Book Update: Bringing the First Three Stories to Life

What I worked on this week, and why I keep rewriting the first page

I started writing this book back in 2017. Writing a memoir of sorts has been a slow, steady labor of love, tucked in between running the studios and living life. This past week, I spent my writing time with the first three chapters, and I want to share a little of what that looked like.

Every chapter in the book has three parts: a story from my life, the lessons I took from it, and a set of reflection questions for you. This week was all about the stories, and specifically about the very first lines of each one.

Here’s what I’ve learned: it’s not enough to tell you what happened. I want you to be there with me. So I went back through each opening and asked, what did it smell like? What did it sound like? What did it feel like in my hands?

Chapter 1 now opens at a campsite in the mountains of southwestern Pennsylvania. It’s early evening after a summer thunderstorm. There’s a paper plate of baked beans and chopped-up hot dog in front of me, the smell of wet grass in the air, and a four-year-old (me) about to learn that her picnic bench doesn’t have a back. You can probably guess how that ended, haha.

Chapter 2 opens on a rainy night with a fake Christmas tree lying on the front lawn, lights still on its branches, and a seven-year-old who decided it was hers to drag back inside. That image ended up becoming the heart of the whole chapter: what happens when we pick up weight that was never ours to carry.

Chapter 3 opens with a phone ringing on the kitchen wall on a June afternoon in 1997. That one was the hardest to write. Some stories you have to approach slowly.

Revising these took more out of me than I expected. Going back to sit in those moments, with all five senses turned on, brings things up. But it also reminded me why I’m writing this book in the first place. I’m not writing it so you’ll know my story. I’m writing it so that somewhere in these pages, you’ll recognize a piece of yours, and find a hand up. This is meant to be an encouraging personal growth book with a huge theme of resilience.

Next up, I’ll keep working through the remaining chapters the same way.

Thank you for following along on this journey. If you have a question about the book, or about the writing process, leave it in the comments. I read every one.

Aubrey