Does Every Story Truly Matter?
Why Write At All?
If the answer is no, some stories just don’t matter, then why write at all? You’ll hear people say that every story matters, all the time, but how much truth is in those words? I’m not exactly sure how to answer that question, because I hold on to a dangerous double standard I just can’t shake. In regards to all of your stories, I think each has merit and purpose. But when posed with the same question about myself, I am not as confident in an answer. What I do believe without a doubt is that everyone does have a story, and the longer you are trudging away in this life, the richer and more complex that story becomes. Of course, I have a story, and a unique one too many, at that, but what exactly is it, and how do I put it onto paper, or in this case the pages of this blog?
What’s the Point?
Does anyone out there really care about my opinions and words?
Writing has a purpose much greater than ourselves, and it is this greater purpose that drives our unwavering desire to share our experience and knowledge through written word. Though I can’t necessarily understand why this is such an innate purpose within us, I find it fascinating. How does this seemingly involuntary desire connect us to each other, purpose, and why? In telling our stories we transcend who we are, and what has made us that way, to become much more than we ever may have thought possible. Through our words, we live on and reach out much further than our current means allow us.
TO BE HEARD – TO MATTER – TO MAKE A DIFFERENCE – TO BE REMEMBERED.
What My Stories and Experiences Look Like
I don’t really know what my “most important” story is, nor do I even have a clue on how to tell that story if I did. I thought I did at one point, but now I am not so sure. Here are some random topics that come to mind.
- All the advice I have for a vast amount of subjects
- Depression and suicidal ideation
- Camping and getting outdoors
- How to plan a killer vacation
- How to budget and use money wisely
- My time as a skilled culinary artist working on the line, and the havoc it caused my body
- Recipes and how to cook basics
- My amazing wife and our relationship
- Living with severe fibromyalgia and ALL its effects
- My hard-won understanding that I am so much more than my parents
- How to Spoil a Pup
- How to purchase property and soon a guide to the building process
- My troubled childhood
- Writing prompts answered
- My insistence to go in the opposite direction from the crowd
- How terrifying it is when your life-long lifestyle of running and escaping is finally cut short from a body that no longer has the ability to continue to hide and you finally must confront the things you’ve been through
- What all that looks like collectively in the brain of a single person… and the list continues on and on
Every Story Matters, Because You Matter. That’s Why We Write!
Overall my most pressing thoughts put down on paper are that,
I feel trapped in a body that just will not work
and
Stuck inside a fading mind that is shutting down and crashing quickly.
And I am scared.
I am trying so desperately to hold on to anything I have left. So I am fighting to get back in alignment with the basics of who I was, who I am. And I have no idea what comes next. Who am I, and what am I doing now that all these things have been taken away? I do not know. And I am just one out of millions to feel this same way, or am I? Maybe my stories do matter because I am the only one to experience these exact things. Though others have come close, no one can match up precisely to your experience, and there may be millions out there who need to know and understand your story. So it seems what makes us so different is actually what helps us connect the most. In the end, writing promotes growth and understanding in a truly remarkable way. And I’m proud to say I have talent in this craft.
This Is Me. This Is What I Am Doing.
Writing is an escape, a coping mechanism, my closest confidant, a release, and an expression. All these collective reasons are why I write. Why it matters so much to me. So I am here. I am going to show up. And I’m going to put my words out there on this small corner of the internet regardless of response.