How To Write a Good Personal Story

Story writing tips

1. Let your story speak for itself—say “less ‘about’; more ‘is’.” [1]
2. Start with a beginning, continue with the middle, close with an ending.
3. Be personal and natural.
4. Think of a story you like. What makes it good?
5. Universality: Make your story appeal to a wide audience.
6. Omit needless words. [2]
7. Ask a friend to review your writing. If you're passionate, join a storytelling guild.

Advanced tips

• Decide on a message or theme, and use this as a framework on which to hang the details of the setting, characters, and plot.
• Good stories often describe a problem and then its resolution.
• Writing well means rewriting, unless one has the talent of Mozart.

Topics for sacred storytelling

• A lesson, initiation, or unusual experience that changed your outlook, at least for the moment
• A healing of a physical, emotional, or spiritual nature
• (Everyone has these experiences, though unless told they may slip from memory.)

Inspirational Quotes

• "Stories are how we learn." Bill Mooney and David Holt, The Storyteller's Guide
• "People are hungry for stories. It's part of our very being." Studs Terkel
• "We are the first generation bombarded with so many stories from so many authorities, none of which are our own." Sam Keen
• "Stories have power. They delight, enchant, touch, teach, recall, inspire, motivate, challenge. They help us understand. They imprint a picture on our minds." Janet Litherland
• "Whenever you write something [about a powerful experience]... you are pressurizing it, you're compacting it. You're taking all the force and energy of that experience and you're squeezing it into a few words." Frederick Lenz

Planet Bytes Guidelines

The purpose of Planet Bytes stories

• To inspire and educate about the spiritual, contemplative, and conscious nature of animals and other non-humans and what we can learn from them about life, death, compassion, service, love and relationship.

Etiquette for previously published stories

• If you send us a story for inclusion in Planet Bytes which was already published elsewhere (e.g. a newspaper article or a story from a book or website), please include the source information so we can honor the rights and wishes of the original publisher.