Back to Basics: “Make ‘em wait”

  

Continuing with

“Make ‘em cry, make ‘em laugh, make ‘em wait.”

Wilkie Collins (1824-1889)

 

Why should you avoid opening a story in the following way? 

 

“We eventually found Old John, alive, buried under four feet of tree limbs—the elephant had buried him the way elephants bury their own—but for six hours we didn’t know if we’d ever find him, dead or alive.”

 

If you begin your story this way, you have given away your ending. That weakens the power of your story. It diminishes readers’ involvement.

 

Giving away the ending spoils 

an essential element of a good story: 

suspense.

 

Remember this definition:

 

A quality story “will consist of a real person who is confronted with a significant problem, who struggles diligently to solve that problem, and who ultimately succeeds—and in doing so becomes a different character” (Jon Franklin, Writing for Story). Note the tension and suspense: (1) a significant problem which (2) the character struggles diligently to solve.

 

In other words, “A story consists of a sequence of actions that occur when a sympathetic character encounters a complicating situation that he confronts and solves” (Jon Franklin, Writing for Story). Note the tension and suspense: (1) a complicating situation which (2) the character confronts. (Jon Franklin is a two-time Pulitzer Prize winner and a well-known pioneer in creative nonfiction.)

 

Writers develop what Franklin calls “a sympathetic character” and “a real person” when they make readers cry and laugh, which we covered in previous blog posts, based on Wilkie Collins’ quote, “Make ‘em cry, make ‘em laugh, make ‘em wait. (See recent posts if you missed them.)

 

Today let’s take a closer look at Collins’ advice to “make ‘em wait” for resolution.

 

After all, as you lived the stories in your memoir, you endured a time lag—maybe months, maybe years—before you found resolution.

 

You didn’t know how the incident would end.

You had to wait. Make your readers wait, too.

 

Here’s why: Readers open the pages of your book because they want to learn from you. They know you weren’t handed an easy fix—that’s not the way life or God work—so they don’t want you to offer them a trite, instant, easy fix.

 

“We desperately want our situation solved. We want resolution. But God unfolds the plot in his own time. It is in our months or years of waiting that our story comes to maturity” (Dan Allender, To Be Told).

 

James wrote about coming to maturity when he penned, “the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its good work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything” (James 1:3-4).

 

Readers know you came to the maturity

that James and Allender highlight

—they just don’t know how—

and they want to discover it.

They want to mine the gems that formed

during your coming to maturity.

 

Pat answers or platitudes won’t do.

They want the real thing:

 

They want to tag along with you

to see how, step by step, you dealt with your problem

so they can deal with theirs.

 

Step by step means you let readers experience the suspense you experienced. “Make ‘em wait.”

 

Perhaps your calamity, your unwelcome surprise, your tragedy arose from cancer, or an addiction—yours or someone else’s.

 

Maybe, like friends of mine, you were kidnapped by Marxist guerrillas.

 

Perhaps you were a victim of road rage or of a mass shooting.

 

Or maybe you said, “As for me and my household, we will serve the Lord” (Joshua 24:15), and that led to being misunderstood and scorned, and it required sacrifice and courage beyond your expectation.

 

Perhaps your child got into trouble with the law, or your spouse betrayed you. Or you lost your job and health insurance, and then you lost your house.

 

Whatever your incident, spell it out for readers.

 

Keep in mind that making ‘em cry

will be a companion to making ‘em wait;

they will be intertwined.

Specify, in sufficient depth,

why your crisis made you “cry”

and invite readers to “cry” with you.

 

Just be sure to hold readers captive.

 

Explain what was at stake. What were the possible outcomes? Which did you hope for? Why? Which outcome did you fear most? Why?

 

Detail the complications and disappointments and setbacks.

 

Share your doubts.

 

Unravel the story as you lived it—unable to see into the future—and let readers unravel it with you.

 

Pull readers in. If you gave in to despair, write in such a way that readers experience your despair with you.

 

Admit to weeks or years of faltering faith.

 

Tell about your tears, sleepless nights, and prayers.

 

Describe the times God seemed silent.

 

Keep your frustrated goals before your readers. Leave them hanging.

