Tag Archives: Linda Joy Myers

Memoir Summit at the Birthplace of the Revolution

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by Jerry Waxler

I grew up surrounded by icons of the American Revolution: the Liberty Bell, Independence Hall, and Valley Forge National Park. Even in elementary school I felt proud of the role my region played in the birth of the nation. Now that I’ve grown up, I feel another surge of pride, this time about the contribution our region is making to the Memoir Revolution. With our substantial infrastructure of writing programs and groups of every variety, it’s a wonderful place for writers. However, in most cases, we life writers have had to tag along with the more numerous fiction writers. Now, I’m thrilled to announce an event that celebrates the growing movement toward writing stories about real people.

At the free Memoir Summit on the beautiful campus of Rosemont College on Philadelphia’s Main Line, four authors and teachers share their passion for the genre. The goal is to inspire writers and aspiring writers to come together for an afternoon, deepen their understanding of the genre, and gain insights into how to turn their own lives into stories.

The first speaker, Beth Kephart offers her awesomely enriched point of view, as a writer of both memoir and fiction. She has published 16 books, five of which are memoirs. She writes prodigiously about memoir on her own blog, and recently published a book for memoir writers called Handling the Truth.  The book has been mentioned in Oprah’s magazine O.  Beth teaches memoir writing at the University of Pennsylvania and was recently honored as one of the 50 most influential Philadelphia Writers. Come and be influenced!

Linda Joy Myers will be joining us from Berkeley, California. She is the founder of National Association of Memoir Writers, and a passionate proponent of the healing and sharing that comes from writing your story. As a therapist, teacher and memoir writer, she steers readers and students toward the elegant solution of applying storytelling to the puzzles of life. Her books include her own memoir, Don’t Call Me Mother: A Daughter’s Journey from Abandonment to Forgiveness and a handbook for memoir writers called Power of Memoir: How to Write Your Healing Story. She hosts an online Memoir Telesummit, and so it is fitting that she is an honored guest at this first Philadelphia Memoir Summit. Come and learn about the healing power of writing your memoir.

Robert Waxler is a professor of literature at University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth. He teaches his college students how to use literature to gain insights into their own lives. When he himself encountered difficulties in the lives of his two sons, he turned to the written word to help him make sense of the profound emotions. He recorded his journey of grieving and healing in his two memoirs, Losing Jonathan and Courage to Walk. Robert Waxler co-founded an organization called Changing Lives through Literature that partners with the judicial system to offer selected convicts an alternative sentence. Instead of going to jail they read and discuss novels. The method leverages the power of the written word to help people grow. Come and let Bob Waxler share his views with you about how turning your life into literature can help you, as well.

I have been following and writing about these three speakers for years. The essays on my blog go deep into the experiences of Beth Kephart in Slant of Sun, Linda Joy Myers in Don’t Call Me Mother, and Robert Waxler in Losing Jonathan and Courage to Heal. And I’ve interviewed all three. I love what they are saying and doing. In their books about reading and writing, they are as passionate as I am about promoting literature by helping and encouraging you to write your life.

When I first became intrigued by memoirs in my fifties, I realized that until then, I had immersed myself in fiction stories. Memoirs gave me an opportunity to apply the principles of literature to the process of living. Once I began to do so, I gained an exciting way to look at myself and others. After I read each memoir, I ponder its meaning and share my findings on my blog.

After doing this hundreds of times, I published Memoir Revolution, which chronicles the birth of the life-into-story movement of the twenty-first century. As the fourth speaker at the Philadelphia Memoir Summit, I’ll share perspectives on the Memoir Revolution and offer six steps to help you get started and keep going on your own memoir. Come and join the revolution!

This fascinating interplay between life and literature is also the subject of Robert Waxler’s book in progress called Linguistic Beings: How Literature Helps us To Understand Ourselves and the World. From his manuscript, I learned there is a name for the process of carefully thinking about what you read. Waxler quotes Sven Birkerts who said, “[Deep Reading means] we don’t just read the words, we dream our lives in their vicinity.*” The term Deep Reading perfectly describes how memoir reading and writing help us become “more human.” By writing your own memoir, you can dream your life in the vicinity of your words, and offer others the opportunity to do the same.

