Writing What We Know: The Full Story

“If you wrote only from experience, you’d get maybe one book, maybe three poems. Writers write from empathy.”

Nikki Giovanni

Raise your hand if, early on, you did not hear, “Write what you know.” 

None of you?

It’s good advice, actually, as far as it goes. But poet (among other things) Nikki Giovanni is right. Unless we live lives of continuous adventure, if we limited ourselves to just what we’re lived, we wouldn’t have enough material for a lifetime of writing.

Still, we can’t just pen any old thing and try to make it sound like we know what we’re talking about. There is nothing worse for creative confidence than feeling like we don’t know what the Sam Hill we’re doing, right?

In this week’s podcast (published Monday, May 19, 2025) we look at “write what you know” from several different angles. Lots of examples included—I talk endlessly about my own writing, only because, well, that’s what I know.

Here, I’m offering a chance for you to ponder those angles. Maybe jot some things down or do a little journaling. Or just think about it while you’re taking a shower or sitting at your kids’ baseball practice or dance class. You know, while you’re acting like you’re paying attention! (I mean, how many missed catches and fumbly pirouettes can a person take in?)

Writing What You’ve Experienced

• Consider where you are in your life right now. Building a home? A relationship? A career to support your writing habit? A family? 
• What’s in your immediate past? A move? A loss? A job change? A new baby? A facelift? (Just want to be sure you’re paying attention!)
• What is your biggest struggle? Keeping everybody alive? Dealing with a health issue? Trying to stay sane?
• What are you living that could encourage or educate your readers? Or just let them know they aren’t alone? 

We can use anything we experience to lend that voice of authority to our work. It’s all fuel. Or, as Scribblie Joyce Magnin calls it, “fodder.”  It’s not “using” what you’ve been through but imparting the knowledge you gained from it. And you have.  

Incorporating the Bits and Pieces

I don’t know about you, but I have a whole file of Snippets For Later Use. Little details that are waiting for just the right moment to appear in a story. The word “persnickety.” Someone who puts ketchup on their scrambled eggs. A bird pooping on a wedding dress. (Okay, not everything will make it to the page…)

• Look at the snippets of your life that make it unique. Are you mad for dangly earrings? Insist on cucumber slices in your water? Say the Lord’s Prayer in elevators because you’re convinced you’re going to die?
• They don’t have to be your snippets. They can be somebody else’s. The way hair grows on the tops of an old man’s ears. The determination to keep wearing those stilettos long after it’s safe. (is it ever?) An obsession with the color puce. 

We can let all that great stuff in to give our work color and texture. Not to mention fun. 

Writing What We Want To Know

If we authors weren’t a curious bunch, there would be no historical or speculative fiction, no biographies, no psychological thrillers. If we wanted to write about a serial killer or a gold miner or a World War II nurse we’d first have to go be one. Good luck with that.  

• What do you want to know about?
• What excites your curiosity?
• What intrigues you?
• Who are the fascinating people whose knowledge you want to tap into?

That could be the crux of your next piece of work.

That includes settings. While some authors—like Eudora Welty, William Faulkner, and Marjorie Rawlings, to name a few—wrote solely about the places where they lived, and others—like Ernest Hemingway, Tom Clancy, and Agatha Christie—reflected their travels in their work—we do have other options.

• Where do you want to go?
• What places call to you?
• What places have you been which you’ve never considered as possible settings?

There are many ways to get there. Rather than shrug them off as impossibilities, we can explore until we know those mysterious settings. 

Writing What Our Souls Know

This is where the real heart of our work comes through. We can, and really must, write what we know about the human experience. 

• What are the inner turmoils you have endured or witnessed?
• What do you see that makes people breathe and move and have their being?
• What do you know that stops them from doing that fully?

While we are each unique in our responses to life’s obstacles and struggles and learning  curves, the feelings themselves are universal. Whatever we have surrendered or sacrificed, forgiven or let go of, had a passion for or watched wither—we are not alone in that. 

• What do you know about the human condition that you didn’t fully understand 10 years ago?
• Five years ago?
• What has life taught you?

Often the writing itself helps us answer those questions. 

So, now… 

I’m thinking, let’s chronicle all that we know, inside and out. 

Let’s celebrate how freakin’ wise and smart we are.

And then let’s write about it. Because when it comes to life, we are the pros. 

Once we’ve done that, let’s share. Because somebody out there needs what you know.

Until then, Scribblies…

Scribble on!

Nancy Rue