Write Your Memoir: The Soul Work of Telling Your Story

How autobiography is good for the soul. Drawing from more than 25 years of literary know-how and modeled after a 15-week college course, this manual provides guidance for seekers wishing to delve further into self-exploration through writing. Extending beyond the idea that memoir writing intends to put past events into a more understandable current perspective, the guide maintains that keeping a document of one’s life is actually the basis of a psychic process called “soul work,” which manifests as a desire to experience the state of being alive to the fullest. This unusual approach to memoir writing aims to generate more honest and genuine results that come from inner needs rather than outer expectations. Intended to clarify a writer’s developmental path, this resource emphasizes the importance of self-awareness and the need for dealing with difficult material that actually alters the writer in the process, resulting in significant growth of the soul.

Table of Contents:
Chapter One: What is soul-work and what does it look like? Why is it worth doing? Chapter Two: Listening to Your Life, Starting the Writing Chapter Three: Where Should I Start My Memoir? Chapter Four: Should I Work Alone or With Others? Chapter Five: Letting Your Story Tell You How It Needs To Be Told Chapter Six: Understanding the New Material, and What It Can Give You Chapter Seven: Now It’s Time to Talk About Structure . . . Chapter Eight The Fall From Grace and the Fall Into Grace Chapter Nine: The Six Stages Each Memoir, and Each Memoir-Writer, Will Go Through Chapter Ten: Up Close and Personal—What’s Your Relationship to Your Narrative? Chapter Eleven: Detail, Details, Details . . . Research and How to Use It Chapter Twelve: Overlooked and Hidden Memories. The Lies We Tell Ourselves Chapter Thirteen: How the Six Stages Are Mirrored in the Memoir You’re Writing Chapter Fourteen: Memoir Writing as Liberation Chapter Fifteen Endings

About the Author :
Allan G. Hunter is a professor of literature at Curry College, where he also teaches memoir writing for the Blue Hills Writing Institute. He is the author of Life Passages, The Six Archetypes of Love, and Stories We Need to Know. He lives in Watertown, Massachusetts.

Review :
"Write Your Memoir is an extremely well written, concise, clear and lucid guide to the practice of writing a memoir. This is a good book and one I will definitely use when I teach this subject."