Beyond likeable: Worthy

In addition to crafting well-rounded, relatable, realistic, fleshed-out, believable characters in our memoirs (click here if you missed our recent post), Angela Ackerman asks a thought-provoking question: Will Writers Find Your Protagonist Worthy?

Her post challenged me to re-examine main characters in a memoir I’m writing. Her insights will be valuable to you, too, as you write your memoir.

Angela asks if our readers will consider our key people “worth rooting for.”

You and I need to discover the “true worthiness” of our key figures and then find words to describe them.

“True worthiness” is more than being nice or charming or attractive or accomplished or likeable. It’s higher and deeper and wider than those.

Such worthiness has to do with a person’s moral code, principles, standards, beliefs, ideals, values, and ethics.

I’m not necessarily talking about prominent, recognized, lauded people.

Think about this: In most cases, your heroes and mine are everyday common people, living quiet, private lives, maybe even mundane lives.

You and I have the task of showing

how those ordinary unsung heroes

came into our lives

and led us,

cheered for us,

steered us away from foolishness,

prayed for us,

cried with us,

laughed with us,

(and sometimes laughed at us),

changed us,

showed us how to live

and love

and work

and worship.

They modeled integrity

and honor

and faithfulness

and commitment,

and we memoirists

need to flesh out those people

and develop those key characters in our stories

so readers feel they know them

and “find them worthy of rooting for.”

Look over the main personalities in your memoir—not all people, only key figures.

If you haven’t read your rough drafts for a while, you’ll be able read with fresh eyes and ears (yes, read them aloud). Put yourself in your readers’ shoes while you read your drafts and ask yourself if your key figures are “worthy of rooting for.” If not, spend time developing your heroes.

Pull back the layers

and dig deeply,

all the while asking yourself

what experiences, choices,

values, beliefs, 

and/or people

made them into the persons they became?

Get out your magnifying glass.

Then make those characters come alive!

Enable your readers to discover

and appreciate

your real heroes.

The end result

will be worth your time and effort.

In your memoir, how are you teaching values and beliefs?

Does our culture’s focus on consumerism bother you?

It bothers me.

It burdens my heart.

Our craving for material goods and comfort makes me very sad because, the way I see it, such pursuits clash with the reasons God gave us life.

Often I feel out of step with people around me, especially at Christmas when I recognize, yet again, what we’ve made of it: an emphasis on consumerism.

This year I’ve made time to ponder how it is that I dance to a tune different from so many around me. I want to know how it happened because I want to include my values and beliefs in stories I write for my grandchildren.

Looking back over the years, I’d say it’s God’s fault I’m out of sync with so much of my culture.

He sent me way out of my culture—to South America for three years and to Africa for eight—and He did some heavy-duty remodeling of my heart.

On those two continents, God showed me that millions of people live always on the edge of desperation. I watched them, got to know them, sang with them, cried for them, and prayed for them.

The experiences humbled me and changed me and broke me.

Through them, God gave my world a good shaking. 

He shook up my priorities, my worldview, my lifestyle. He shook up the way I spend money—or not.

It’s as if He said, “You and your family don’t need more stuff! Instead, use your money for the poor and needy, the orphan and widow!” (James 1:27 sums it up pretty well, but also see Deuteronomy 14:28-29 and Isaiah 1:17.)

God turned me into what Kay Warren calls “seriously disturbed, gloriously ruined.”

In Dangerous Surrender: What Happens When You Say Yes to God, Kay writes of those who belong to the Seriously Disturbed, Gloriously Ruined Club:

They are no longer content to live with the focus of their lives on their world—themselves, their problems, their family, their career. 

Their eyes have been opened to new realities. 

They have seen how the suffering world lives, and it is now real. 

They cannot ignore the suffering or pretend it doesn’t exist.
 

They are compelled to do something about it.

Kay helped me see: God trained me, He gave me a counter-cultural view of consumerism—and of our purposes for being. He impressed upon me that my life’s goal is not to increase the number and quality of my possessions. He whispered to me that gifts for family members don’t need to be expensive and extravagant. He said loud and clear: “Be generous with the needy instead!”

So I ask myself: What vignettes can I write to illustrate those values and beliefs to my children and grandchildren?

And, at the same time, how can I emphasize Jesus’ warning not to give to the needy for the purpose of drawing attention to ourselves and receive honor from others? (See Matthew 6:2)

How about you? Do you ever feel you’re marching to the beat of a different drummer?

Do you know why or why not?

What experiences re-shaped your heart and cemented your values and beliefs?

What stories can you write for your readers to reveal values and beliefs different from those the world offers them?

Write stories to communicate James’ message: “Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world” (James 1:27).

Take care to emphasize Jesus’ warning not to give to the needy for the purpose of drawing attention to ourselves and receive honor from others (Matthew 6:2).

Pray, as you write, that God will give your children, grandchildren, and other readers a sense of purpose and joy in being generous to those in need.