Back to Basics: Make ‘em laugh

 

“Laughter is a universal language,” writes Chuck Swindoll. “The power of humor to build rapport is . . .  profound. . . . When handled with care, humor will also endear you to your audiences [readers], who will then give you greater access to their hearts.” (Saying it Well: Touching Others with Your Words)

 

You know Chuck’s right. Think back to a time when an author or speaker made you laugh. Charmed you. Beguiled you.

 

The two of you might never have met. Perhaps it was a performer, an athlete, an author, or a conference speaker—but after laughing you felt admiration, maybe even a link. His personality shined through. You enjoyed him. You liked him. You felt like you knew her, approved of her, and would like to spend time with her.

 

Laughter is a bonder, a connector.

Humor offers readers a shared experience.

 

That’s why the “laugh” part of  “Make ‘em cry, make ‘em laugh, make ‘em wait” is important for writers to grasp.

 

Wilkie Collins gets credit for that advice, and writers and speakers follow that for obvious reasons: It keeps audiences engaged.

 

Here’s an example of how humor can endear you to your reader.

 

I once read an article about what could have been a boring subject—a winter squash soup. But the article was no yawner. See for yourself:

 

“I found myself under a misty night sky, the brick patio glistening with rain under the light of the crescent moon. 

 

“I raised a giant Kabocha [squash] over my head, gave out a shriek for good measure and hurled it into the brick. It was primal. . . .

 

“The husk broke loose, and I gathered the sweet orange chunks and returned to my warm kitchen. . . .

 

“There was something exhilarating about starting a pot of autumn soup by howling in the moonlight.” (Betsy Wharton, The Peninsula Daily News)

 

You smiled. I know you did. Some of you even chuckled.

 

You feel you know Betsy, at least a little,

after catching a glimpse of her shrieking

and howling in the moonlight.

 

Humor makes you, the author, feel real to readers.

 

Humor can also lighten the mood during stressful segments of your memoir. When writing about heavy topics—heartbreak, tragedy—humor can give readers a break.

 

Laughter lets readers catch their breath and regroup.

Humor can provide much-needed perspective and balance.

 

In composing my memoir, Grandma’s Letters from Africa, I’d been writing about witnessing (from a distance) inconceivable massacres that raged for months in neighboring African nations.

 

I continued writing about many colleagues who evacuated to Nairobi, Kenya, where my husband and I lived. For months we had prayed for those dear people, housed one of them, and welcomed a couple of them to join us for Christmas.

 

We listened to their stories, wept with them, and welcomed their children to our school.

 

Even though our missionary colleagues evacuated, we agonized over continuing bloodbaths Africans were inflicting upon each other.

 

The daily relentlessness left me numb.

 

Then things got worse.

Violent protests began near our office

and home in Nairobi.

 

Our world was spinning out of control.

 

And right there in the middle of it, I wrote a light-hearted vignette about my midnight fights with mosquitoes—about holding my own mock-violent protest over those most irritating insects in our apartment.

 

My silly little drama didn’t seem out of place in my memoir because that was how real life was happening at the time: In the midst of danger and chaos, wacky incidents popped up. (And I was thankful to laugh about something. Ya can’t cry all the time!) The mosquito vignetted offered a breather to both me, the writer, and my readers.

 

Antoinette Truglio-Martin captured the idea well when she said,

 

“Storytellers need to find  a chuckle

in between the drama and the sobs.”

 

Search for ways to make readers laugh—or giggle, or maybe snicker, or at least smile—in your memoir.

 

• Humor can add much-needed balance, respite from intense chapters in your story. (Click on Lisa Romeo’s post, “How to Add Humor to a Sad Memoir.”)
• It can enliven what could be a less-than-riveting topic, like Betsy Wharton’s cooking squash.
• And it can shine light on your personality and help readers feel connected with you. And that means they’ll be more likely to grasp your memoir’s important lessons and messages.

 

Back to Basics: WHEN to write the seared, charred, blistered parts

 

Not all memoirs involve deeply sad experiences. Some are humorous, many are tender. Some are full of adventure.