 

Make them curious: Leave readers wondering about the outcome.

 

When they finish a chapter of your memoir, make ‘em worry for you. Make ‘em wonder what will happen in the next chapter.

 

Save the resolution for the conclusion. When that time comes, tie everything together. Make sense of your crisis.

 

In good memoir form, tell how you changed and matured, how you knew God better than before, how you came to understand His ways and His love. How did the experience strengthen your faith for future situations? What new person did you become as a result of the experience?

 

Keep up the suspense.

 

Don’t tell readers the end until the end!

 

You might think you live an unremarkable life, but God has been writing His sacred stories through you and your family

 

“Invisible Lines of Connection: Sacred stories of the ordinary.”

 

Those words zing me, those “Aha!” words penned by Lawrence Kushner.

 

I marvel at those words combined that way. They stretch my awareness of God and of life—and of myself and my family.

 

I applaud their meaning.

 

Those words capture the purpose—the heart—of our memoirs.

 

Writing a memoir includes looking back, sorting out, mulling, unraveling, looking for deeper meanings and patterns and threads.

 

In doing so, you discover that from one generation to the next to the next, God arranges “invisible lines of connection.” In your everyday moments, He writes “sacred stories of the ordinary.”

 

“Reverence before heaven. Amazing grace,” Kushner writes. “It is a way of understanding your place within Creation. . . . When viewed from a point of high enough vantage, everything is revealed to be in the hands of God. . . . (Invisible Lines of Connection: Sacred Stories of the Ordinary; emphasis mine). 

 

God’s presence and His holy, invisible, connecting lines in your life have been there all along, since before your birth.

 

Try to take this in: God includes you in His sacred stories that span the centuries.

 

“You are a story,” writes Dan Allender. “You are not merely the possessor and teller of a number of stores; you are a well-written, intentional story that is authored by the greatest Writer of all time, and even before time and after time.

 

“The weight of these words,” Allender continues, “. . . will call you to a level of coauthorship that is staggering in its scope and meaning” (To Be Told).

 

You are part of God’s divine story.

 

You began with a plan God wrote:

 

“For I know the plans I have for you,”

says the Lord.

“They are plans for good and not for disaster,

to give you a future and a hope”

(Jeremiah 29:11, NLT).

 

“The Lord will watch over your coming and going

both now and forevermore” (Psalm 121:8, NIV).

 

You discover sacred stories of the ordinary, Kushner says, “just beneath the surface. . . .”

 

You might think you live an inconspicuous,

unremarkable life but,

through the generations,

God has been writing His sacred stories

through you and your family’s ordinary events.

 

Search for ways God has watched over

your ancestors’ coming and going

because through those people and events

God was preparing for, and then shaping, you.

 

The beginning of our story on earth “seldom coincides with our birth. Our story begins,” says Allender, “with the characters who gave us birth, including their past relationships with their parents and issues such as success and shame; power and abuse; love, loss, and addiction; heartache and secrets. . . .  We owe our existence to the generations that came before us. Our beginning, which took place before we were born, signals some of the themes that will play out in our life.”

 

So then, track sacred connections around you.

 

Ask God to give you glimpses of His hand-written, just-beneath-the-surface stories.

 

And then ponder this: 

 

You are the bridge God has placed

between your family’s generations past

and generations yet to come.

 

Your stories matter.

 

Your stories can make a difference.

 

Stories guide, inspire, encourage, influence,

motivate, and empower.

 

Stories heal.

 

Stories shape lives.

 

Your stories can help mold the lives of children, nieces,

nephews, grandchildren, and generations yet unborn.

 

“Sometimes a particular story, or version of a story, is so potent,” says Ayd Instone, and “becomes so interwoven in our lives that it defines the direction our life story takes and modifies behavior. . . . ” 

 

Write your stories for generations yet to come.

 

“Write what should not be forgotten.”

Isabel Allende

 

While you're writing your rough draft, God will continue working

 

Making peace with our problems—our heartaches, disasters, tragedies, mysteries—takes time.

 

So, too, our memoirs: Stories need time to marinate.

