Why Memoir Matters

In the end, what we have are our stories.

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I may never have had the pleasure of meeting you, so pardon my questions, but I want to know what wakes you up in the middle of the night. I want to know how you felt the first time you caught a fish. I want to know who your first kiss was, who broke your heart, and how you healed.

Tell me about the biggest sky you’ve ever seen, or the moment a stranger helped guide you out of a tight parking space. I want to know about the time you stood on top of a hill or a mountain or a stage and sang at the top of your lungs.

Tell me what your safe space was when you were a child. And who your safe space is now that you’re an adult.

I want to know about the best piece of pie you ever ate. The person who betrayed you. The time you couldn’t pay your bills.

The moment you remembered that you are magic.

I want to know these things about you.

But even more than that, I want you to know them about yourself. To me, that’s why memoir matters.

This morning, I had the pleasure of talking with Ryan Benz, author of an inspiring and deeply satisfying memoir called Wander, in which he tells the story of quitting his corporate job and finding new meaning in his life by walking the Appalachian Trail.

Ryan is going to be one of our guest instructors for the Story Summit memoir class I’m teaching, which starts next week, and our conversation has stayed with me all day.

At one point, he talked about the most important quality of memoir—one that was mentioned over and over again in reviews of Wander, because it’s what readers are hungry for. Here’s what he said:

We’re all living lives that feel more complicated than ever—faster, fuller, sometimes like a whirling dervish we can’t quite step out of. To pause and make meaning of our lives while we’re still living them is one of the greatest ways we can honor ourselves—our experiences, our relationships, the moments that shape us. The ones that make us cringe or want to hide, and the ones that make us feel prouder than we ever thought we could.

There is no such thing as an ordinary life.

I want to know about yours.

My conversation with Ryan this morning reminded me why this is so important.

Memoir is a portal into both the magnificent and the mundane—into everything that matters in your life. And if we’re wise, we take time to put it on paper.

I’ve had a lot of reminders of that lately.

I’ve been writing the eulogy for my sister-in-law’s memorial service, which has led to conversations with family members and long moments of reflection about what she brought to the world through her particular way of being—her humor, her steadiness, her love. Telling those stories is our way of keeping people alive, generation after generation.

I’ve also been thinking about my dad, who passed away in 1989 at the age of 84. He was 52 years old when I was born, so two-thirds of his life had already unfolded before I was old enough to really know him.

He wanted to write a memoir.

He wrote one paragraph.

My mom gave it to me after he died. In those few words, he described being born in the age of the horse and buggy on a Missouri farm and living long enough to see men land on the moon and the rise of the technology age.

It was the perfect opening. A doorway into a life I will never fully know, because the end of that paragraph is where the story stopped. How I wish he had written the rest.

As Ryan said, young people today will grow up in a world shaped by artificial intelligence, by speed and scale and constant noise. But what we need—what we will always need—are stories written by human beings. Stories with a heartbeat. Stories that carry memory, meaning, and truth.

You have things to teach, to reveal, to heal, to sort out in your life. We all do.

And while it may feel intimidating to begin, there is no better way to enter that conversation than through memoir.

Here’s another half a minute with Ryan that I think says it all.

Your story could get someone through their next day.

So please. Start writing.

And if you want companionship and guidance along the way, I would love to walk with you through the memoir class.

With blessings,

Deb

P.S. If you’re wondering whether this class is right for you, you can book a time to talk with me here. I’m always happy to connect.

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A NOTE TO MY READERS: I write “A World of Your Own” as a member of the Iowa Writers’ Collaborative, which is led by Julie Gammack, of Des Moines. I’m honored to be part of this group, featuring the diverse voices of more than 70 professional writers and journalists across the state of Iowa. I encourage you to check out their columns.