Listen closely to yourself and dispute the thoughts that don’t serve you – even if those are true. For example, you might think, “Writing a novel is hard. Selling a novel is hard.” Yes, both thoughts are true, but they don’t serve you. The only thought that serves you is, “I’m off to write a novel.”
— Eric Maisel
January 2014 issue of The Writer magazine.
Imagine a room full of people, they are looking at a speaker behind a podium. They want to know more about the topic. In a way, they want to be entertained, even though it’s a somber occasion. They are talking about you . . . in the past tense.
Who knows more about you than you? Who best to talk about the essence of you, than you? For today’s prompt, write about you. Provide enough information so the reader or the person in that room has a view of your life. Write about high points, achievements, life markers. Write about what is important to you.
You can make a list in chronological order of events that have shaped you.
You can look up various years and discover what historical events took place in particular years. Write what your life was like during those historical events. Did they affect you?
Today’s prompt: Write about you. We can call it Life Changing Events or The Chronicles of [insert your name here]. Or we can call it your eulogy.
When using prompts for writing, you can answer from your personal experience, or from your fictional or real character’s point of view. Feel free to let your imagination meander.
If you only know where the trolley you got on would take you . . . What trolley did you get on, and where did it take you? What other trolleys were running then? What if you had taken one of them? Not had kids, had kids, chose to live on the Atlantic instead of Pacific, gave up art or gave up law, married him/her or didn’t. Tell us about your trolley.
Prompt: What trolley did you get on?
When using the freewrite style of writing . . . write freely with no worries about the end result. The editor that sits on your shoulder, the inner critic. . . out the door. Give ’em the boot. Not invited to this party.
It’s not about the writing . . . it’s about the process.
The process of letting go. Trust yourself. Go with your imagination. Go with what’s on your mind.
Today’s writing prompt: I stand on the edge of . . .
Part 1
Make a list of pivotal events in your life. Those times when, at night, you were not the same person you were in the morning. By day’s end, you were a different person. Just write a list.
When you are finished writing the list: take something from your list and write the details . . . as you remember them. You can be as detailed, or as general as you want to be.
Write about an event that altered your life: all the gritty details. . . be as honest and as genuine as you can. Bleed onto the page.
Part 2 will be the next prompt post #41.
Write about a strong feeling or attachment you had when you were young.
Write about an incident that happened between you and another person from your point of view. Write for about 20 minutes.
Move the camera lens, focusing on the other person, write about this same incident from the other person’s point of view.
Write about your favorite thing to do when you were twelve years old.
You can respond from your personal experience, or answer as your fictional character would answer.
What surprises me …
Excerpt from Gift From the Sea by Anne Morrow Lindbergh.
I began these pages for myself in order to think out my own particular pattern of living, my own individual balance of life, work and human relationships. And since I think best with a pencil in my hand, I started naturally to write. I had the feeling, when the thoughts first clarified on paper, that my experience was very different from other people’s. (Are we all under this illusion?) My situation had, in certain ways, more freedom than that of most people, and in certain other ways, much less. . . .
And so gradually, these chapters, fed by conversations, arguments and revelations from men and women of all groups, became more than my individual story, until I decided in the end to give them back to the people who had shared and stimulated many of these thoughts. Here, then, with my warm feelings of gratitude and companionship for those working along the same lines, I return my gift from the sea.
Your turn . . . write snippets of your story. Just write!