Yes, I admit it. I'm working on a memoir. It's an illness narrative I share with my brother. To that end, I spent this past week at Omega Institute for Holistic Studies in Rhinebeck, NY, under the tutelage of Nick Flynn, author of several memoirs including "Another Bullshit Night in Suck City."
Nick's work explores his relationship (or lack of relationship) with his father during the years his father was homeless on the streets of Boston. It also captures the catastrophic aftermath of his mother's suicide. In memoir and in poetry.
The question is: Why do we write memoir? Why would anybody be interested in our story? We all have problems. We all weather hardship, loss, sorrow, anger, betrayal, even illness...not a redeeming memory among them.
Until you consider the fact that you survived.
How are you going to process survival if you don't put it into words?
"We don't write what we know.
We write what we wonder about."
~Richard Peck~
So...some of us write to make sense of our lives. We do it for our own good. That fear we can't name? The anger the rises up unprovoked? The despair that shadows us wherever we go? It needs a name, a place, a person. Until we know its identity we can't negotiate our relationship with it.
"We do not write in order to be understood.
We write in order to understand."
~C.S. Lewis~
And who knows? Your story may be just what someone else needs to hear. How you survived. Where you found strength. Who you forgave. In other words, you write for the rest of us. Thank you.
"Tell your story
because your story will heal you
and it will heal someone else."
~Iyanla Vanzant~
The point is that narrative medicine is pure memoir, doctors and patients alike sharing their stories. Their pain. Their fear. Despair. Bitterness. Loneliness. All of us seeking a reason for hope. Relief. Joy. Healing.
When will you start yours?
"All you have to do
is write one sentence.
Write the truest sentence you know."
~Ernest Hemingway~
jan
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