How Do We Get Our Stories Out of Ourselves
I'd like to tell you about
my friend and colleague Maureen Shepard, founder of Health Ascent. A practicing
homeopath, she's also developing a line of unique plant essences and is in the
process of beginning to write a book about how to partner with nature. Over the
course of several months, we've had a series of casual conversations about what
kinds of stories should go into such a book. Last week, one discussion seemed
particularly valuable. With Maureen's permission, I now share the essence of our
exchange with you.
About a month ago, Maureen
took a two-week trip to Peru. She came home inspired by traveling through
different regions of the country and doing ceremonies with indigenous shamans.
Her adventures culminated on the banks of Lake Titicaca, where there was a
particularly momentous occasion in which she felt called forth and recognized as
an elder. As she recounted the events that took place, her enthusiasm and her
descriptions moved me. But now that she's home, time has passed, and the
holidays are upon her, her memories and the meaning are harder to articulate.
One of the assignments she's given herself is to get the details of the trip
down on paper.
How do we get our stories
out of ourselves? What is going to communicate the felt essence of something
we've experienced to our readers? What techniques can writers employ in the
creative process to recall meaningful details, and what more can be done that
might impact readers?
First, it's important to
understand what happens when people read. The brain thinks in pictures (not in
words), so what's happening is that the words of a book evoke pictures for
readers. These pictures are images of their own creation, which are drawn from
memories of their own past and fantasies. The picture-making process is largely
associative. So when we write, the more specific we can be about what the five
physical senses perceive, the more easily we can trigger the reader.
So tip one is to include
visual, auditory, tactile, olfactory, and gustatory information. For Maureen,
this might be details on the sights of the lakefront, the expressions on the
faces of the shamans, the words of an invocation spoken in ceremony, the call of
a condor, the warmth of the sun on her face or the flutter of the breeze blowing
through her hair, the roughness of the path beneath her feet as she was hiking a
trail up a mountain, the scent of a field of flowers, or the sensational flavor
of Ricky's warm apple strudel in Pisac.
Second, it's important to
give readers a framework within which to comprehend our story. Just because we
say, "Lake Titicaca," doesn't mean people know the same things we know about it.
There is definitely room to bring in factual content that we may only access
ourselves by doing a spot of research on geography, history, sociology,
anthropology, and so on. In Maureen's case, there are elements, such as the
spiritual significance of the site to indigenous ceremonialists, features of the
natural landscape, and her beliefs about ancient civilizations being connected
to the landscape, which would enrich her readers' understanding of why this
event was meaningful to her.
Third, in addition to
sensory input, we can stir readers' imaginations and bring them along with us by
revealing the stream of consciousness of the central figure. For example, "When
our hands clasped, my cold hand began to warm up and I thought, 'How great it is
to be here together.' "
Finally, to facilitate
writing an essay or an anecdote, we can ask ourselves a series of questions.
Examples: What did it look like? How did I feel? What was I thinking? Did I
learn a lesson? Was there a turning point? What's the most relevant piece of
information I'd like to impart? What does the reader need to know about this in
order for it to make sense? Taking a journalistic approach to documenting our
own memories can lead us to recall more about them. This is the who, what,
where, why, when, and how of anything that we're describing.
It's acceptable to either
write the questions we use to access content right into the story (Why did I
feel that way? Well, because of . . . ), or to leave them out of the
final draft. The most important thing is to get our details out on the page
where we can work with them.
All of these techniques are
employed in service to the process of writing. We then have enough material to
manipulate and restructure the story for dramatic effect and logical flow. In
the end only snippets from the event may make it into the final draft. Cutting
is easier than building up.
If you're interested in reading more articles on similar topics, you may enjoy my weekly ezine: "Get a Book Deal News." Visit my website StephanieGunning.com to sign up.
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