 

God’s timetable is usually different than ours—He often makes us wait—but within our waiting, God acts (even if we don’t sense that He’s doing anything). 

 

One of my favorite Bible stories is that of Habakkuk, who said, “I will stand like a guard to watch. . . . I will wait to see what the Lord will say to me” (Habakkuk 2:1).

 

Perhaps by now you’ve discovered that in your waiting and watching, God has acted. Your story is coming to maturity.

 

You’ve found some long-hidden answers. You’ve discovered some clarification over past mysteries.

 

It’s as if you’re experiencing

what Habakkuk did:

“The Lord answered me: ‘Write down what I show you.

Write it clearly’.”

(Habakkuk 2:2)

 

When your story is ripening

(not fully ripe, just on the way),

it’s time to begin writing your memoir . . . 

because . . .

 

Here’s something interesting and delightful:

While you're writing your rough draft, 

God will continue working.

Even more puzzle pieces will fall into place.

You’ll stumble upon insights and answers

that evaded you too long.

You’ll find additional healing from past heartaches.

How amazing is that?!

 

“Make ‘em wait”

 

Continuing with

“Make ‘em cry, make ‘em laugh, make ‘em wait.”

Wilkie Collins (1824-1889)

 

Why should you avoid opening a story in the following way?  

 

“We eventually found Old John, alive, buried under four feet of tree limbs—the elephant had buried him the way elephants bury their own—but for six hours we didn’t know if we’d ever find him, dead or alive.”

 

If you begin your story this way, you have given away your ending. That weakens the power of your story. It diminishes readers’ involvement.

 

Giving away the ending spoils essential elements in good stories: tension and suspense.

 

A quality story “will consist of a real person who is confronted with a significant problem, who struggles diligently to solve that problem, and who ultimately succeeds—and in doing so becomes a different character” (Jon Franklin, Writing for Story). Note the tension: (1) a significant problem which (2) the character struggles diligently to solve.

 

In other words, “A story consists of a sequence of actions that occur when a sympathetic character encounters a complicating situation that he confronts and solves” (Jon Franklin, Writing for Story). Note the tension: (1) a complicating situation (2) the character confronts. (Jon Franklin is a two-time Pulitzer Prize winner and a well-known pioneer in creative nonfiction.)

 

Writers develop what Franklin calls “a sympathetic character” and “a real person” when they make readers laugh and “make ‘em cry,” which we covered in previous blog posts, based on Wilkie Collins’ quote, “Make ‘em cry, make ‘em laugh, make ‘em wait. Click on those links if you missed them.

 

Today we’ll look at tension and suspense, and Collins’ advice to “make ‘em wait” for resolution.

 

After all, as you lived the stories in your memoir, you endured a time lag—maybe months, maybe years—before you found resolution. You didn’t know how the incident would end.

 

You had to wait. Make your readers wait, too.

 

Here’s why: Readers open the pages of your book because they want to learn from you. They know you weren’t handed an easy fix—that’s not the way life, or God, works—so they don’t want you to offer them a trite, instant, easy fix.

 

“We desperately want our situation solved. We want resolution. But God unfolds the plot in his own time. It is in our months or years of waiting that our story comes to maturity” (Dan Allender, To Be Told).

 

James wrote about coming to maturity when he wrote, “the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its good work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything” (James 1:3-4).

 

Readers know you came to the maturity that James and Allender highlight—they just don’t know how—and they want to discover it. They want to mine the gems that formed during your coming to maturity. Pat answers or platitudes won’t do.

 

They want the real thing: They want to tag along with you to see how, step by step, you dealt with your problem so they can deal with theirs. 

 

Step by step means you let readers experience the suspense you experienced. “Make ‘em wait.”

 

Perhaps your calamity, your unwelcome surprise, your tragedy arose from cancer, or an addiction—yours or someone else’s.

 

Or maybe you said, “As for me and my household, we will serve the Lord” (Joshua 24:15), and that led to being misunderstood and scorned, and it required sacrifice and courage beyond your expectation.

 

Perhaps your child got into trouble with the law or your spouse betrayed you. Or you lost your job and health insurance, and then you lost your house.

 

Whatever your tension-inducing incident, spell it out for your readers.

