Narratves

When does your narrative begin?

Your narrative is your  linear story of your life. It doesn't necessarily coincide with your first memory. I have a very early first memory. When I was two years old the tip of my finger was sliced off when it was slammed in a door.  I was playing hide and seek with my sister, and I found her in th bathroom.  Unfortunately, she had taken a break from the game and she didn't take kindly to being spied on in the bathroom! I have memory of seeing my sister in the bathroom and I have memory of a very bright light in the doctor's office.  These memories are static snapshots in my head and not sequential stories. They are pretty powerful, but  they are not  part of my narrative. In order to be part of my narrative, they must be part of a larger whole.  They must have a place in a time line and they must have a sense of  myself as the creator of my own story.

My narrative does not begin until much later. Despite these early memories, my sense of self existing in linear time and space doesn't really begin until fifth-grade .I remember lots of things before then, but they are somewhat disconnected from each other and they don't have a linear time line.  But in the fifth grade I begin to have a sense of myself as a cocreator of my life.

Up until then, I did not have an internal locus of control.  That is, I still felt as if life jut happened and I was along for the ride.  In fifth grade, I began to have an internal sense of being somewhat in control of my destiny.   Of course, as an 11 year old, I was curtailed from being in complete control by certain legalities and the whims of my parent.  However, I was starting to understand that I had my own responses to situations.  I was aware that circumstances may have been beyond my control, but that I could choose my behaviors in response.

I am sure that my narrative really began when my family moved to a new community.  It was not the first time I moved to a new home, but it was the first time I really understood what it meant to leave friends and familiar places.  It was the beginning of a new chapter of my life and it was the first time I felt that I was in charge of my destiny.

New chapters usually happen with be life developments or through catastrophic events.  Starting high school or college are normal life developments.  Being diagnosed with a chronic illness would be a good example of a catastrophe.  New chapters  propel you into self-reflection and self-discovery if you let them.  They can be an opportunity for reinvention or they can lead to stagnation or despair. 

High School seems to be a time when early narratives are really in high gear. Maybe that's why those friendships are so intense an why those four years take forever.  Those experiences are all firsts and the first time for everything seems more intense and more important. 

That's why new chapters in life are opportunities for discovery and reflection.    They are the first time for something; a new experience.  My current new chapter will start on August 10 when I drop my kid off at college for the first time and I will officially be an empty-nester. 

This chapter will probably have as much impact as any that has come before, so I think I will continue this blog in upcoming posts so stay tuned!