Autobiography Workshop

I have wondered about the shape my autobiography should take. Should I lay out the stories and let people decide? Should I lead the reader to certain conclusions?

Actually, I plan on doing both. By laying out my stories here, I am giving the reader a chance to draw some of his own conclusions. Eventually, I plan to give shape to the many stories that I have laid out here.

All of this lead me to a question -
Am I creating an autobiography at this point or just trying to recreate a journal?

I’ve decided that before I get to the actual autobiography writing, there will necessarily be some journal recreation – with some differences. Of course, a journal is autobiographical in nature but there are some specific differences that I am thinking of.

• My little creation here will have the perspective of an autobiography. Journals tend to be more in the emotion of the moment.
• I will invariably miss some details that I would have had had I kept a journal through the years.
• I will have more of an opportunity to add my reflections.
• Memory tends to change and omit things over time. So some of my writings may have inaccuracies. I will try to temper these by interviewing others who were witnesses to the events I describe.

This is a big undertaking. One I hope will be fruitful for myself and maybe provide some ideas to anyone who reads this.

I’ve started a list of people in my life. I’m surprised at how long the list is. Not everyone plays a significant role but it’s interesting just how many people I remember.

With my off-line list, I track first and last names. At first, I thought that I would include first names with last initials on the blog, but I’m not sure this would be right. I don’t plan on writing any derogatory about anyone. However, I know I don’t feel comfortable thinking that someone may be writing about me on a blog somewhere no matter how innocent.

The bottom line is that I think that I will just use initials for people. I will still name places and dates, etc., but not people. This way the person I refer to will still remain at least somewhat of a mystery should anyone try to figure out my history.

Maybe someday, I’ll change my policy. But for now – I think this is best.

Any comments?

Three months ago, I made a list of all of the people I could remember in my life. I wrote the list on a loose leaf piece of paper. Thinking that I wouldn’t lose it, I left it loose.

Yep. It’s gone.

A couple of things:

1. Don’t write on loose-leaf paper, unless you intend what you’ve written on it to be temporary or you put the paper in a binder specified for that purpose.
2. If you write your lists on a computer, make sure you remember where you saved it.

That’s pretty much all of the wisdom I have right now.

I will follow this with my re-created list of people who have passed through my life, or I theirs.

I thought that a good list to start with would be a list of all of the lists I want to make.

Brilliant, I know.

I brainstormed the following list:

• Major events
• Life changing events
• Perspective changing events
• Places lived
• Parents
• Siblings
• Ancestors
• School names
• Friends
• People I’ve known
• People who’ve made an impact on me.
• Teachers
  • Teachers comments about me
• Stories from school
• Kisses
• Pets
• Songs
• Music listened to
  • Music memories
• Vacations
• Jobs
• Hobbies
• Cousins
• Musical instruments played
• Girlfriends
• Crushes
• Sports
• Clubs
• Plays I was in
• Foods I like/dislike
• Children
• Near death experiences
• Churches/Wards attended
• Temple experiences
• TV shows
• Movies
• Internet sites
• School classes
• Wife
• Turning points
• Enemies
• Heroes
• Radio stations
  • Radio personalities
• Hospital visits
• Surgeries
• Broken bones
• Stitches
• Holidays
• Lessons learned in life
  • Marital
  • Family
  • School
  • Business
• Accomplishments
• Changes I’ve noticed in my lifetime
• Hairstyles
• Cars
• Toys
• Beliefs
• Values
• Dating
• Places
• Favorites
  • Food
  • Music
  • Movies
  • Etc.
• Hangout places
• Weekend activities
• Traditions

________________________

Added: (Thanks alejna!)

• childhood fantasies
• other abandoned dreams
• dreams
• nightmares
• fears

________________________

Of course this list is not all inclusive. I’m sure that there are plenty of things I missed. Please comment with ideas or what you think of this list.

Want to learn more:

• How to Start an Autobiography
  
• Autobiography Characteristics
• Benjamin Franklin Autobiography: 7 Reasons He Wrote His Story – This article is especially helpful in determining your own reasons for writing your autobiography.
• If You Don’t Write Your Autobiography, Nobody Will!
• Fill-in-the-blank autobiography – A fantastic tool for getting started.

About a year ago, I visited a site (the name escapes me now) that said a good way to start my story was through memory lists.

Memory lists?

Memory lists.

Basically, you think of a category of something that happened in your life: events, high school, friends, family, etc. and make lists.

For example,

Schools I Attended:
Juan de Anza Elementary School
Dana Junior High
Longs Peak Middle School
Hawthorne High School
El Camino College
Brigham Young University

It’s that easy.

But I can even expand those lists so that I would make a list of events, friends, or places associated with any of those schools.

For example:
People from Anza
T.C.
S.A.
P.R.
J.T.
M. and C. T.
K. and S.N.
Ms. H.
Ms. T
Mrs. L.

Just creating the list starts to produce a constant flow of memories.

Ms. T was my second grade teacher. I was the best speller in her class. In fact I was the best speller K-2. I never missed a spelling word. I always won the spelling bees. This was all true until one fateful spelling test.

The whole list consisted of contractions: can’t, don’t, I’m, etc. Number 8 was o’clock. For the first time in my young spelling career, my mind went blank. Finally, I came up with a’clock.

I don’t know if my teacher even looked at my paper. Maybe she just assumed that everything would be spelled correctly. When she returned my test to me, the customary 100% and smiley face appeared at the top. I thought nothing of it, except that I was proud that I had guessed correctly.

My mom always check my work. Proudly I showed her the test. She smiled but it only took a second longer for her to find my mistake.

“You must tell your teacher,” she said.

The tears and chest heaving commenced immediately.

“Do I have to?

“Of course you do.”

At the beginning of the next school day, with my eyes still red and puffy, I walked up to Ms. T to show her her mistake, er, my mistake. I couldn’t even get the first word out before the tears choked off any means of communication.

I managed to squeek out, “I” sniffle, sniffle “made” sniffle, sniffle “a mistake.” Nose wipe, sniffle. I gained a little composure. “I shouldn’t get 100%.” Sniffle. I handed her my test. “I misspelled o’clock.”

This in the time when a teacher could still place a comforting hand on a shoulder. And so Ms. T placed her hand on my shoulder and got down on my level.

“Oh sweetie, you should get a hundred percent for telling me.”

One last sniffle and a smile.

She didn’t give me a hundred percent of course. I learned an important lesson about honesty.

I hadn’t thought about that incident for quite some time. But you can see the power of lists.

Now…
Lists, an autobiography do not make. But they are the best way of starting that I know. The number of lists that you make are limited only by your imagination.

Recommended Product:

I’ve been meaning, for a while, to get started with writing some of the stories from my life. Somehow, I think that it would be beneficial to others to watch as I go through this process. Hopefully, my stories will help others decide to write their own stories. Maybe it’ll just be a good laugh – or not. In any case, here it is.

I chose the name Autobiography Workshop for a couple of reasons:

1. It’s going to take some work to get my Autobiography in order.
2. I’m still working on my life.

I hope to eventually pull everything together in some cohesive examination of what all of the stories mean when lined back-to-back. I am hopeful that at the end of this all that there will be some meaning. That all of this living has lead me to some conclusions.