How to Draw Inspiration from Your Own Experiences
“You may encounter many defeats, but you must not be defeated. In fact, it may be necessary to encounter the defeats, so you can know who you are, what you can rise from, how you can still come out of it.” – Maya Angelou
What defeats have you encountered? What have they taught you about who you are, what you can withstand, and what you can accomplish?
Use the brainstorming and speed writing techniques outlined in this article to write about yourself and the bumpiest ride life has taken you through. Write from a 3rd person perspective. Write about yourself as the protagonist, the hero.
Write as truthfully as possible. You don’t have to show this writing to anyone. Write until you’re crying or laughing or both.
Now take a moment. Breathe. Close the book or the Microsoft document you were writing on. Let your story simmer for at least a day.
Revisit the Story
How does reading your story make you feel? Are there lessons you have learned that you would want to pass on to children? Can you rewrite it in a way that a child would understand it?
There are a lot of challenging events that adults go through that are not appropriate for a children’s book. But all of these events teach us something, change us in some way. To write a meaningful story, we can take the core of our own experiences and turn them into stories for children.
One way to do that is to make the protagonist a child and to make the obstacles you have faced into obstacles a child may face. These might be small obstacles like not knowing how to tie your shoes, or they may big lessons like overcoming racism. Keep the messaging the same but change the details so that the age group you’re writing for can understand them.
Here are some ideas on how complex experiences can be simplified into children’s stories without losing their impact:
- Experiencing unemployment could be turned into a story about a child losing a toy and learning that determination and patience can help you find what you are looking for, or something even better than what you were looking for.
- Experiencing death of a loved one could be turned into a story about a friend moving away, and ways a child can heal and move forward.
- Experiencing prejudice could be turned into a story about an animal who looks different and is excluded from the pack until the other animals realize their value and all they have to offer.
If you are an author-illustrator, you can even use the places you visited during this period in your life as inspiration for your illustrations.
A personal example
In my newest book, The Little Fairy Finds Her Glow, I wrote about a little fairy who breaks her wings and loses her glow. She only finds it again when she realizes that her happiness isn’t related to flying. It comes from helping those in need, even when she is hurting.
This story came from speedwriting about my own experiences with depression. I filled pages and pages with my story. Then I changed it to how I would tell my daughter that story.
Once I was happy with the result, I changed it once more so that my daughter was the protagonist. This time, instead of writing directly about topics like social isolation and trauma, I wrote about obstacles and characters that were appropriate for a children’s book.
I wrote about broken wings, shadow fairies, and fireflies stuck in webs. I also wrote about befriending those who are excluded, helping those who are in need, and finding the things that make you happy.
I illustrated the character to look like my daughter. I set the story in a park I love visiting in Toronto. And I used shadows and glows as symbols of sadness and happiness.
The core of my story remained the same, but I simplified it to ensure that children could relate to it.
Experiment and learn
So, try it out. Write your story with yourself as the hero. Rewrite it as a conversation with a child. And then revise it once more so the protagonist is the child, and the obstacles are something a child can understand.
Check out this article to learn more about story elements, structure, and tips to make your book stand out.
About Tasneem Dairywala
Tasneem Dairywala is a children’s author-illustrator, art educator, and founder of the non-profit organization, Art Ignite. With a major in drawing and painting and a minor in English from OCAD University, Tasneem’s work is characterized by its vibrant colors and imaginative worlds, inspired by her passion for using the arts to inspire empathy, resilience, and kindness in children.
Tasneem has exhibited her paintings and illustrations in galleries and cultural spaces across Toronto. She has been recognized for her contributions to the arts community through grants from the Ontario Arts Council, Toronto Arts Council, the City of Toronto, and Inspirit Foundation. Her newest book, The Little Fairy Finds Her Glow, is now available on Amazon, showcasing her unique style and commitment to creating meaningful stories for children.
Through her work as an art educator and founder of Art Ignite, Tasneem has connected people from diverse backgrounds through the arts, emphasizing the power of creativity to inspire and unite.
To stay up to date on Tasneem’s work, be sure to subscribe to her monthly newsletter and follow her on WordPress, Instagram and Facebook. She is always excited to connect with her audience and share her artistic journey.
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I love these useful tips on how to draw from one’s own experiences and use that powerfully in writing! ☀️
So true that our experiences can be good examples to use in children’s books. A friend and I recently published a series of books that deal with childhood hardships. I can relate to Seamore the crab. He needs glasses, but feels he will let his family down if they find out he has poor eyesight. That’s exactly how I felt when I first needed glasses. It can be traumatic for a child. Thank you for your post.
Oh definitely. We might not know what it’s like to be a kid today, but we do know what it was like to be a kid when we were kids, and some of those experiences and feelings are universal.