who wants to write his own life story.

I found an email course on Writing your Autobiography and Journal at u3aonline.org.au. It's the cheapest.

"Write something worth reading or live something worth writing." ~ Benjamin Franklin

Words of the Day
Today, I see the word 'naked truth' in a refreshing light, thanks to my new Mary Terzian:

"Writing about painful memories helps us heal. It did for me. I cried for weeks and months every time I touched upon painful subjects that I had tried hard to bury. I covered them up. It was past history It didn't work. Finally I bared it all and felt like sitting naked in a roomful of clad people. If it comes from the heart it has to be the "naked" truth". ~ Mary Terzian

"Creativity... oozing out from every one of my pores." ~ Mary Terzian

One of my favourite writer is Caroline. I like the way she express herself - Poetic, simple, and in a quiet manner, but somehow could moves me to tears.

Here's an extract from her memoir:

"We were on our way to bury our sister and I was scribbling notes about her as we drove to the church, about a half an hour's drive from my new home. It was a kind of trip down memory lane as we had decided to say our goodbyes in the neighborhood of our childhoods. On a loose sheet of paper I had written about our incredible loss, our devastation at the tragic and wasted life of someone so young and beautiful. There was no way we could reconcile the guardian angel of our family with the desperately ill young woman who ended her life by throwing herself from a bridge into the water below..."

"We lived in chaos. Our house was a bit like mum's mind - a mess. It was a clean kind of mess - the house that is, while mum's mind was more disordered than messy, and at times it made her irrational and unpredictable. It was easy to put the house in order, which she did from time to time. If only her mind could be fixed so simply; she may have avoided years of prescribed tranquilisers, electric shock and visits to "hospital".

Another favourite writer is Ruth. Here's what she wrote:

"I am 36 years old going on 17...I can't seem to stick with one interest and see it through to fruition. I resemble one of those fireworks that starts off brilliant and then fizzles at the climatic point. "