 

Others, though, include traumatic incidents.

 

And so, today, we’ll look at writing a memoir that includes seared, charred, blistering parts.

 

I’ve seen something happen too often and saw it again when my friend began composing his memoir by writing about the most disturbing year of his life. Wow!

 

When memoirists start by writing the super-painful stuff, too often they become overwhelmed all over again with the devastation they endured—and soon they give up altogether.

 

Don’t let that happen to you.

 

A word of caution:

Re-living and writing about past traumas

can cause PTSD.

Consider seeing a good therapist (not all are good!)

before and during your writing.

 

Begin by composing your easy segments—not the harrowing ones. Write the funny incidents, the fascinating experiences, the happy vignettes. That way you can ease your way into both writing and doing the reflecting that memoir entails.

 

Jot down thoughts, reactions, questions, memories, conversations. Create descriptions of key people (click on “No cardboard characters!”) and of main places in your story (click on “The importance of 'place' in your memoir”). Before long, you’ll be assembling a rough draft of your memoir.

 

You don’t have to craft your chapters/vignettes

in the same order they’ll appear

in your completed memoir.

Write them in any order that’s easiest for you.

Later you can organize them in the best way.

 

My heart wants you to fall in love with:

• pondering,
• and discovering the good stuff you overlooked in the past,
• and making sense of what used to mystify you,
• and discovering how far you’ve come,
• and choosing just the right words,
• and fashioning your memoir as a gift for yourself and for others.

 

For now, give yourself permission to begin with uncomplicated parts of your stories. Tackle the hard ones later.

 

And here’s something interesting: Even if you’re not physically putting your aching, tender, throbbing accounts into words (with pen and ink or on a computer screen), you are working on the story. I can’t explain how that works but, behind the scenes, your heart and brain are working on how to write the troubling stuff.

 

Be encouraged by what memoirist Kathleen Pooler said about writing her two memoirs:

 

“When I first started writing out my stories, facing painful memories was difficult. As I kept writing, new insights revealed themselves to me . . . just through the process of facing them and writing about them. I experienced healing through reading my own words and began to feel I was on the other side of pain.”  (Kathleen Pooler, author of Ever Faithful to His Lead and Just the Way He Walked)

 

If you’re not ready to write, let your heart and mind rest for a few weeks or months—or however long it takes. Pour out your heart to God. Wait patiently before Him, putting your hope in Him (Psalm 62:5-6).

 

He bends down and listens to you. He hears and answers (Psalm 116:1-2).

 

Stay alert. One day you’ll be vacuuming the car, or playing catch with your grandson, or folding laundry, and you’ll have one of those A-ha! moments.

 

Or maybe you’ll hear a song, or someone else’s story, or a Bible verse, or a poem and, out of the blue, God speaks, or maybe nudges, offering you insight and clarity about your hurtful experiences.

 

When that happens, listen. Jot down notes to yourself. You’ll be mining treasures. Later you can use your notes to add to your rough draft.

 

Speaking of your rough draft:

It is for your eyes only.

 

Because of that, you can write it all—the seared, charred, blistered parts, the questions you never had the courage to ask aloud, the doubts you kept secret, the anger you kept bottled up.

 

You will revise your memoir

numerous times before you publish it

so keep this in mind:

You can always delete, or revise,

the bleeding, raw portions of your first draft.

 

For now, just wrestle them into writing, for your own sake. (Review last week’s post about using method writing, a creative, helpful way to recall situations, and then to write about them.)

 

Invite God to sit close beside you. He wants to help you remember, maybe to see things differently, to notice the ways He helped in the past and continues to help you day by day, year by year. He wants you to see there’s a good place for you on this side of your pain.

 

My heart longs for you to experience that “He heals the  brokenhearted and binds up their wounds.” (Psalm 147:3)

 

 

Back to Basics: “Make ‘em cry” by re-living the painful parts so that you can write them

 

Have you made progress in applying “make ‘em cry” to your memoir? I hope so! (Click on last week’s Make ‘em cry, make ‘em laugh, make ‘em wait.)