Whether you’ve already written about your life, or are only considering it, come join these speakers and an audience of other aspiring memoir writers. Together, we can spend an afternoon dreaming about writing in the vicinity of each other.

Notes
Here is a longer quote about Deep Reading from Robert Waxler’s manuscript, reprinted with permission: “Deep reading is a risky but rewarding encounter with our rhythms and needs, our own feelings and emotions, and it offers a way of making sense of that encounter. Through such reading, we discover how we are all connected to others and to our own evolving stories. We experience our own plots and stories unfolding through the imaginative language and voice of others, and we desire to move on.” Robert Waxler

For more information about the Memoir Summit click here.

For more information about Philadelphia’s annual writer’s conference, click here.

Links to Articles about these speakers

Interview and seven part blog about Beth Kephart’s “Slant of Sun”
Use this memoir as a study guide: lessons 1 to 3
Lessons 4-5 from Beth Kephart’s Memoir, Slant of Sun
Four More Writing Lessons from Reading a Memoir
Memoir Lessons: Mysteries of emerging consciousness
Memoir Lessons: Moms, Quirks, Choices
Lessons from Kephart: Labels, Definitions, Language
Memoir Lessons: Buddies, Endings, and Beyond
Interview with Beth Kephart

Interview with Linda Joy Myers: A leader of memoir writers tells her own story
Link to Linda Joy Myers’ Blog

Blog about another talk I gave with Robert Waxler: Revealing Death and Other Courageous Acts of Life
Essay about Robert Waxler’s Courage to Walk
My Interview with Robert Waxler, Part 1, Part 2, Part 3

For brief descriptions and links to all the posts on Memory Writers Network, click here.

To order Memoir Revolution about the powerful trend to create, connect, and learn, see the Amazon page for eBook or Paperback.

To order my how-to-get-started guide to write your memoir, click here.

Interview with Memoir Activist – Founder of National Association of Memoir Writers

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by Jerry Waxler

Read Memoir Revolution to learn why now is the perfect time to write your memoir.

After writing my memoir for a few years, I wanted company, so in 2007 I began posting my thoughts on a blog called Memory Writers Network. I envisioned that by sending my essays out into the world, I would connect with like-minded writers. Over the next few years, such a network indeed materialized.

Readers commented on the blog or emailed me to thank me. Many of them included links to their own work, and some shared my interest in creating virtual communities. Shirley Showalter, and Sharon Lippincott, and later Kathleen Pooler and Linda Joy Myers sent “let’s get together and write” vibes into the ether. Linda Joy even created an organization called the National Association of Memoir Writers to gather aspiring writers under one virtual roof. Thanks to these collaborations, as well as my local critique groups and classes, memoir writing turned from an isolated activity to a social one. We were gathering to help each other find our stories.

With each passing year, I found more memoirs to read, more aspiring memoir writers to support, and more groups springing up. I thought I detected a mass movement, and dove in even deeper. The longer I studied, the more robust the movement became. I recently published my observations in the Memoir Revolution, a sort of memoir of my investigation into the birth of this cultural development which has begun to change the way we look at ourselves and each other. To celebrate both the book and the movement it represents, I will be speaking at the prestigious annual Memoir Telesummit hosted by the National Association of Memoir Writers.

The Telesummit, in its tenth year, is a day-long series of meetings, free and accessible by phone, will offer interviews with me and other experts about writing, publishing and marketing memoirs. Whether you are just now deciding to write your life story, or wondering how you would publish or sell it once you complete it, the experts at the Telesummit will offer you enthusiastic, in-depth information and guidance.

I recently asked Linda Joy Myers to help us understand the Telesummit, what it is and why she has worked so passionately for so long to encourage memoir writers. Like all of us, Linda Joy Myers has a story. I knew the roots of that story, chronicled in her memoir, Don’t Call Me Mother. In this interview I learn how those earlier experiences led to her memoir activism.

