Posts Tagged ‘storytelling’

A field of sunflowers, the smell of summer rain, the smoothness of silk, the sound of morning birds, the taste of a hand-picked apple.

Many of us take for granted our ability to experience the world through our five senses. In fact, some of us even deny or suppress the use some senses.

During a Life Writing class I’m taking at the StoryStudio Chicago, we discussed how smell is the hardest sense to connect with, thus write about because our society deliberately masks odors. One young lady suggested that smell is the only sense that we cannot willingly invite or disinvite, and odor can be viewed as an invasion of our personal space.

I never thought of it this way, but I have to agree. If something stinks, sure you can pinch your nose, but how long can you comfortably do that? And if you get a big enough whiff, the smell drifts to your mouth and infects your taste buds. On the other hand, our other senses are relatively easy to cut off.

If we see something we don’t want to view, we can turn our heads or shut our eyes. If something is uncomfortable to the touch, we can simply pull away. If we taste something that disgusts us, we can spit it out and rinse our mouths with a beverage. And if we hear something we don’t agree with, we simply plug our ears.

Perhaps these reactions could simply be viewed as not exposing ourselves to uncomfortable situations or maybe it is something deeper. By not experiencing the full range of our senses, even embracing the things that are displeasing, are we denying ourselves the ability to fully live?

Life is comprised of the good, the bad, and the downright ugly. We rely on the bad for a proper perspective on the good. We rely on the ugly, so we can better recognize and appreciate beauty. The relativity of life is what adds the exclamation points to our experiences.

But as artists, do we have an added responsibility to expose ourselves to the good, bad, and the ugly to offer a well-rounded interpretation of our world? Does the denial of our senses restrict our ability to fully convey the art of life?

As a writer, are you doing your readers a disservice because you refuse to smell garbage in sweltering heat, but willing stick your nose in a red rose? After all, metaphorically referencing life experiences is what punctuates a story.

Let me know what you think. Do we have a responsibility as artists to experience the desirable, as well as the undesirable for the sake of our art?

It’s easy to tell what happened, it’s quite another to describe what happened. In writing, the one factor that separates the reporting of events and the painting of a vivid picture is the use of description.

Here are a few tips to help you illustrate your stories through the art of description:

Make Sense of Your Senses
Don’t simply say you ate a strawberry; describe the taste of a strawberry. Don’t simply say you saw a girl running across a field; describe how the girl looked and what was in the field. Don’t simply say the music was awful; tell us why it was awful.

We’ve all heard the old writing adage of “show, don’t tell.” Despite how cliché this term has become, it’s true. Perhaps this is the hardest part about writing: translating a sensation that our brain readily identifies with into words.

Metaphorically Speaking
Metaphors are a great way of illustrating the seemingly indescribable. In fact, according to Aristotle, it’s a sign of genius.

“The greatest thing by far is to be a master of metaphor. It is the one thing that cannot be learned from others; it is also a sign of genius, since a good metaphor implies an eye for resemblance.”

Simply put, metaphors are analogies between two ideas or objects. To find the connection in one indescribable idea to a describable idea is the catalyst of understanding.

Separate Fact From Description
Life will present “indisputable” facts. For example, the car is red. Two people likely can agree on this. Enter further description: The red car is sexy. The red car looks like it defies gravity as is races down the road. Now, we can agree to disagree.

In telling a story, it is important to separate fact from description. In fact, isolate all of the indisputable facts in your story; this will be your skeleton. Then add meat to your story by building your description around the facts. (How do you like my metaphor?)

Writing about your life experiences and publishing them for the whole world to read is intimidating for some and simply unthinkable for others. So daunting a task it deters countless aspiring biographers from venturing down Memoir Lane all together.

Privately journaling about your past can trigger deeply emotional responses, let alone revealing these vulnerabilities to complete strangers; that’s just downright traumatic. But there are concrete benefits for unlocking your secret journal and taking your story to a larger audience.

The new e-book, Profit from Your Past: Crafting Publishable Literature Using Reflective Writing Therapy, is designed to explore the benefits of sharing your life story and walk you through the process of shaping your journal entries into publishable literature.

Download your copy of Profit from Your Past today.