Personal stories allow you to share your life with others and, indirectly, to let them experience the things that happen around you. Your job as a writer is to put the reader in the middle of the action by letting them have an experience. Here's how to create an effective personal story.
Steps
Method 1 of 3: Find the Center Point
Step 1. Choose your event
A personal story focuses on an event in your life. It could be a failure, a change in life, a realization, a childhood memory, anything. If it's an interesting topic to write, it probably is also interesting to read. Think about a circumstance in your life that led to some result, consequence, or where you learned a lesson.
It doesn't have to be an important or significant event. Sometimes, the simplest of thoughts or circumstances can lead to a kind of poetic eloquence. If from your story you make the reader think: "Yes, this is what I felt when I was with my father", then you have managed to convey something. There is no too trivial topic if you communicate your message effectively
Step 2. Determine your narrator and his or her knowledge
If the story was commissioned to you, check with your client how much room for maneuver you have in this job. You can decide to speak in first person and this first person must be you. Or, you can be free to put whoever you want as a narrator, and decide what and how much knowledge they may have.
The narrator can speak in the first person, but still give the impression of knowing as much as the reader. In this way the reader can gain another advantage as he can add a little malice to the story
Step 3. Think about how the story flows
You may think that following a path from A to Z is the only right path, but that's not necessarily the case. While starting from the beginning certainly works, it's best to experiment with other timelines in your story.
Flashback sequences are a fairly common and effective writing tool. You can also consider reflection, where you speak in the present and the narrator revisits a specific moment from the past
Step 4. Write down the events
Having a basic outline will help you organize your thoughts, see what details you need to include, and choose your writing methods. For now only interested in the main points.
This will set the tone of the narrative, giving your work a general sense. Look beyond the subject you are presenting and think about what you are trying to achieve through it. How do you want the audience to feel when they read your piece?
Method 2 of 3: Write Your First Draft
Step 1. Start your story decisively
Your leitmotif is the most important part of the whole passage - it's what will appeal to your reader and keep their interest in your story.
Don't start with yourself. "I'm going to tell you about that time I had problems with my parents," is not an adequate start. Better something like "I felt my heart tighten, I knew I would make a wise decision." Try to pique the reader's interest right from the start
Step 2. Put a start, middle and end
Basically, a short story is a story - and a good story has a clear introduction, a body and a conclusion. Your story has to take place in the body and it has to end properly.
At the end of your story, the reader must feel that you have left him something. It should be a morality or the knowledge of a person or the process of a thought. Summarize this in your conclusion
Step 3. Use dialogue
It's amazing how much you can understand people from what they say. One way to do this is through a carefully constructed dialogue. Work hard to create one that allows characters and their voices to emerge through a unique choice of words and use them actively rather than passively.
Don't make up the details. If someone hasn't said it, don't put it in history. Make the story as realistic as possible
Step 4. Give some sensory information
Cover all five senses: taste, smell, touch, sight, and sound. If something has been seen normally, it speaks of something that has been tasted. If he has been overheard, tell about how he imagined it.
Change your vocabulary as you describe. Instead of "cute", use "glorious"; instead of "smelled", use "inhaled"; instead of "burned" use "burned". Using vivid words creates more picturesque images
Step 5. Use similes and metaphors
Connect objects or events to others using "like" or "type" conjunctions. These are two of the most common writing tools used and allow the reader to visualize the words you are writing.
For example: instead of "I scratched my arm", use "a gash opened in the arm and the blood seemed to gush like water from a garden hose." Doing so will be like painting a picture in the reader's head
Step 6. Put it all together
You are probably faced with a reinterpretation of fun, exciting, dynamic events, and you wish to capture attention. When you tell them, put them in order, add emphasis where it is appropriate to mark the accent and remove details that may be insignificant. Can you see how the result becomes homogeneous?
This is just your first project. Some authors create a third, fourth, fifth, sixth and other drafts before they are satisfied with their work. Be as picky as you want, add images here, a bit of dialogue there, and even songs moving around. When you are done, you can breathe a sigh of satisfaction
Method 3 of 3: Make Your Final Draft Great
Step 1. Get a friend
Ask him to read your work. Better still if he has never heard the story before - so he is completely impartial and able to offer you an objective opinion.
Don't be shy about asking for a critical opinion as well. If he can't keep up with your story, he should tell you! If something is not clear, it will need to be reworked
Step 2. Check for fluency and clarity of the text
Take a break from history and let your eyes rest. Return to the story when you are rested and able to see if some elements could be rephrased or expanded.
Reread the story and think about what details should be left out or taken out entirely. The rhythm of the story must be compelling, and not follow a tortoise's step. Make sure the main events are presented in a lively way, but that the sentences are concise
Step 3. Do the punctuation, grammar and spelling checks
Sometimes the most basic of mistakes is the hardest to notice. If you have a friend or family member who is particularly good at this, ask them for help.