A Memoir Activist Tells Her Story, Interview with Linda Joy Myers

Jerry Waxler: In your memoir, you talk about the experience of being in an orchestra in high school. I imagine that experience of a young woman, making music in an orchestra pit, seeing and hearing how the music of each one contributed to the sound filling the room. Compared with that, writing is so lonely. When you fell in love with writing, how did you first adapt to this solo activity?

Linda Joy Myers: Actually, playing a musical instrument is a singular activity–you alone can make the music happen, you have to rely on your strength, perseverance, and ongoing discipline to create music. Yes, it’s special to be in a group to play, but every day you practice alone. Just like when you write.

Jerry Waxler: You wrote a memoir and have famously shared the stunning length of time it took you. Fifteen years. That’s a long time to work on a single project. How did you manage to stick with it? Were you ever tempted to set the whole thing aside and give up? What brought you back into the project?

Linda Joy Myers: I hate to admit how long it took, but for a looong time, I was not “writing a memoir” or “writing a book.” The story of my family, three generations of mothers who had abandoned their daughters, seemed unusual, perhaps a cautionary tale for others to learn from. The gripping emotional toll for several generations was something obvious to me even as a child, and later when I looked for books that could help me sort it all out, I found none. It seemed so out of the ordinary to have a mother who acted like my mother, at times even tender and loving when she visited, then who let me know I was NOT her daughter when I visited her when I was older. Even her letters were signed “Love, Mother,” and some of them were tender or reminiscent. I suppose confusion about all this was one reason to write my story. As I wrote, I acted as my own witness, I needed to sort it all out.

So I began and stopped, and began again. I would stop for a year or more, overwhelmed either by the plot, where to start, whose voice to use, or the sheer emotional toll it took to try to wrap words around my memories. I stopped too because there were parts of my life that were simply too painful to write about. But it seemed the memoir was chasing ME–tapping me on the shoulder, getting my attention. It told me that I was a coward, and was I really going to give up on the story I had wanted to write??

Finally, I quit running from it. I turned around to face it and committed to finish the book. I hired a coach and supplied her 20 pages a week until it was done. More time passed until it was published, and it was revised several times after that, but getting the first draft out was important.

Jerry Waxler: When did you first start to think you could help others write their memoirs? What sort of motivation drove you to create a place where other memoir writers could congregate?

Linda Joy Myers: My love of memory and reminiscence, which isn’t valued much by society, drove me to recognize that if I wanted to be happy in work other than doing therapy, I needed to choose something that was interesting to me which I could sustain, so I began to teach memoir writing. I had taught in psychology programs for several years, and my first degree was in education, so I knew how to teach. I started with a group of three, and offered memoir writing trainings for therapists, and memoir writing groups in person, for a while twice a week, for 15 years. I loved the exploration that we all did together, digging into the layers of personhood as well as the layers of craft and story making itself.

Jerry Waxler: As the leader of NAMW, you are in a sense the orchestra leader. But the analogy isn’t perfect. We are all out here writing on our own and only come together occasionally. How do you see yourself in relationship to this loose conglomeration of writers, teachers, and other participants? Help us understand the role you see yourself playing in this movement I call the Memoir Revolution.

Linda Joy Myers: I’m doing what I love. I thought that if I started an organization, we could all gather under its umbrella and talk about memories, story, and share the intimacy that writing memoirs brings to a group. And we share the creative process, which has been an important part of my life since I was a child and began learning piano and cello, and later I learned more about the process of creating something from nothing through painting and sculpture.

Jerry Waxler: I have glommed on to the National Association of Memoir Writers as a wonderful safe and supportive place for turning self into story. What sorts of other feedback have you had from members? What sorts of dialogue with members helps you keep the organization serving the goals of members who want to write and share their life stories?