 

Keep in mind that making ‘em cry

will be a companion in making ‘em wait;

they will be intertwined.

Specify, in sufficient depth,

why your crisis made you “cry”

and invite readers to “cry” with you.

 

Hold readers captive.

 

Explain what was at stake. What were the possible outcomes? Which did you hope for? Why? Which outcome did you fear most? Why?

 

Spell out complications and disappointments and setbacks.

 

Share your doubts.

 

Unravel the story as you lived it—unable to see into the future—and let readers unravel it with you.

 

Pull readers in. If you gave in to despair, write in such a way that readers experience your despair with you.

 

Admit to weeks or years of faltering faith.

 

Tell about your tears, sleepless nights, and prayers.

 

Describe the times God seemed silent.

 

Keep your frustrated goals before your readers. Leave them hanging.

 

Make them curious: Leave readers wondering about the outcome.

 

When they finish a chapter of your memoir, make ‘em worry for you. Make ‘em wonder what will happen in the next chapter.

 

Keep up the suspense.

 

Just don’t tell them the end until the end!

 

Save the resolution for the conclusion. When that time comes, tie everything together. Make sense of your crisis. Tell, specifically, how you and God succeeded in reaching a good conclusion.

 

In good memoir form, tell how you changed and matured, how you knew God better than before, how you came to understand His ways and His love. What did you learn from the times God was silent? How did the experience strengthen your faith for future situations?

 

What new person did you become as a result of the experience?

 

Let readers feel the same surprise and joy and hope you did.

Tuesday Tidbit: “Called to a level of coauthoring that’s staggering”

Your “Sacred Stories of the Ordinary”

“Invisible Lines of Connection: Sacred stories of the ordinary.”

Those words zing me, those “Aha!” words penned by Lawrence Kushner.

I marvel at those words combined that way. They stretch my awareness of God and of life—and of myself and my family.

I applaud their meaning.

Those words capture the purpose—the heart—of spiritual memoirs.

Writing a memoir includes looking back, pondering, sorting out, reflecting, mulling, examining, unraveling, looking for deeper meanings and patterns and threads.

In doing so, you discover that from one generation to the next to the next, God arranges “invisible lines of connection.” In your everyday moments, He writes “sacred stories of the ordinary.”

“Reverence before heaven. Amazing grace.” Kushner writes. “It is a way of understanding your place within Creation.… When viewed from a point of high enough vantage, everything is revealed to be in the hands of God…,” (Invisible Lines of Connection: Sacred Stories of the Ordinary; emphasis mine). 

God’s presence and His holy, invisible, connecting lines in your life have been there all along, since before your birth.

Try to take this in: God includes you in His sacred stories that span the centuries.

“You are a story,” writes Dan Allender. “You are not merely the possessor and teller of a number of stores; you are a well-written, intentional story that is authored by the greatest Writer of all time, and even before time and after time.

“The weight of these words,” Allender continues, “… will call you to a level of coauthorship that is staggering in its scope and meaning” (To Be Told).

You are part of God’s divine story.

You began with a plan God wrote:

“For I know the plans I have for you,” says the Lord. “They are plans for good and not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope” (Jeremiah 29:11, NLT).

“The Lord will watch over your coming and going both now and forever more” (Psalm 121:8, NIV).

You discover sacred stories of the ordinary, Kushner says, “just beneath the surface.…”

You might think you live an inconspicuous, unremarkable life but, through the generations, God has been writing His sacred stories through you and your family’s ordinary events.

Grandpa, my cousins, and me.

Search for ways God has watched over your ancestors’ coming and going because through those people and events God was preparing for, and then shaping, you.

The beginning of our story on earth “seldom coincides with our birth. Our story begins,” says Allender, “with the characters who gave us birth, including their past relationships with their parents and issues such as success and shame; power and abuse; love, loss, and addiction; heartache and secrets.… We owe our existence to the generations that came before us. Our beginning, which took place before we were born, signals some of the themes that will play out in our life.”

So then, track sacred connections around you.

Look for broader, deeper significance hidden in everyday moments.

Ask God to give you glimpses of His hand-written, just-beneath-the-surface stories.