If you’re a writer, or want to be a writer, follow Wilkie Collins’ counsel, “Make ‘em cry, make ‘em laugh, make ‘em wait” because those three keep readers engaged in your story.

 

By “engaged,” I mean that if readers can get into your story,

they can grasp what you’re offering them.

 

Yes, I said, “what you’re offering them.”

 

Readers want to get something for themselves from your memoir.

 

Ron Hutchcraft explained how that can work:

“Often, a major life-storm means a major life-loss of some kind: your health, your income, your future plans, your marriage, your loved one.  And that loss leaves a gaping hole. . . .

“But after the storm, you have a choice. Let your loss—and the hole it leaves—define your life from now on. Goodbye, hope.

“Or begin to rebuild your life around that hole. And to rebuild your life on what you've learned from that loss. Now that's a blueprint for hope.  From the devastation of one storm comes a new strength to withstand future storms.”

  

That’s what you can offer readers:

Tell them what you ascertained about hope,

and how you learned that

 “from the devastation . . . comes a new strength

to withstand the storms.”

 

You see, if they recognize they have something in common with you,

they can find courage and healing and solutions the way you did.

 

Readers are looking for the takeaways you extend to them.

 

Takeaways are your insights—the lessons you learned—

which they can apply to their own lives,

gems you uncovered that will guide them in the future,

a reason to trust God,

a better understanding of themselves,

and a resource for living well.

 

That means you must write your story.

 

But that means you must re-live the painful parts so that you can write them.

 

And today I offer you help with that: 

 

When you’re ready to write—even the blistered parts—Bill Roorbach, in his Writing Life Stories, explains a creative, helpful way to (a) recall situations that made you cry, and then (b) write about them.

 

Bill suggests you utilize method writing, a spin-off of method acting.

 

Here’s how method acting works:

 

Before the curtain rises, the actor remembers an occasion in which he experienced the emotion he needs to act out. He spends time reliving that emotion so that when he steps on stage, he’s all wrapped up in the ache or the passion or the anger and succeeds in playing his part.

 

Method writing, then, requires you to step out of the present and into the past. If you’re writing about a tragic event, take time (set aside time) to remember the event and relive it so you can rediscover the emotions you felt.

 

Avoid over-the-top hysteria

but be honest in admitting your emotional response.

 

In the midst of the reliving, ask yourself:

 

• What was at stake? What did I have to lose or gain?
• What dreams would never come true?
• At the time, how did I envision my life would never be the same?
• Where would I find courage to live another day?
• What were my fears?
• My hopes?
• My prayers?

 

When you’re caught up in the emotion, get it onto paper or computer screen.

 

Your “emotion should be so realistic and gripping that the reader can’t help but feel it too. . .” (Becca Puglisi)

 

To paraphrase Larry Brooks, make your readers happy they are not there, yet grateful to feel what it was like to be you.

 

Emotion: That’s how you create a way for readers to join you in your story, to make them care, to compel them to keep reading, and to find the gems and blessings you’re offering them.

For now, make 'em cry. In future weeks, we'll make 'em laugh and make 'em wait.

Back to Basics: Make ‘em laugh, make ‘em cry, make ‘em wait

Think back to a time when a story made you cry. What did those tears do to your heart? And your mind? Did you feel a closeness—or at least empathy—toward the author? Did it keep you reading to find out how the story ended?

 

Write your memoir in such a way that makes readers care—about both you and your story.

 

How do you do that? By including sincere emotions.

 

“The heart is always the first target

in telling purposeful stories.

Stories must give listeners [and readers]

an emotional experience. . . .”

(Peter Guber)

 

You bring emotion into your story by following Wilkie Collins’ advice: “Make ‘em cry, make ‘em laugh, make ‘em wait.”

 

Sometimes people wonder why we should make ‘em cry, why we should include emotional stuff surrounding our sorrows and struggles.

 

The reasons to include life’s hard things are many.