Linda Joy Myers: People tell me that they are getting a lot out of our programs at NAMW. The free monthly Roundtables invite people to get to know us and learn from the presenters without being members, and there are a lot of free resources on the site. Members enjoy connecting with each other and with me on a regular basis, asking questions, saying hello to each other, and discussing various publishing, marketing, and writing questions on our Facebook site. Everyone needs an outlet where they can share this special challenges and rewards of writing!

Jerry Waxler: Thank you for offering the Telesummit to members, and thank you for inviting me to participate. I find it one of the best places on the Internet where a variety of memoir specialists come together to talk about the various aspects of the genre. What do you hope attendees will take home from this event?

Linda Joy Myers: People join us from all skill levels with different needs, so each person will take what they need from the presenters. However, I try to offer a well-rounded group of experts–in writing, marketing, and publishing–so they can learn about various aspects that have to do with writing and publishing.

This Telesummit is celebrating the “Memoir Revolution” which is the title of your book, and bringing three top memoir specialists in: Denis Ledoux, who started over 15 years ago offering programs for memoir writers, long before the “memoir craze” began; and Matilda Butler, whose Women’s Memoirs programs focus on the voices of women as they write their stories. I’m pleased that Stephanie Chandler, who is a whiz at marketing and creativity at helping writers find their position on the net and develop their brand, and Joel Friedlander, another marketing, book design, and self-publishing guru, can join us. As they say, it takes a village–and that is what the memoir revolution is all about–a village, a community of writers who passionately care about sharing their stories and creating a great book. At the same time, we all become each other’s best-friend-networkers. That’s how I met you: on the web!

Jerry Waxler: There are so many aspects to writing a memoir, from digging deep within yourself, to learning to construct a story, editing, publishing and even marketing. I notice this broad range in the topics you offer in the Telesummit. Do you ever wish it was easier? What do you tell aspiring memoir writers about the gamut of activities required to go from start to finish?

Linda Joy Myers: Sure, at times we are all too busy trying to write, learning about platform, figuring out how to blog and post to Social Media. Sometimes, I have to unplug and just let it go, even when the things on my to-do list are still shouting at me–and this is true for everyone I know. Still, it’s a world that invites us to join in with our own voices, this writing-publishing-blogging-sharing world. We are free to express in ways that were unthinkable only a decade ago, and that is not going to change. People’s lives are enhanced by being able to reach out and touch someone!

People can tune into our NAMW monthly Roundtable Discussions, which are always free, and join our membership teleseminars each month–as a member you have access to over 130 audios and articles in the membership area–and you will learn so very much about all aspects of the writing life.

Jerry Waxler: When I started writing my memoir, I couldn’t have foreseen the lovely experience of learning to construct a story, and learning to see myself through the lens of story. After I had been writing for a few years, I experienced these things for myself, giving me some of the most intriguing creative rewards of my life. As a memoir activist, how do you try to communicate these future benefits to potential writers? What do you wish they could know about the process?

Linda Joy Myers: I talk about the invitation and magic that writing offers us. Everyone who is interested in writing has written enough to have experienced moments when the writing seems to have a life of its own, when writing reveals thoughts and feelings and even new memories–and these moments are a kind of ecstasy that lift us from our “regular” lives to another level of existence. While writing is also hard work, these special moments are the gift of the muse, a reward for perseverance and ongoing attention to our stories. I enjoy reminding people about this!

Notes

For brief descriptions and links to all the posts on Memory Writers Network, click here.

To order Memoir Revolution about the powerful trend to create, connect, and learn, see the Amazon page for eBook or Paperback.

To order my how-to-get-started guide to write your memoir, click here.

Learn the inner and outer dimensions of memoir writing

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by Jerry Waxler

I have been a fan of Linda Joy Myers ever since I read her memoir “Don’t Call Me Mother.” (Also see my essay “Mothers and Daughters Don’t Always Mix“) The book was straightforward and elegant, transforming a painful past into a compelling story. When I reached out to learn more about how she wrote it, she explained that writing the memoir was itself a journey that lasted more than a decade. During that period, she developed a more sophisticated understanding of her own childhood and at the same time learned the craft of storytelling.