And then ponder this: 

You are the bridge God has placed between your family’s generations past and generations yet to come.

Your stories matter.

Your stories can make a difference.

Stories guide, inspire, encourage, influence, motivate, and empower.

Stories heal.

Stories shape lives.

Your stories can help mold the lives of children, nieces, nephews, grandchildren, and generations yet unborn.

“Sometimes a particular story, or version of a story, is so potent,” says Ayd Instone, and “becomes so interwoven in our lives that it defines the direction our life story takes and modifies behavior...” (emphasis mine).

Your stories are important. Write them for generations yet to come.

“Write what should not be forgotten.”

Isabel Allende

Adapted from a post of April 18, 2012

Tuesday Tidbit: Wait until your story is ready

Making peace with our problems—our heartaches, disasters, tragedies, mysteries—often takes time. God's timetable is usually different than ours—He often makes us wait—but within our waiting, God acts (even if we don't sense that He's doing anything).

So, too, our stories: Stories need time to marinate.

Remember a memoir's unique characteristics: It requires reflecting on the past, looking back to an earlier time, pondering what happened, and examining what it means now, years later.

Perhaps you've discovered that in your waiting, your story has come to maturity.

You've found some answers long hidden. You've discovered some clarification over past mysteries.

Your story has ripened. It is ready.

It's time to begin writing your memoir.

Here's something interesting and delightful: In writing your rough draft, God will continue working. Even more puzzle pieces will fall into place. You'll stumble upon answers that evaded you to long. You'll find additional healing from past heartaches. How amazing is that?!

There you have it, 

your 15 seconds of inspiration, 

your Tuesday Tidbit.

Tuesday Tidbit: The power of your memoir

“There is a world full of desperate,

broken people,

longing to hear

the honest words

of another ragamuffin.”

Jeff Goins

“Your story

is the one

that could

set us all ablaze.” 

Dan Allender, To Be Told

So there you have it: your 15 seconds of inspiration,

your Tuesday Tidbit.

Inspiration to keep you writing your stories

“Young people are educated in many ways,” writes David Brooks, “but they are given relatively little help in understanding how a life develops, how careers and families evolve, what are the common mistakes and the common blessings of modern adulthood.”

Dan Allender helps us with this perspective, “Our story begins with the characters who gave us birth, including their past relationships with their parents and issues such as success and shame; power and abuse; love, loss, and addiction; heartache and secrets; and family myths. Our birth is a beginning, but we owe our existence to the generations that came before us. Our beginning … took place before we were born….” (To Be Told)

“I discovered how much the stories about the women who came before me, who are now gone, matter to me now,” says author Joy DeKok. “I can draw from their wisdom and learn from their decisions, mistakes, and successes. As a society, we often discard our elderly or those already gone as insignificant. This lie birthed a passion in me to urge men and women of all ages to preserve and share their stories now so this generation and those to come later, will have the benefit of their wisdom and life-knowledge.…

“The world, or my corner of it, [is] changed when I share the past forward. … The past can only have value in the future if we preserve it now.… The world is hungry for real-life stories.… We want to watch how people  cope, respond, mess up, and succeed.… People want our stories.” (Joy DeKok, author of Your Life a Legacy)

Great is the Lord and most worthy of praise; 

his greatness no one can fathom. 

One generation will commend your works to another; 

they will tell of your mighty acts. 

They will speak of the glorious splendor of your majesty.… 

They will tell of the power of your awesome works.… 

They will celebrate your abundant goodness

and joyfully sing of your righteousness. 

(Psalm 145: 3-7, NIV)

You have a story inside that younger generations need to hear. Only you can write it best. Connect your story with God’s story and write yourself onto the pages of your family’s Christian history.

"The calling of storytelling"

Because exciting things are happening in our family, 

my next few blog posts will be brief but, I hope, 

meaningful to you personally as well as in writing your memoir.

Make ‘em wait

Part 3 of

“Make ‘em cry, make ‘em laugh, make ‘em wait.”

Wilkie Collins (1824-1889)

Why should you avoid opening a story in the following way?  

