LifeStory Briefs

When I first started writing stories from my childhood, I wrote from my adult perspective, reflecting back to those years. Then something magical happened: the little girl within me, the one that I had been and was now remembering, started writing my stories for me. Because her version of how things happened was so much more honest and entertaining than I can be as an adult, I surrendered to her influence, never knowing where it would take me from one moment to the next.

I love Donna’s description what happened to her as a “magical event,” for when we find our voices, it often feels magical. “Surrender” is a perfect way to describe what happens when our voice begins to emerge. And when that happens, it’s much easier to tell our story.

A Voice of a Past Self

Donna found her voice by inviting one of her past selves—her child-self—to speak. From a child’s perspective, the world looks different: less complicated, brighter and fresher. The famous memoirist, Anais Nin, writes, “The poet is the one who is able to keep the fresh vision of the child alive.” What would happen if you wrote about your childhood from your child’s point of view?

To see how this might work for you, try this: choose an event from your childhood (a remembered birthday party, a family trip, a new house) and tell it from your child’s point of view. For an example, go to page 8 and read the excerpt from Donna Remmert’s book. Close your eyes and mentally go back to the time you’ve chosen, seeing yourself at that age, feeling what it was like to be you at that time. Then let that you tell the story. Like Donna, you might be surprised and very pleased by the voice that emerges.

A Voice of a Different Self

All of us are made up of different selves—a family/relational self, a work/professional self, a variety of past selves, a mystical/spiritual self. For a lovely example of a “mystical/spiritual” voice, go to page 10 and read Nora Jamieson’s short essay, “Drifting.” Here is the first paragraph:

I am drifting in my canoe. It is early morning on Long Pond and the sun’s warmth infuses the cool night air. It quickens into a soft boil of breath that moves over the water. As I drift, I think about this. This brief reunion of warmth and cool, dark and light, stillness and movement. This brief moment where one blessed thing lives aside another before giving itself over completely. The wind, stronger now, slowly spins me, the canoe, my control into itself and out beyond the shelter of the island. I think about that old Gospel song. They say Gods goin to trouble these waters. Wade in sister, wade in.

Can you hear the difference in this voice? It’s quiet, reflective, almost poetic. In fact, Nora uses several poetic devices: repetition (drifting...drift...This brief reunion...This brief moment…), sentence balance, even “ungrammatical” elements. The voice itself is almost like a prayer, inviting the speaker and her listeners to “Wade in sister, wade in.” As you read her essay, you’ll hear this prayerful voice over and over, asking to be woven into the fabric of creation, to be submerged in the depths of Mystery.

Often, our lives and our writing are dominated by a single, loud voice—the one we use for work, the one we use in our relationships. But you may have a different voice that would like to be heard: a quieter, more reflective voice, a prayerful, poetic voice. How can you let that voice speak?

Nora’s reflective voice emerges when she writes about her experiences in the natural world. Would that work for you? If so, choose a natural landscape that centers you, a place from memory or from imagination. Go there, relax deeply into the place (as Nora does as she drifts in her canoe) and then begin to record your observations and feelings. Or perhaps you might choose a place with religious associations: a place of worship, a sacred spot. Go there (in reality or in imagination), wait, listen, and then write, letting that voice speak.

However, you choose to do it, honoring the voice of a “different self” is one way to find our true voices.

A Duet of Voices

Sometimes we find our true voices when we speak to others, honestly and openly in dialogue. If you’ll read the story “My Grandmother’s Gifts” (page 13, by Dianne Lodge-Peters), you’ll see how Dianne’s voice is sharpened and brought to life by listening to and responding to her grandmother’s voice, heard in memory, heard in letters, heard in the words of family stories. By including her grandmother’s voice in her own story, Dianne shows us how she found her own voice, an echo of a voice dearly-loved and deeply-honored. Her story reminds me of a comment by Carl Jung, the famous psychologist: “The meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemical substances: if there is any reaction, both are transformed.”

Is there someone whose voice has helped to bring your own voice to life, to transform your voice? Think about the people in your life whose words have influenced you. Imagine yourself in dialogue with them. (Reread Dianne’s story to see how she does this.)

Finding Your Voice

Sometimes I think that the most important thing I can do for myself is to find my true voice: a voice that allows me to speak true and deeply-felt words, a voice that is confident and courageous, even outrageous too, perhaps. Who is to tell us what kind of voice is “right” or “proper”? Who is to tell us what words to speak or how to speak them? As you experiment with different ways to tell your story, listen to your own different voices, surrender to their influences, and experience the magic that comes with letting them speak.—Susan Wittig Albert