Linda Joy wanted to share these benefits with others so she offered memoir writing workshops and then started the National Association of Memoir Writers, an organization that offers courses, teleseminars, support, and other benefits to aspiring memoir writers everywhere.

I already knew that Linda Joy brings compassion and insight to the memoir field, so I was eager to read her new book “The Power of Memoirs, Writing Your Healing Story.” The book covers the basics of scene and plot to help writers weave the skein of events into a story worth reading. It also offers valuable tips for writers you won’t find in other books, such as insight into the knack of accepting feedback from a critique group, in my opinion one of the most important tools any writer can have.

And then, Linda Joy goes beyond craft and turns inward towards the heart of the matter. As a professional psychotherapist, Linda Joy helps her clients work through their memories. In this book, she performs a similar service for aspiring memoir writers. In hefty, substantive chapters like “Psychology of Memoir Writing,” “The Dark Stuff,” and “The Power of Writing to Heal” Linda Joy provides excellent guidance to help you decipher your memories and bring them to the page.

Families matter

A key goal of a memoir is to portray other characters in your life. This can be especially complex when trying to explain parents, grandparents, and siblings who were influencing you while you were under construction. They are part of you. And so, the more you understand those relationships the better you understand yourself. “The Power of Memoir” offers tips about how to write about family. By seeing them through the eyes of a writer, you will gain fresh perspectives and piece together a more sensible story about your family than the one that was shapelessly tangled in memory.

Spirituality

I have been searching for years to find language to express the spirituality of life. Linda Joy’s “Power of Memoir” contains a superb section about this topic. When writing a memoir, we review our past and explore the way we were influenced by our higher power, our religious framework, and other aspects of the inner connections known broadly as “spirituality.”

However, the past is not the only time frame at work here. You actually write the memoir in the present, a journey that both require spiritual strength and generates it. Linda Joy lovingly offers guidance that fosters this connection with the inner self, to help you get in touch with spirituality right here and now.

Psychology Research

While many authors and teachers observe the healing nature of memoir writing, these observations do not constitute the kind of scientific research that would support its use as a form of therapy. To find such evidence, Linda Joy turns to the research of psychologist James Pennebaker from the University of Texas who has spent his academic career studying this question. His research offers a fascinating look at the emotional benefits of writing. Linda Joy also cites brain imaging research that offers additional evidence for these benefits.

This book will help you write yours

So whether you want to write your memoir because you are curious about yourself, or you want to heal old hurts, or you want to share your journey with other people, or you want to strengthen your brain, or you consider writing to be a wonderful hobby, or you wish to publish a book and enter the stream of culture – for any of these reasons, you will benefit from traveling in Linda Joy’s company while discovering the Healing Power of your own memoir.

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Home page for Power of Memoir

Click here to read my essay about Linda Joy’s Memoir, Don’t Call Me Mother

“Don’t Call Me Mother” Amazon Link

Click for my essay about Linda Joy’s Memoir

Read an interview with Linda Joy Myers here.

More memoir writing resources

To see brief descriptions and links to all the essays on this blog, click here.

To order my short, step-by-step how-to guide to write your memoir, click here.

A leader of memoir writers tells her own story

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by Jerry Waxler

I have long admired Linda Joy Myers as a thought-leader in the memoir movement. In addition to writing an amazing memoir about her own journey, she is the founder of the National Association of Memoir Writers which brings resources and support to anyone who wants to develop the story of their life. Now she has added another contribution to the field with her book, “The Power of Memoir: Writing Your Healing Story.” In this interview, I ask Linda Joy to share more thoughts about her journey as a writer and teacher.

Jerry Waxler: When did you first become interested in writing your memoir?