 

First, in the process of writing about them, we can find some healing for ourselves. We can look back and recognize:

 

• Often during the worst of times, we learned our most important lessons.
• Difficulties get our attention and give us a holy discontent with things that are not right in our lives.
• Afflictions can be the stuff of turning points and second chances.
• They can make us cling to God.
• They can lead to personal victories.

 

If we resist writing about our heartaches and wounds, it could be that we’re refusing to deal with them.

 

Mick Silva at Higher Purpose Writers addresses that by quoting Adam McHugh:

 

“We are unable to get to the good that God works

because we cannot face the bad that life brings.”

Mick goes on to write, “That's the exact trouble I see so often editing Christian writers—their books are full of characters and situations that attempt to jump over the struggle and pain of life to apply scripture or platitudes and resolve readers’ angst.

“Christians are trained in many churches,” Mick says, “to habitually deny the true emotion and sadness we feel, and many think we're supposed to ‘claim the promises’ and slap a shiny ‘VICTORY’ sticker on. . . .”

Mick advises us to admit how bad things were in our devastating situation because “just accepting that makes it far better than we tend to realize.”

Acknowledging a bad experience opens a door,

inviting us to move toward the deep healing God offers

so we can move forward in life.

Here's the second reason for writing about your painful stuff: Second Corinthians 1:3-4 tell us God the Father comforts us in all our heartaches and afflictions so that in turn we can share the same comfort with others who are also going through difficulties. 

And so, Henri Nouwen is correct:

 

“Our sufferings and pains

are not simply bothersome interruptions

of our lives.”

 

You see, sharing our hardships can benefit readers. When we make ourselves vulnerable and share our agonizing experiences, readers recognize they have something in common with us.

 

Eileen Vorbach Collins writes about the angst she endured in trying to process her child’s suicide and then writing a memoir about it. “How can I be happy to be publishing a book that I wish I could not have written? Writing . . . was sometimes excruciating. Why couldn’t I put it behind me? Why couldn’t I move on?

 

“To write about grief, especially the suicide of a child, feels risky. The stigma is real. Will readers judge me? After all, what . . . kind of mother could I be? My child took her life and I’m capitalizing on it . . . by writing a book. . . .”

 

But then Eileen turned a corner because she realized other people need to know her story:

 

“I can only tell you that when newly bereaved,

I wanted nothing more than to read authentic stories 

by real people

who had survived the most terrible loss imaginable.

Stories that would show me

it was possible to find a place of bearable sorrow.

I hope my stories will do that for someone else.”

 

Eileen’s talking about turning her sorrows into blessings for others. She didn’t want her devastation to be wasted.

 

God can use you to bless others

so your suffering won’t be wasted.

 

Think about what Peter Guber says here:

“. . . Stories can be a stand-in for life,

allowing [us readers] to expand beyond what we could reasonably

squeeze into a lifetime of direct experience. . . .

We can take in the stories of others

who escaped life-threatening situations

without taking on the risk . . .

[and we have] an opportunity to try out solutions.” 

(Peter Guber)

 

When, by sharing our stories, we comfort others with the comfort God has given us, we offer readers experience, healing, wisdom, and choices.

 

“You are a bringer of meaning,” writes Joe Bunting.

 

“Your story should incorporate some joy,” Bunting says. “But pain is the Great Teacher.

 

“By bringing meaning to the pain, you bring meaning to the pain of the world. This is why people need story. They want to know they’re not alone. Others suffer just like them.

 

“They want to know their suffering has a purpose, that there is hope, redemption. . . .

 

“You think you’re just telling a story. But the truth is, you’re bringing life.” (Joe Bunting, The Meaning of Pain)

 

Things that caused you to weep and despair gave you a story to tell for the benefit of others.

 

If you want readers to see

how God brought beauty from your ashes,

they have to see, smell, hear, taste, and feel the ashes with you.

You have to make ‘em cry with you.

 

If you write your memoir well,

you will bring the story to a hope-filled, satisfying resolution.

You will accomplish what Joe Bunting calls “bringing life.”