Your Story Matters presents a dynamic and spiritually formative process for understanding and redeeming the past in order to live well in the present and into the future. Leslie Leyland Fields has used and taught this practical and inspiring writing process for decades, helping people from all walks of life to access memory and sift through the truth of their stories. This is not just a book for … book for writers. Each one of us has a story, and understanding God’s work in our stories is a vital part of our faith. Through the spiritual practice of writing, we can “remember” his acts among us, “declare his glory among the nations,” and pass on to others what we have witnessed of God in this life: the mysterious, the tragic, the miraculous, the ordinary. With a companion video curriculum from RightNow Media, this is a “why not” book as opposed to a “how to” book. Leslie asks each of us an important question: “Why not learn to tell your story, in the context of the grander story of God?”
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What is YOUR story? Fields has written a real life, applicable, easily implemented guide to helping you craft your memoir. This is a book that will lead you down some difficult roads, but it’s one that you’ll be thankful for in the end.
Fields is affable and easy to relate to. She gently takes the reader to a place where they understand the nuances of their own powerful stories, seeing God’s hand in every part. Through exercises that encourage us to see the winding spiritual journey of our lives, Fields equips the reader to take back control of what is uniquely theirs–their life story.
Being honest about our challenges (and victories) allows us to put down on paper the ways in which we’ve overcome. Sharing that story with others through memoir is how we turn what others meant for evil into good–by allowing God to redeem our painful moments and sharing of His faithfulness. You are able to leave a legacy for those who come after you–shouldn’t it be one you’ve invested your heart in?
The cool thing with this book is that there is also a RightNow Media companion curriculum for use with it! I love having books that I can use in multiple settings, and I think a lot of this content would be easy to adapt to your audience.
If you’ve been looking for the encouragement to record the ways God has impacted your personal story, reading “Your Story Matters” is a great place to start. Then take some time to document your journey, taking care to be honest and vulnerable with your truth.
I was an early reader, thanks to NavPress Publishing. All opinions are my own.
I enjoyed practicing the process Leslie outlined for writing personal stories. She has much wisdom to share with writers and anyone who wants to share their story in writing. I will return to this book as a resource.
Write Your Faith-Based Story
I am a sucker for books about any type of writing, so when I saw this at a favorite book review site, I picked it up based on the title and the subtitle alone. I didn’t realize that it was not just for anyone’s self-help journey; that’s the way the title and subtitle came across to me. I didn’t realize it’s strong Christian bent. If I had realized that it was so specific, I would not have chosen it. That said, I still read the book. If you are Christian and interested in writing your story based on your faith, you might find this book helpful and enlightening. I felt, though, that the author shared too much of her own stories and the stories of others she has worked with. I felt like she needed to focus more on what the reader should do rather than on herself and her students. As such, the reader might find it is not as helpful for them in helping to craft their faith-based story.
I received a free copy of this book, but that did not affect my review.
“Your Story Matters” is for anyone who’s ever had an inkling to write a story from their life experiences. Leslie Leyland Fields believes writing our life stories is a holy endeavor—a step of faith that involves wrestling with our past and our Creator—as we trust God to reveal universal truths through the stories of our lives.
But how do we do it? With her reassuring voice, Leslie leads us through the entire process in easy-to-read chapters that combine practical writing advice with vignettes from her teaching career and from personal lessons she learned while crafting her own memoir. Each chapter concludes with essays from her students—people from all walks of life with varying degrees of writing experience. Reading these essays made me think, “If they can do it, why couldn’t I?”
I especially enjoyed the chapter on WordSeeking. This exercise (akin to free writing) allows the creative side of our brains to work unhindered from the constraints of editing. “Writing is messy because spiritual work is messy.” How freeing it is to lock up our inner editors and simply write. When we do this, we’re often surprised by the treasures we find among the clutter. “We write to excavate,” Leslie says. “We write to discover that inner story.”
Once we find that inner story, we can move on to structuring and polishing our work and, eventually, to sharing it with others.
Leslie, a fisherwoman from Alaska, describes the sacred fellowship that comes from sharing our life stories: “We risk passing like strange ships in the long night. Time, busyness, the speed of life will keep us apart unless we braid word around word from our own passage, then toss it out, coiled, shimmering, toward the hands on the other deck open, waiting to catch, to coil and secure the two ships together, hull to hull. Don’t we all sail the same turbulent waters? Aren’t we longing to stop for a while, to not be alone on the high seas?”
“Your Story Matters” isn’t a book to be read in one sitting. Its power comes from digesting slowly, chapter by chapter, letting each morsel nourish us so that we may craft our stories well and … in due time … find the courage to release them into the night.