Voice Notes at a Red Light

Is this really a memoir?

Photo by Kyle Lin on Unsplash

For the ones recording voice memos in the car, scribbling notes in notebooks, wondering if any of it matters. If your voice has any value. If the life you lived is worthy of being told.

Here’s my honest take on the epic and soul-crushing task of putting your life on paper for other people to read.

Sometimes the quiet people stay quiet because there’s so much noise. So many people taking up space. The clamor for attention is so intense that stepping back feels like the only sane response. No. That’s not my thing. I don’t want to be that visible.

But those are exactly the people who need to be telling their stories.

I’m telling you this because it’s important to say it aloud: When you put your story in a book, everyone who reads it has the opportunity to have an opinion about you and your life.

That is some scary shit.

One of the hardest things about writing a memoir is coming to terms with the fact that everybody who reads it is going to have a different experience of you. They’re going to understand you differently because of their own experiences.

Sure. Some will love you. Some might even have their lives changed by your story. Or at least feel less alone.

And some will misunderstand you completely.

They’ll project onto you. They’ll judge you. The story you find to be the most vulnerable, the most brave, the most truthful version of yourself. Maybe they’ll just have a low opinion. Maybe they’ll (gasp) write a bad review.

So this is where you stop writing for other people and start writing for yourself.

Tell your truth.

Tell your truth.

And that means accepting that you are not responsible for managing how you’re perceived through your story. Everyone filters it through their own fears, their own experiences. They will not see you as you are. They will see you through their wounds.

When you try to manage every reader’s expectation, when you worry about how you look, you lose the story. You lose yourself.

So the real work of memoir isn’t just the writing. It’s staying connected to your own truth while the whole thing is happening. As you write, transform yourself through the process.

If you have real revelations about your life through writing it, a reader might experience that transformation without having to go through all of the struggle you went through.

Trust that your memoir is your story.

Tell your truth.

Because at the end of the day, you are the only one who lived that life.

With love and flow,

🌊 Polly

P.S. I just started fresh on Instagram. Come find me at @pollywordflow if you want the bite-sized version of these missives.