Linda Joy Myers: At first, I wrote my stories as journal entries and poetry. My inner critic was very noisy and nasty, so I kept my writing small and private. For a while, I was confused about whose story I was telling. Because my story is about three generations, actually about five generations of mothers and daughters, I didn’t know where to start. I wrote two novel length versions that had to do with of the imagined story of my great-grandmother, born in 1873, three years before Custer’s Last Stand. And I wanted to explore the early life of my grandmother who was raising me. I knew her as an older woman, when she would tell me the stories of her early life, but her most interesting story she tried to keep from me: her elopement when she was 16! It caused quite a scandal.

My story? Well, it took one of my mentors to invite me to tell my own story, which I hadn’t yet claimed. I was raised with huge admonitions against “airing the dirty laundry” of the family, and my story would definitely do that. It was hard to break all those rules! So it took many years, lots of classes, and lots of “I’m NOT going to write this darn thing.” As I tell people, the memoir kept chasing me until I turned around and agreed to write it. When I did, the old ghosts became silent. I suppose it helped that those who would get upset at me for telling the family tales were dead. Well, most of them. Some of my extended family eventually freaked out that I had written a memoir, even though I left their dastardly deeds out of consideration and respect. Now I might write it all, as I have nothing to lose. So there might be another memoir someday.

JW: When you did you first become interested in teaching others how to write memoirs?

LJM: One day I stumbled upon the research that Dr. James Pennebaker and other psychologists were doing on the healing power of writing stories. Time stopped as I sat there at my desk, enthralled,  everything silent, as energy rushed through my body. I began searching for all the research on the topic I could find–this was in 1999-2000. I called Dr. Pennebaker to find out more, and I met him in person. Inspired, I began teaching therapists how they could use writing to help clients, using Xeroxed memoir stories from my favorite memoirs and articles about the writing as healing research. In these workshops I was blown away by the stories that came out of people who were not “writers.” I decided to write my first book “Becoming Whole–Writing Your Healing Story” to share the great news of the research and the amazing stories that came out of my workshops. Teaching people “the good news” was the most fun I’d had in a long time.

JW: You have said in interviews for your own memoir “Don’t Call me Mother” that you made huge sweeping changes, even throwing out a manuscript and starting over. It sounds like you were burning with creative desire to tell that story well. Could you say more about the sheer length and persistence of this effort for you? What kept you going?

LJM: I worked on the memoir for more than a decade, and during most of that time I was still trying to heal. I got stuck a lot, and quit working on it many times, feeling defeated and overwhelmed by how hard it was to write when the issue I was trying to heal was still being lived out. My mother continued her abandonment of me and her grandchildren, and I discovered how little she claimed us all when she was dying. None of her few friends in Chicago had any idea she had a daughter or grandchildren! So the situation of being denied and abandoned was a continuous wound. I envisioned my book as being able to help others with similar situations.

After my mother’s death, I had a new version of my story, finally feeling some resolution, and became serious about finishing the book. After many agents passed on it, I needed to see it published, so I and a couple of friends started our own publishing company, and we each published our work.

As I prepared the final versions and edits of “Don’t Call Me Mother,” I saw the through line of the narrative, and the theme became clear. I edited out all the pieces that didn’t fit the theme, which turned out to be about 56,000 words. Actually, it felt like a relief to cut it down to size, and I felt happy about finally finishing the story. The editing process and getting a completed book was as healing as writing it.

JW: I read an interview with Mary Karr, author of “The Liar’s Club” in which she talks about how vulnerable kids are. Typically, people only talk about this vulnerability in therapist’s offices. When the memoir wave started, people started to write and read about their vulnerable childhood in books. As a teacher of memoir writing, how do you feel about your clients “coming out of the closet” so to speak and writing about these exquisitely private scenes? Does it help? Is it scary?

LJM: These kinds of books about abuse were being written in the 1980s, but memoirs were not popularized as literature until Tobias Wolff’s “This Boy’s Life” or Mary Karr’s “Liar’s Club,” among others.

As a teacher and coach, I see people digging deep into truths never before shared with a living soul. We in the groups feel honored that we are allowed to witness this kind of courage–the  survival skills of our writing partners and the amazing spirit of determination that many people need just to grow up, to live, and to move forward in their lives.

