I USED TO BE MUCH MUCHIER!

Gosh, I wish I had an awesome picture regarding this posting!
Who wants to sit and read a bunch of words without something to look at?
I think I'll just stick on this unrelated picture... however, the more I think of it, the more that I think it really does have EVERYTHING to do with the subject...you'll see...

YOUR PERSONAL-LIFE'S STORY...
Most people I know have heard this term before.  But sometimes (as I did) we confuse it with another method of preserving one's life in written form...JOURNAL-ING.
The more lessons I had about these subjects at church the more confused I became.
Until one day, I finally made sense of it all and that is what this posting is about...the difference, and the "how to" (or at least MY "how to") about getting 'er done.

Part of one's Personal History (Personal Preserve) is THE STORY OF THEIR LIFE - from beginning to the point you are at now and beyond.
A Journal is a DAILY OR PERIODIC PRESERVE OF YOUR LIFE...a diary, sort of.  A place where you can write down your "comings and goings" and all the minutia, feelings, lessons learned, happenings, and activities that daily life brings.

How to write each of these different preserves of your life... (now that is the topic for many a lengthy book that has been written and never read...) is as different as each preserve is from one another. It's all in the APPROACH.

I had to simplify the process for myself  to something I could understand and get excited about doing...FACE IT, either preserve is a daunting task, but who better to write your life's story than you? (Just a thought, you can record yourself talking about your memories if writing doesn't suit you.)

So, what I did (and so far, I think it's worked pretty well - and has actually been very enjoyable) was:

1) BRAINSTORM - Write down, in short descriptions ANY and EVERY memory that you have in your head.  Just start writing them down...in no order for now. There will be tons of them, but just start writing.  I started with my earliest memories and worked from there. No details right now, just brainstorm.  Go through each age. (Lists of favorite things in many catagories such as - perfume smells, musicians, names, actors, movies, places to visit etc are a fun and easy way to preserve things that don't really have an experience to relate to.)

2) ORGANIZE - After you feel like you've remembered most of your memories (you will remember more as you go along), then organize them chronologically (you know how I love chronological-ness) by listing them into years, or ages.  I actually cut strips of paper that I wrote my memories on and taped them in order - now days you can do this on computer and then copy and paste them into order.

3) WRITE - Take one memory at a time and "flesh it out" as much as you can.  Remember as many details as you can about it.  Places, people, surrounding circumstances, feelings you had, etc.  (Correct! This is a time-consuming endeavour, but it's fun...nothing better than traveling down your "memory lane" with yourself.  It's really amazing the memories that stick in one's mind.  Continue in this way until you've got them all written about.  This is the first draft.

4) REFINE - Go back through your preserve and "clean things up" - spell check, make headings of dates or experiences for easy reference - edit so that it's a nice preserve that will be handed down through the generations. What a valuable gift.  You will need to update as your life continues, but once you've got all your past written about, any updating will be a breeze.

JOURNALS - Daily or periodic preserve of your day to day life. Some like to record every day, some (like me) make an effort to write twice a year.  Pros and cons to both. Pro to writing/recording every day or often, is that you have your day fresh in your mind and all the nuances revolving around your activities and feelings, rather than just writing down facts of what occurred. Journals help you learn about yourself and your relationships to the world, God, and others in your life.
Journals are easy to keep - just write about your life from day to day.
There are other inclusions you may consider to preserving the essence of you in your journal.  You can make lists of such things as: Jobs you've had; places you've lived, visited, traveled to, your favorite things, things you collect, your goals, your concerns, things that make you smile, etc. You can insert pictures or magazine articles you like, cut out a current event that is a big deal, doodle, talk about the weather, what are you wearing? How much does a gallon of gas and/or milk cost? What perfume are you wearing? What music are you listening to now? What movies did you see in the past 6 months, etc. etc.

Remember, nothing is too trivial a detail to include.  Details give a true flavor of the world you are living in, for some future person to only imagine.

These writings are a testament to your existence. That you really lived a life. It could be a priceless help to a descendant that reads your words from a daily life of a person they may not know that well because of age difference. Would you like to have you Grandmother's or Grandfather's journal to read for even a week of their life. What they did, what they thought, their dreams and fears, their favorite things etc.


Those who think they have nothing to offer from their life are in a sense SELFISH. They are intentionally keeping themselves from those who would love and could benefit knowing them better and how they lived life, dealt with problems and trials etc.

Consider these two very important preserves of your life.  They are not the same.  Both play a major roll in your life's preserve...maybe not so much for your benefit (even though, in going back and reading what you've written, you learn a lot about yourself), but maybe for someone else's benefit.

Write to them, if you can't bring yourself to just write.  Picture someone that you love or that loves you and write to them about yourself, your life, dreams, troubles, all those things you've not been able to say to someone else yet.

Preserve yourself.