There’s a Story Between the Lines
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What Compelled You to Write Your Story.
The computer can’t tell you the emotional story. It can give you the exact mathematical design, but what’s missing is the eyebrows.
Frank Zappa
It is impossible to categorize all writers into one neat group; everyone’s stories have a story behind them. You may have been inspired by a movie you saw, a news headline or a book you read, or perhaps by something that happened to you sometime in the past that left a lasting impression on you. For some writing comes naturally, for others it comes a little harder.
Every story I create, creates me. I write to create myself.
Octavia E. Butler
No matter what we write, whether fiction or nonfiction, we each bring something unique to the table, a story that only we can tell, in the way we tell it. Even if we think similarly about some aspects of life, our take on the same subject is likely to be vastly different.
Each day has a story to — deserves to be told, because we are made of stories. I mean, scientists say that human beings are made of atoms, but a little bird told me that we are also made of stories.
Eduardo Galeano
The story I write today will be different from the story I wrote five years ago, because there’s more context between the lines, I’ve gained more life experience. My writing will likely change even more in five years. Throughout your life, you are constantly being taught lessons, and some of those lessons are a reminder that some stories need to be told, if only to educate others.
I began writing Broken Beginnings about twelve years ago, but the story changed as the characters and research developed. Broken Beginnings is fiction. I have written some nonfiction, including some of the hardest, dealing with the murder of friends in 1997, a father and son. My wife, who survived, gave me permission to write about it, and in fact encouraged me to do so.
The most authentic thing about us is our capacity to create, to overcome, to endure, to transform, to love and to be greater than our suffering.
Ben Okri
Despite how much we write, how much we grow, we will never be able to tell a story that will please everyone because we all have unique likes and dislikes. It’s true that we are all flawed, but that doesn’t mean our stories aren’t worth telling; in fact, it’s often the imperfections that make the stories more compelling.
Therefore, keep polishing those stories, exploring the stories behind them, and growing as a writer and as a person.
Copyright ©️ Michelle R Kidwell
September.12.2023
