Your readers look to you for answers, guidance, and inspiration

 You’re writing your memoir for more than your readers’ entertainment.

 

Your story, like all stories, has layers of significance, and whether or not readers realize it, they’re looking to you for answers and guidance and inspiration.

 

They want to know how you coped with life—

sorrows and joys,

victories and defeats,

despair and hope—

so they can apply your story to their own life’s story.

 

They’re looking for a takeway—that part of your story they will always hold close because it impacted their lives.

 

Be sure your memoir has takeaways—

but more than that: state your takeaways.

Put them into words.

 

Takeaways:

• your insights that readers can apply to their own lives,
• lessons you learned that will guide them in the future,
• a resource for living life well,
• a reason to hope,
• a reason to trust God,
• a better understanding of themselves and their purposes.

 

Train yourself to recognize takeaways in your stories. Dig around and find them because the gems you’ll unearth can be rich treasures for your readers.

 

The other day I was reading John Ogilvie’s devotional, Silent Strength for My Life, and realized it was packed with takeaways.

 

As I sat there reading, I thought of you—those who follow Spiritual Memoirs 101. I asked myself, What stories can people write to illustrate the points Ogilvie is making here?

 

Ogilvie writes about Jesus’ words in Luke 9:23: “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me.”

 

To some of your readers, that verse could sound old-fashioned and religious and maybe even irrelevant in today’s world. But Ogilvie brings that verse alive in practical ways for today’s readers, and you can do the same.

 

First, he reminds us of Henry David Thoreau and the familiar saying about “marching to the beat of a different drummer.”

 

Ogilvie writes, “Christians march to the drumbeat of Christ, He’s our ‘different drummer.’ His will, His Kingdom, and His values set the cadences for our life. We belong first and foremost to Him. The one place He will not accept is second place. . . .”

 

Ogilvie then gets specific. While you read the following, ask yourself what stories you can include in your memoir to illustrate his points:

 

• “In what relationships, situations, and responsibilities do we find it most difficult to march with our Drummer?”
• “It’s so easy to tone down or compromise our convictions to maintain popularity. Sometimes our thinking is controlled more by culture than by Christ.”
• “If we were totally committed, what would we do differently today?”
• “Following our Drummer requires times alone with Him so we can receive His marching orders.”
• “When we do [receive His marching orders], we’ll discover the meaning of another . . . metaphor: We find ourselves on ‘a road less traveled.’ But it’s a road that will be traveled with and for the Master.”
• “Listen for the drumbeat.”

 

Which of your past experiences illustrate the above points? Maybe you’ll come up with a personal incident, or perhaps you’ll write about watching another person living through one or more of the above points.

 

Give yourself time to recall your past and find events and experiences and conversations and outcomes that illustrate Ogilvie’s message.

 

Remember:

Readers long to discover takeaways.

They search for universal truths, transforming truths,

spiritual truths, underlying truths, relevant truths.

 

Readers want to find—

sometimes they even ache to find, burn to find—

such truths and takeaways from your memoir

so they can apply them to their own lives.

 

You see, there’s a reason the Bible is full of stories.

People respond to stories on a deep level and,

as a result, stories can be transformative—

they can change hearts and minds and lives.

 

God has given you experiences

that you can turn into stories for others.

 

Pray and ask Him to help you remember your past

and then to find words to put important messages into writing.

Your stories are important.

 

Be good stewards of your experiences and stories.

 

God can use your memoir in ways you might never imagine!

 

Your stories could be life-changing for those who read them.