How to Document Your Life Without Writing a Memoir

The idea of documenting your life sounds wonderful.

The idea of writing your memoir? Not so much.

Where would you even start? Childhood? Your parents? That first terrible apartment? The job that changed everything? The marriage? The divorce? The kids? The trip you still talk about? And are you really supposed to sit down and write 300 pages about yourself?

No wonder most of us never do it.

But here's the thing:

You don't need to write a memoir to document your life.

In fact, there may be a much better way.

Stop Thinking of Your Life as a Book

A book has a beginning, a middle and an end.

Your life doesn't.

You're still adding to it.

You're still becoming someone. Changing your mind. Going places. Loving people. Losing people. Learning things. Making mistakes. Having very ordinary Tuesdays that may someday feel anything but ordinary.

So instead of thinking, Someday I should write all of this down, start thinking:

What parts of my life would I hate to lose?

That's a very different question.

And it's a much easier place to begin.

Start With Pieces, Not Chapters

You don't have to document your life chronologically.

You don't even have to start at the beginning.

Start with something you actually feel like talking about.

The house you grew up in.

The best decision you ever made.

The worst job you ever had.

The song that instantly takes you back to being 17.

How you met your spouse.

What becoming a parent actually felt like.

The vacation your family still laughs about.

The recipe everyone asks you to make.

The person who changed the direction of your life.

Your first car.

Your biggest financial mistake.

The advice you wish you'd ignored.

The advice you wish you'd taken.

A life isn't one giant story. It's thousands of little ones.

Capture one.

Then another.

That's how a life starts taking shape.

Don't Just Write It

This is where the traditional journal gets it wrong.

Some things are wonderful in writing.

Others aren't.

Imagine trying to describe your mother's laugh when you could simply record it.

Or writing three paragraphs about your grandfather's pocket watch when you could photograph it and explain, in your own voice, why you've kept it all these years.

Maybe the story of your childhood home needs words.

Maybe your wedding needs video.

Maybe your grandmother's recipe needs a photo of the stained recipe card.

Maybe the soundtrack of your twenties needs the actual songs.

Maybe the story behind an old photograph needs your voice.

Your life happened in more than one format. Your life story should too.

Use Questions When You Don't Know Where to Start

A blank page is intimidating.

A good question isn't.

Instead of:

Tell your life story.

Try:

What did you think you would be when you grew up?

What did your parents argue about?

What did $20 mean to you when you were 18?

Who was your first kiss?

What did you believe at 25 that you don't believe anymore?

What family tradition would you never want to disappear?

What do you hope your children understand about you someday?

Suddenly you're not "writing a memoir."

You're answering a question.

And sometimes one good question unlocks a story you haven't thought about in 30 years.

Document the Ordinary Stuff Too

We tend to save the milestones.

Weddings. Graduations. Babies. Birthdays. Big vacations.

But some of the most interesting pieces of a life aren't milestones at all.

What was always in your refrigerator?

What did Saturday mornings look like when your kids were little?

What did you wear to work?

What was your go-to takeout order?

What did your house sound like?

What were you worried about?

What were you obsessed with?

What made you laugh?

What did you think the future was going to look like?

These things can feel completely unimportant while you're living them.

Twenty years later, they're fascinating.

Don't only document the highlight reel. Document the person living it.

Get the Important Stuff Out of Your Camera Roll

Your camera roll is very good at storing photos.

It's terrible at explaining them.

There may be 20,000 photos sitting on your phone right now.

But which ones matter?

Who are those people?

Why were you there?

What happened five minutes before that picture?

Why did you save the screenshot?

Why is that blurry photograph one you'd never delete?

A photograph can preserve what something looked like.

Context preserves what it meant.

That's the piece we're in danger of losing.

So when something matters, give it context.

Add the story.

Add the name.

Add your voice.

Add the reason you kept it.

Don't Wait Until You're "Old Enough"

Life-story keeping has somehow become associated with the end of life.

We think we'll document everything later.

When we're retired.

When the kids are grown.

When we have more time.

When someone hands us a stack of questions and asks us to remember what happened 50 years ago.

But why?

The 35-year-old version of you has things to say that the 75-year-old version of you won't remember exactly the same way.

The new parent version of you knows things the empty-nester version will have forgotten.

The person starting over after a divorce, changing careers, falling in love, traveling somewhere extraordinary or just trying to figure life out is part of the story too.

Don't wait until your life becomes history to start documenting it.

Capture some of it while it's still happening.

Make It Small Enough That You'll Actually Do It

You don't need a weekend retreat.

You don't need to organize every photograph you've ever taken.

And you definitely don't need to write 500 words every Sunday.

Try this instead:

One question. One memory. One photo. One voice recording. One piece of your life at a time.

Five minutes counts.

So does thirty seconds.

The goal isn't to "finish."

There is no finished.

The goal is to create a habit of noticing:

This is part of my life. I want to keep this.

Give Your Life Somewhere to Live

Most of us already have the raw material.

It's just everywhere.

Photos on our phones.

Videos buried in camera rolls.

Documents in cloud drives.

Old photographs in boxes.

Recipes in drawers.

Links in text messages.

Memories in our heads.

Stories our families have heard a hundred times—and others we've never told anyone.

You don't necessarily need to create more.

You need a place to bring the meaningful pieces together.

That's why we created The Life Story Journal by My Peeps.

It's a private, multimedia way to document your life through guided questions and answer with words, photos, voice and video.

Not because your life needs to become a memoir.

Because it deserves somewhere to live.

And you don't have to finish your life story.

You just have to start keeping it.