Looking at Your Lifetime Stories

 

Timeline Stories

“There is not one big cosmic meaning for all; there is only the meaning we each give to our life, an individual meaning, an individual plot, like an individual novel, a book for each person.”

Anais Nin

          Have you ever made a timeline of your life? Starting at birth, blocked out by decades; then record on it what you remember happening each year of each decade right up until today. I think you would find that you have an outline for a book—a memoir, or perhaps a novel, since what we remember is only what was significant to us. Our interpretation is singular, though others were present, and involved. Their experience would be different from ours because it would be based on what was significant to them.

We remember only what we assigned meaning to. We tend to assume that the way we remember our past is the way it was, however, while the events that took place may be factual, the meaning of those events can only be assigned. Here’s an example: Once, when I was nine, I told an older neighbor who was trying unsuccessfully to get his lawnmower cranked that when my daddy had the same problem, he called the lawnmower a “(insert some very crude and ugly words here)” and gave it a good kick and it started right up. The neighbor, who was a high school boy, thought this extremely funny coming from the mouth of a small girl-child, so he laughingly told my dad. My dad’s response was to whip me with a belt. He told me the punishment was because I had “told the neighbor our business,” but I think he whipped me because he was embarrassed that his child had picked up all his swear words and repeated them out loud to someone else. Which of these is factually accurate matters not at all, because they are both true—or possibly, neither is true.

Every individual timeline turns into a series of stories; short essays linked together by the meaning that individual gives them. Together, they constitute a life. That life is a complicated narrative that weaves in other people, other places, our relationships with pets, and religion, and nature. It becomes a rich tapestry of individual and collective identity, colored by facts, and seasoned with meaning. Everyone, from the most unsophisticated human being to the most highly recognized personality, is a story that is worth knowing, and telling. There are no “throw-away” people on this earth. None that is not as brimming with meaningful stories as you and I.

If you have never made a timeline of your life, I recommend it. Especially if you want to truly know who lives inside your skin. Anais Nin said that our lives are composed mostly of dreams and that those dreams must be connected to actions to have meaning. Today, pay attention to what has meaning for you. That is one way to connect with your soul.

                                        In the Spirit,

                                        Jane