How to Write About Yourself
In 2015, Slate published Laura Bennett’s article, “The First-Person Industrial Complex,” which critiqued the surge of personal essays flooding the internet. Bennett argued that these pieces, often sensational and deeply personal, were being commodified by outlets eager to capitalize on intimate storytelling. The article sparked widespread discussion about the ethics and craft of personal writing, as well as its value.
You might remember those days — Buzzfeed, xoJane, and others were churning out personal essays with titles like, “On Falling In and Out of Love With My Dad” and “I Was Cheating on My Boyfriend When He Died.” These salacious, deeply personal stories, mostly from women, promised juicy glimpses into private lives. These became known as “harrowing” essays.
I bring this up because that article was the basis of my master’s thesis. At the time, I had just started my MA in rhetoric and composition and was obsessed with creative nonfiction and truth. Bennett’s piece, which blew up on Twitter, sparked a visceral reaction in me. I hated the emphasis on the stories themselves rather than on what I saw as a craft issue (and a problem with the editors pushing them out).
I was so fired up that I spent the next two years essentially writing a response to that damned article, ultimately creating my own “theory” of the craft of self-disclosure (in case you’re interested, Assay published an abridged version of one of my research essays on the topic.)
I also co-taught an upper-division nonfiction course based on my research. My mentor and I worked with students to develop their own theories about confessional writing and self-disclosure. That hands-on work profoundly changed my approach to personal writing.
In applying these theories to my work, I have come to realize there’s no single “right” way to approach self-disclosure in writing. Instead, like any other element of craft, it involves studying examples, learning from the greats, experimenting, getting feedback, and revising.
“So What?”
One of the most impactful craft pieces I’ve ever read is Vivian Gornick’s The Situation and the Story. To dramatically oversimplify it — the situation is the thing that happened; the story is the “so what.”
In personal writing, the 'so what' is where many writers struggle. We often describe the situation and assume the reader 'gets it,' but your essay or memoir needs to show why the situation matters—why it needs to be told, and why you’re the one to tell it.
The problem with most 'harrowing' essays is that they focus on substance without style. 'I lost my tampon in my vagina for a week' might be shocking, but beyond that, why should readers care?
Examining the situation and the story is just one approach to personal writing. I'll dive deeper into this in The Art of Self-Disclosure on Sunday, August 18th.
How to Write About Yourself (& Why You Should
So, you know you need to find the “so what” of your story. But where do you begin? And perhaps more importantly, should you even bother?
If you want to write about yourself, you absolutely should. Much has been debated about the value of personal writing – as a therapeutic tool, as confessional writing (ugh), as literature – but the truth is, readers want memoirs and personal essays. I am one of them! So really, why NOT engage in personal writing?
The mistake many make before even starting is believing the writing has to be perfect and publishable. Perfectionism and capitalism are writing’s worst enemies. So, first, let yourself write. Forget about perfection on the first pass. Don’t worry about judgment. Write for yourself first.
Then, here are some practical tips to help you dive into your story:
Start with something concrete: A scene, an object, a scent—anything close to the story that brings you in through the senses.
Use second or third person: When the subject is tough, distance yourself by writing from a non-first-person point of view.
Fictionalize it: Approach the writing as fiction to tap into the emotional truth. Autofiction is big right now, so there are plenty of examples to draw from.
Write about not writing: Meta writing never fails. When you can’t write, simply writing about that struggle can help.
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