In a post on the BookBaby blog, Janna Lopez asks how much of yourself are you willing to reveal in your writing. “Putting aside what others might think, writing truth as we understand it with no fear of judgment is no easy endeavor,” Lopez says. “Fear of unearthing deeper, darker emotional currents has everything to do with how much or how little we include of our Selves in our own stories.”
Lopez shares the story of a writer who’d kept journals for decades, but whose writing felt flat when it came time to write her memoir. She was able to capture a spark only when she realized that her journals had captured events, without her own thoughts and feelings.
Lopez shares some exercises that can help you dig deeper and present your authentic self in your writing. When you’re journaling, consider these kinds of questions. Even if you write only fiction, you can benefit from this type of self-exploration:
- What happened (the inciting incident)?
- How do you feel about what happened?
- What have you learned from what happened?
- How has this shaped you?
- How does this show up in your current life?
- What residual effects or realities linger from what happened?
- Were any old notions crushed by a new understanding?
- Does what happened then dictate what happens now?
- Who were you when this happened?
- How did you relate to what happened then?
- How do you relate to what happened now?
- Would you change what happened if you could?
- If this didn’t happen, how would things be different?
- How would you be different?
- Who are you because of what happened?
