Re-Frame Your Narratives
“Tell all the truth but tell it slant” Emily Dickinson
Who are you? It’s your story. Tell it your way.
Who we are, and how we see ourselves, is always changing as we move through life. Moving fluidly through this wealth of changing perspectives keeps us healthy. So, tell your story over and over, as many times, in as many ways, as you like!
What are the facts? Make a list — brief or thorough, but stick to the facts. It will be dry.
What roles have you played/do you play/do you imagine yourself playing? This is another list (mother, daughter, sister, boss) to show how many different perspectives you have. Some of these may well be opposed to one another (sinner/saint, liar/sage, lover/enemy).
Introduce yourself in 100 words. We are often asked to do exactly this, but, looking just at the facts of your life and the various roles you’ve played, obviously, you could never say everything in 100 words! So what do you choose to say? Experiment, for fun, with several versions, each one true but different from the others: funny, serious, absurd, businesslike, heartfelt, poignant, glib… You can use any of these voices to tell your story. There is not one right or real one, though some may feel they come closer to expressing your truth.
Apply this same process to reframe stories from your life. Starting with an event, list the facts, then the characters, each with their own point-of-view. How many different versions of this story can you tell? If you have seen yourself as a hero, try telling the story as a villain, or vice versa. If you have seen yourself as a victim, retell the story from a place of power. If you were a child in the story, can you tell it from your mother’s perspective? The point is to relax that part of you that insists, “This is exactly what happened--no two ways about it!” Try telling it from the third person, switching your personal pronouns from “I” to “he/she/they.” How much space can you create?
*Go fantastic! Translate your personal narratives into the world of make-believe. Again, use the facts and characters to structure the story, but revise into myth, fairy tale, sci-fi, comix, gothic horror—whatever you like. I’m not suggesting you use this on your resume (Tell us a little about yourself. I was born into a family of ghouls…) but getting playful with your stories is fun, and can reveal profound symbolic truths.
Great books on this topic include Story Revisions by Alan Parry and Robert Doan; and Writing the Memoir by Judith Barrington.