How to Write a Personal Experience Essay

Writing an essay about a personal experience or relationship can be a powerful way of both discovering the meaning of your own past and sharing that past with others. When you write about something in your past, you have two perspectives: your perspective in the present and the perspective you had at the time the event occurred. The space between these perspectives is usually where you will find significance in that event or relationship. If the event or relationship is recent, you will be closer to the "you" that experienced the event. If the event is more distant, you will often find yourself reflecting on the experience, your reactions and the meaning of the experience differently. As you write the essay, you will need to decide if you want to talk about the experience as you see it now, or as you saw it then. Often, you may do both of those things, or use your perspective now as the conclusion.

For example, I remember being rejected by a friend in 8th grade and having a miserable summer before starting high school. If I wrote about that experience from my perspective at that time, I would probably focus on my anger and hurt. Now, forty years later, I realize that that experience made me reach out in high school to develop new friends. Those friends encouraged me to join speech, theater and the literary club. More importantly, that experience of rejection gave me a lifelong compassion for others who are hurting, and made me a much more sympathetic friend and listener. Writing about our experiences and relationships often brings us into new insights about those parts of our lives. Putting the expereince on paper can also help heal hurts and help us to grow. Whether you are a hubber, a student, or a parent, you can gain a lot from writing about your past. Often, we start such projects just by jotting down notes or writing out our feelings. If you want to share your experiences, you will probably need to take those notes and organize them into a story. I find in teaching writing that many writers have trouble organizing their memories and writing them effectively, so I have developed the following outlines and guidelines for organizing personal experience essays. These strategies help you organize your memories into an essay which makes a clear point that you can share with other people. You can use these techniques for an essay which is just about this personal event, or to organize a personal experience which you are using as just a part of a larger essay, perhaps as an introduction or conclusion, or as an illustration of a key point in your essay. Please let me know if these are helpful to you!

Ways to Organize A Personal Experience Story

1. Straightforward/ Chronological : This is the most obvious way to tell the story. You just tell it in the way it happened. What you will need to do is to "clip" the memory effectively. Tell enough detail that the reader is drawn into the story, but don't spend so much time in details that your reader gets bored. Generally, you want to make sure you keep the action the center of what you do. Use dialogue to present people and problems. Characteristics of this organization:

• Tells story in the order that it happened
• Tells story suspensefully--least important events leading to more important ones and finally coming to climax
• Explains meaning after climax or lets events show the meaning (Handed my own life, my days my own to plan and fill, anything possible)

2. Metaphor/Repeated use of Object or Event: Sometimes, there is a particular object or repeated event which is the focus of the memory. You can use repetion around this object or event to effectively order your essay. Characteristics of this organization:

• Several memories relating to one object, person or emotion
• Memories often chronological but also should be climactic--most important last
• Tie these memories together with a main theme which would be the main point of your essay

3. Expectations Unfulfilled

This is one of the easiest techniques to use in organizing your experience. It basically involves describing what you (or other people) would expect about an experience, then contrasting that expectation with your actual experience. Obviously, this technique works best when there is a contrast (either horrific, funny or both) between the expectation and fulfillment. An alternative way of using this technique is talking about "Expectations Fulfilled." "Expectations Fulfilled" is a weaker way of using this technique but can be helpful if you have a situation in which reality matched or superceded your expectations.

• Set up with clear and vivid description of the expectations for a particular event
• May be some foreshadowing of disaster
• Reality contrasted with expectations--vivid description
• Reflection on experience

4. Internal/external conflicts

With this technique, you organize your story around what is happening internallly in your mind, verses what is happening in the event. Of course, like "Expectations Unfulfilled" this works best if there is a conflict between what is happening in your thoughts and what is happening in the situation. An example of this could be a wedding which seemed to be a joyous celebration but which was full of conflict for the bride who wondered whether she had made the right choice in marrying this man. Another example could be a birthday party where the birthday kid seemed to be having fun but was inwardly devistated when her divorced parents acted coldly toward one another.

Points to Remember:

1. Be sure you Tell an Interesting and Entertaining story

• build suspense, have a conflict/resolution, use action verbs, use time markers, use specific memories and moments told in vivid detail, use conversation (this will help you slow down and be more specific)
• Present the places (setting) and people (characters) vividly
• go into detail, talk about specific objects, describe them. paint a picture of the scene with your words so that the reader will feel they are there
• what do the people look like? How do they talk? What gestures? Facial expressions?

II. Explain the Significance of this person and the events--either throughout the story or in the conclusion (that makes it easy to conclude this sort of essay)

• Tell why this event is important in your life. What does this memory mean to you or what does it tell about you?
• show-through your reaction in the story, through dialogue, through comparison, through contrasting present and past. Another way to "show" is to paint a vivid picture of a scene or person at the end which will allow the reader to know how you feel. Showing the significance is usually more vivid and interesting.
• tell--clarify the meaning of the past directly by commenting from your present perspective--you can do this at the end or as you go along.

Ways to Organize a Remembering a Person Essay

In a personal experience essay about a person you remember, your memories of events are part of the essay, but formost is your memory about the person. Generally, it helps to keep the essay focused on one to three important memories about that person. These memories can be specific events (best), or anechdotes about events which happened repeatedly. Characteristics of this sort of essay

1.Vivid Portrait

• dialogue (the reader can hear how this person talks)
• describe a place which reflects the person (the reader can know about the interests of the person and picture them where you do)

2. Specific Memories

• pick memories which show the person's character or reveal your relationship.
• one time incidents: every essay should have 1-3 of these. Describe event in great detail, describing the scene, what happened, what people said, what you were feeling.
• recurring activities: you can have these also if you describe them vividly and make sure that they are not to general and prove a point(not: my mother always scolded me/ better: my mother always scolded me about my messy habits--followed by an incident which describes how this affected your relationship)

3. Indication of the Person's Significance

• Choose 1 or 2 main points to make: Trying to explain everything that person means to you is too much to do in a short essay
• All of your description and all of your stories should be centered around proving these main points

Examples of other organizing techniques:

I. Revelation/Expectations Reversed

A. Usual Judgment of person

B. Analysis of personality/Physical description /some of background history

C. Revelation about them (story of a particular moment when you saw this person from a different perspective)

II. Conflict/Resolution

A. Story of a conflict you have with this person

B. Analysis of personality/Physical description/background history

C. Second story of conflict but this one resolves into closer relationship

D. Third story--conflict leads to a lesson learned

E. Forth story--a different conflict/ lesson learned is conveyed to others

III. Comparison/Contrast

Notice that both views are found in each paragraph/section. This paper is ordered thematically. Another possibility is to talk about all the views of another person first, then talk about your views.

A. Opening: Description and set-up of contrast

B. Middle: Comparison/Contrast: How others view this person /How I view this person

C. Conclusion: How I have come to see this person