“We eventually found Old John, alive, buried under four feet of tree limbs—the elephant had buried him the way elephants bury their own—but for six hours we didn’t know if we’d ever find him, dead or alive.”

If you begin your story this way, you have given away your ending. That weakens the power of your story. It diminishes readers’ involvement.

Giving away the ending spoils essential elements in good stories: tension and suspense.

A quality story “will consist of a real person who is confronted with a significant problem, who struggles diligently to solve that problem, and who ultimately succeeds—and in doing so becomes a different character” (Jon Franklin,* Writing for Story). Note the tension: (1) a significant problem (2) the character struggles diligently to solve.

In other words, “A story consists of a sequence of actions that occur when a sympathetic character encounters a complicating situation that he confronts and solves.” (Jon Franklin,* Writing for Story) Note the tension: (1) a complicating situation (2) the character confronts.

(Writers develop what Franklin calls “a sympathetic character” and “a real person” when they “make‘em laugh” and “make ‘em cry,” which we covered in our two previous blog posts. Click on links if you missed them.)

Today we’ll look at tension and suspense, and Wilkie Collins’ advice to “make ‘em wait” for resolution.

After all, as you lived the stories in your memoir, you endured a time lag—maybe months, maybe years—before you found resolution for your problem. You didn’t know how the incident would end.

You had to wait. Make your readers wait, too.

Here’s why: Readers open the pages of your book because they want to learn from you. They know you weren’t handed an easy fix—that’s not the way life, or God, works—so they don’t want you to offer them a trite, instant, easy fix.

“We desperately want our situation solved. We want resolution. But God unfolds the plot in his own time. It is in our months or years of waiting that our story comes to maturity.” (Dan Allender, To Be Told, emphasis mine)

James wrote about coming to maturity when he wrote, “the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its good work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything” (James 1:3-4).

Readers know you came to the maturity that James and Allender highlight—they just don’t know how—and they want to discover it. They want to mine the gems that formed during your coming to maturity. Pat answers or platitudes won’t do.

They want the real thing: They want to tag along with you to see how, step by step, you dealt with your problem so they can deal with theirs. 

Step by step means you let readers experience the suspense you experienced. “Make ‘em wait.”

Perhaps your calamity, your unwelcome surprise, your tragedy arose from cancer, or an addiction—yours or someone else’s.

Or maybe you said, “As for me and my household, we will serve the Lord,” (Joshua 24:15) and that led to being misunderstood and scorned, and it required sacrifice and courage beyond your expectation.

Perhaps your child got into trouble with the law or your spouse betrayed you. Or you lost your job and health insurance, and then you lost your house.

Whatever your tension-inducing incident, spell it out for your readers. Keep in mind that making ‘em cry will be a companion in making ‘em wait; they will be intertwined. Specify, in sufficient depth, why your crisis made you “cry” and invite readers to “cry” with you.

Hold readers captive.

Explain what was at stake. What were the possible outcomes? Which did you hope for? Why? Which outcome did you fear most? Why?

Spell out complications and disappointments and setbacks.

Share your doubts.

Unravel the story as you lived it—unable to see into the future—and let readers unravel it with you.

Pull readers in. If you gave in to despair, write in such a way that readers experience your despair with you.

Admit to weeks or years of faltering faith.

Tell about your tears, sleepless nights, and prayers.

Describe the times God seemed silent.

Keep your frustrated goals before your readers. Leave them hanging.

Make them curious: Leave readers wondering about the outcome.

When they finish a chapter of your memoir, make ‘em worry for you. Make ‘em wonder what will happen in the next chapter.

Keep up the suspense.

Just don’t tell them the end until the end!

Save the resolution for the conclusion. When that time comes, tie everything together. Make sense of your crisis. Tell, specifically, how you and God succeeded in reaching a good conclusion.

In good memoir form, tell how you changed and matured, how you knew God better than before, how you came to understand His ways and His love. What did you learn from the times God was silent? How did the experience strengthen your faith for future situations?

What new person did you became as a result of the experience?

Let readers feel the same surprise and joy and hope you did.

*Jon Franklin is a two-time Pulitzer Prize winner and a well-known pioneer in creative nonfiction.