Writing a memoir is hard! There are many times I’ve wanted to give up, (including today). I decided I needed to help myself by being aligned with my reason why. I sat down this morning to ask myself the question once again…..Why am I writing this memoir?

Here is the reasons I came up with.

1. I want to finish it. I want to have the sense of achievement and safisfication that I did it!
2. I want to lean into my strengths, and my top two (according to the VIA character strengths survey) are a Love of Learning and Creativity. I want to learn how to write this memoir, to weave all my memories into something meaningful. It feels like a very interesting, creative puzzle – one that has no instructions, or picture of how it should look, but nevertheless, it is one I want to learn how to do.
3. Writing is one of the ways that give my life a sense of purpose and meaning.
4. I feel like my story is interesting and I have something to offer to readers. Books have always been a huge source of knowledge and comfort for me, and I would hope that one day my book could be that for someone else.
5. I want to hold and heal that part of my life that I’m writing about, and to borrow something from a writer and teacher I admire, Natalie Goldberg, ‘We write memoir not to remember, not to cling, but to honor and let go.’
6. If it is as wonderful as my first dream (of becoming a mother) then I want to finish chasing this dream too, to be a published writer. This is a step in that direction, and I am happy to be on this journey in pursuit of my dream.

I’m glad I did this exercise as it helped clarify for me, why I want to write this memoir…so I will keep going, and if I get stuck again (which I’m sure I will) I can come back to this list to remind myself of my reason why.