Linda Joy Myers » life stories

Truth and Secrets

Linda Joy Myers — Fri, 21 May 2010 23:09:02 +0000

I’m spending some time answering memoir writing questions this month. So here is a popular topic: Truth and Secrets.

When a writer is torn between the desire to tell her story truth and the internal/external pressure to keep family secrets, what do you recommend?

It’s important first for the writer to get the story on the page, to write his or her own truth. Each person has a point of view and a story that no one else can tell, so the writer needs to claim it and try to discover its wisdom by writing about it. This process creates a new perspective that brings forth layers of memories and insights. Exposing these layers is part of the healing process.

And here’s the hot topic in all my memoir workshops: secrets. Secrets are energy magnets. The force it takes to keep secrets hidden is energy that could be used for growth and creativity. So often though, the shame and guilt associated with secrets keep feeding the darkness and the fear. Secrets maintain a great power over us, and we are diminished by them.
We become co-conspirators to family dynamics that we don’t agree with and want to break away from. So we get caught in a conflict—to speak or not to speak? Do we remain closed and complicit, or open up and take the risk of losing friends and family, of being ousted from the family, or shamed once again into submission? These are choices that we need to make consciously and with care.
I tell my students to be open to writing two versions of the story: first, write for yourself, to clear out your emotional closet and sort the events that are jumbled up in your mind. Research has shown that writing the unadorned truth is powerful and creates changes in the brain—in other words: it’s healing and transformational on many levels.

When you put real people in your book, especially if they are identifiable, they should be notified. Even if all the portraits are positive, we’re exposing a real person to the eyes of the world.

The convention is to have people read the sections they appear in, if you are on speaking terms. If not, change the names and identifying characteristics, even if that means changing names for the character, the streets, town and anything that exposes them. If published, the legal branch of the publishing company can vet the manuscript as well, but since so many memoirs are self-published, I think it’s important for people to keep these ethics in mind.

That said, when writing your early drafts, just write out all you have to say and don’t show it to anyone or tell anyone in the family that you are writing a memoir. That preserves your private writing space, and allows you to get out the stories that you need to release from your body. This helps you to develop a perspective on your memories, feelings, and family history that serves you well when you begin to make publishing decisions.

Creativity and Memoir Writing

Linda Joy Myers — Sun, 09 May 2010 18:13:14 +0000

Brenda Ueland in her classic book If You Want To Write talks about the spark of creativity and the process of writing and creating, with inspirational flashes to show us how other writers and creators, painters, playwrights and poets come to hear their muse.
Quotes:
Inspiration comes very slowly and quietly.
And how do these creative thoughts come? Very slowly and quietly. It is the little bomb of revelation bursting inside you.
–the way you are to feel when you are writing is happy, truthful, and free. With complete self-trust…it will be good. Salable? I don’t know, not for a long time anyway.
When you get down to the true self and speak from that, there is always a metamorphosis in your writing, a transfiguration.
When I notice writers getting tangled up in their inner critic, in not wanting to write, feeling stuck and shy after previously writing freely, I know that something needs to be addressed. I suspect that despite their strong pleas to have me as their coach help them with the techniques of editing, of teaching the about skills that will help them be published—an often passionate desire—that the creative process has become lost in the “goal” of getting published, that the editor they were learning how to be has turned into the inner critic.

It’s time to go back to the basics. While I don’t want to discourage people from being published someday, the idea of “someday” needs to be stressed. It seems easier for people to realize that playing a violin sonata or concerto, or being on stage giving a solo piano concert will take many years of practice. Because everyone has to do some kind of writing all their lives, it seems that the expectation that a person who decides to “write” seriously and with goals for professional notice is that after a few stories, journal entries, or a year or two, they will be able to go “out there” with their work. Of course, this does happen, and no teacher wants to discourage magical and unexpected treasures that may arrive at the writer’s doorstep. On the other hand, I’ve learned too that if I give into the student’s desire to be published, to learn how to edit in a time frame that I sense is premature, that they may plunge into self-doubt, depression, and as if a mule is guiding their creative cart, find themselves backing up instead of moving forward.

All creative learning involves this back and forth process, but at the same time, it’s my desire as a coach, as a person who keeps an eye on the pulse of the creative process, to help people to feel encouraged. Premature “professionalism” can throw ice water on that process and even contribute to people not writing at all.
When in Doubt…
The cure for this malady is to return to “freewriting,” without much editing input. To return to the raw, free voice and creative spirit that made them want to write in the first place. The cure is to return to the inner self, mess and all, incorrect grammar, and misplaced modifiers, and not worry about them.
The creative self needs freedom, it needs applause and smiles and unconditional acceptance. When in doubt, I suggest that you find the joy in self-expression once again, and sink into your free floating stream of consciousness. Allow it to guide you down the stream to the heart of yourself. Listen inwardly not outwardly. Forget the editor. Invite your readers to give you what you need to continue to create. Let the “goal” go and return to the Source.