I am humbled and moved each week by their bravery and willingness to put the truth on the page and share it with us. My students tell me frequently how their lives have changed because of this writing, along with the witnessing and compassion they received in the workshop. One woman tells me that she loves her mother now, but when we started, she could barely stand to be in the same room with her.  She wrote both the dark and the light stories about her family, and integrated a whole new relationship with her elderly mother. I love outcomes like this, and she is one of many.

JW: In your therapy work, what seeds do you plant that might help people use the medium of writing to help them organize their thoughts and emotions?

LJM: Most of my therapy clients do very little writing, but when they do, they find it helpful and are often surprised at what shows up in their journal. They focus on significant scenes where they’re stuck, the turning point moments of trauma that even after years of work keep haunting them. They sometimes write during the session, which helps them to focus, or they bring in their journal or dreams. The problem is that most people write very abstractly, but when I can convince them to use scenes, they really do write differently and with more healing power. I talk about the healing power of scene writing in “The Power of Memoir.”

JW: It seems that when someone first starts writing a memoir, they ought to have a background in psychology. By the time they finish their memoir, they need expertise in creative writing and literature. How do you steer through these two aspects of memoir writing?

LJM: When I studied literature it seemed so obvious to me that writing had a psychological component, but in the lit classes this was almost never acknowledged. I’d always thought I wanted to bring the two together somehow, but for a long time couldn’t see how to do it. I kept working on my own writing, and then the studies by Dr. Pennebaker and others were published. After I discovered that exciting research, I had a sense of how to integrate my version of healing and psychology with writing–through writing healing stories.

JW: In coming years, how do you see the memoir writing trend balancing between the two disciplines of introspection and literature?

LJM: It’s hard to predict if memoir writing is a brief trend or if the interest in other people’s stories will continue. Perhaps we are all voyeurs at heart. After all, in previous times, people were not cut off from each other the way we are now, in our boxy houses, in front of TVs or computers all the time. People gathered together and knew each other’s business, for better or worse. They helped each other learn from life and each other about how to live. Extended families and communities had a lot of interaction, input, and guidance. People knew what was going on behind most of the closed doors. I wonder if some of that is missing now. Perhaps memoirs throw open those closed doors and invite us all in to see what is going on, to learn how others are living. Perhaps memoirs are fulfilling some kind of universal social need. We’ll see.

JW: I love the “voice” of your book “The Power of Memoir.” For example, in the lovely sections on how memoirs relate to family and to spirituality, you offer a great deal of focused information in clear, easily accessible language. How did you find this particular voice or style?  Did you experiment? Did you workshop your nonfiction voice?

LJM: I am unaware of my “voice.” It just comes out the way it comes out. It is my voice I guess. I used to be confused about what “voice” meant, thinking that I had to do something special to create a “voice.” But we don’t. However, we do need to keep practicing our writing to get comfortable enough with our ideas and themes to earn the voice that really belongs to us. I don’t think writers should worry about their voice. They just need to write, to say what is true for them, and keep learning about grammar, syntax, and writing skills. And, it’s really important to read good literature of all kinds–fiction, nonfiction, and poetry. Watch good films, and view real art. All of the arts feed our souls and influence our writing.

JW: What are you working on next?

LJM: I’m starting to put together a proposal for a book that will help young adults write a memoir. My agent Verna Dreisbach has created a wonderful organization called “Capitol City Writers” that presents programs for young people to help them learn about all aspects of writing help to give them a head start with their writing career. I used to work with families in crisis and loved working with the youth in those families. Young people already have so many stories they need to tell. You do not have to be old to write a memoir. Even a ten year old has stories. If we can create a book that encourages and helps young writers, that would be terrific. Right now the idea is still in the creative imagination.

For links to all of Linda Joy Myers’ work, click here.

Click here to see my review of “Power of Memoir”

Click here to read more about Capitol City Writers

More memoir writing resources

To see brief descriptions and links to all the essays on this blog, click here.

To order my short, step-by-step how-to guide to write your memoir, click here.