“I want to write my memoir, but I don’t know what to write about.”
When a new memoirist is overwhelmed, it’s easy to ignore the blank page and turn on the TV. But there’s something you want to say and you have a hunch the best way to do it is by writing a book. Now let’s discover what you want to write about.
The first step is to focus on love. What do you love in life? What would you give up everything for? Is it a person, animal or thing? Do you love alcohol more than breathing? Then write about your affair with the bottle. If you would race into a burning building to save your pet, then that is where you start. Write it down, how it feels to suffer, to ache for the love of something other than yourself.
For many memoirists, the thing they love the most is the past. They want to go back and re-live those moments with their parents, perhaps with the intuition that by writing it all down, they will be in control this time. This time it won't swallow them. But what is it they are really in love with? The child they once were. They want to go back with the knowledge that they rescued that child. It wasn't easy. But they are on the other side of all that trauma and it is something to celebrate.
Today, for just ten minutes, tell us about something you love.