Writing Moment by Moment

Linda Joy Myers — Mon, 19 Apr 2010 23:14:05 +0000

I just returned from the wonderful National Association of Poetry conference in Washington DC, and want to invite writers to include poetry more as they write, heal, and reflect on the important moments of your lives.
At the conference, I taught a Spiritual Memoir workshop called “Moments of Being” named for the amazing book of collected memoir pieces by Virginia Woolf. In 1922, Virginia Woolf stood up in front of friends and colleagues and discussed the sexual abuse she had suffered by her half-brother George Duckworth, as well as other happier memories, some of which formed the basis for her book To the Lighthouse. In those days, and in London especially, this was a bold and brave act. She writes not only of this darkness in her life, but dares to write deeper truths about her father and other family members in ways they would not have approved of. By the time she wrote the memoir pieces, some members of her family had died, which perhaps gave her permission.

During my workshop, I encouraged everyone to come up with a “Turning Point List” of events that were significant in a deeply emotional or spiritual way, and then to write one of those stories. I also talked with the group about plotting their turning points on a timeline so they could visually locate when these events happened.
Suggestion: Write a list of 10-20 turning points, moments of being, moments of significance in your life. Then each week, choose 2-4 of those moments and write about them. Soon, you will have written what could be the spine of your memoir. Writing even just 20 minutes at a time helps you to get your memoir written!
Be Brave–Write your Story

Power of Memoir Blog Tour

Linda Joy Myers — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 22:45:43 +0000

I’m so pleased to announce on International Women’s Day that I’m on some blog tours right now with my book The Power of Memoir.

There are a lot of great questions and interview at Women on Writing and Women’s Memoirs. People are stopping by to comment, to leave a question, and so far I’m keeping up with them!

The blog tour at WOW–Women on Writing–lasts all month. Stay tuned this week at Women’s Memoirs for audio posts, a book review, and a recipe and photo scrapbook, along with some great ideas and questions from the hosts at Women’s Memoirs.

The topics on the blog tour include: How to Write Your Memoir and Go Home for the Holidays, Write a Healing Memoir, Truth and Secrets in Memoir Writing, how to manage writing a memoir and the inner and outer critics, and much more.

In the meantime, begin your own memoir with, “I remember the day that everything changed…”

Be brave–write your story!

To view a complete schedule and links for the Blog Tour, CLICK HERE.

13 Reasons to Write a Healing Memoir

Linda Joy Myers — Sun, 17 Jan 2010 17:19:07 +0000

We all know that writing our personal stories is a challenge–of heart, mind, and body. To wrestle with truth, history, and memory requires us to be brave as we dare to speak out after years of silence. For some, there is the sound of trumpets as the feeling of freedom and fullness of open up through the writing. For others, they hear the voice of the inner, and outer, critics. But they write anyway, and keep writing as a practice, a meditation, a dedication. Writing leads to more writing, insights, and memories.

It’s true that memoir writing challenges us, but it can be a good friend, this process, inviting us to become more of who we really are, to find the voice that is ours and ours alone.

“Re-member” means to bring together the different parts of ourselves, and find ourselves whole.

Writing your deep truths frees you from the past and creates meaning out of chaos.
Re-membering brings all parts of you together again.
Writing with your own voice is empowering, story by story.
Telling your truth frees you from shame and guilt.
Your stories on the page will be different from the ones in your head.
Writing a memoir is a transformational and spiritual path.
Your story can help change others’ lives.
Research proves that writing heals both body and mind.
Creating a narrative where you are the “I” character and the narrator integrates the past and the present.
Integrating who you are and bringing memories out of the darkness changes your brain.
Writing and sharing your story breaks you out of isolation and connects you more deeply with the larger world.
Becoming an author is empowering and inspiring, and frees you from the shadows.
Getting published online, in an anthology or in your own book, are ways to get witnessed and move from victim to leader—showing others the way to healing and greater self-esteem.

The Power of Memoir is on Kindle!

Linda Joy Myers — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 21:14:39 +0000

Surprise, surprise. I just discovered that Kindle already has my new book. No yet officially released, it’s available already on Kindle! The wonders of the digital world! So now people are buying it, downloading it and writing me–this is great.

No matter how many times a writer gets published, there is the thrill of knowing that your words and ideas are moving out into the world and being shared with others. I’m passionate about the power of memoir to heal and to create new connections with others. Every week in my work with other writers, I see how writing our stories helps us to be more creative in our personal lives and gives us joy.

I wish everyone a Happy New Year, and I hope that if you feel the desire to write, that today you will sit down and listen to that voice within you, and write.