Everyone’s life is basically a story that has been written, or is being written (if you want to get technical)…We’ve all heard that before, right?! But have you ever sat down and really thought about what that means?
If you Google “outline of a plot” you will see an image that is probably burned in your mind from your high school writing courses. You’ll recognize that every story has an introduction, rising action, climax, falling action, and resolution. I don’t mean to get sappy here, but it seems pretty comparable to human life.
The introduction of your story is your birth.
Rising action is growing up.
Climax is when you’ve figured out who you are.
The falling action and resolution are parts of life I don’t believe I have embarked on just yet, but I imagine they involve the formation of new life (new stories).
So let’s break it down a little more. You are born, literally being introduced to the world—you learn the most basic and most important skills of your life. This stage is when you un-knowingly develop your personality; it is when you picked up all of those quirky silly things you do that seem to come out of nowhere.
You quickly phase into the next stage, your rising action. This portion of your life is a build-up to your climax. You are learning and growing so fast. The phase itself is pretty lengthy…you’re still living under your parents’ roof and rules, but you are learning valuable lessons you’ll later realize you need for your climax.
I like to think we are at the climax of our stories. The climax is the best part of the story. It is the reason people read-- they want to hear the juicy stuff and, let’s be honest, what is juicier than college? You are out on your own, making big decisions, making wrong decisions; doing something exciting with your life while also increasing your chances of being successful and happy in your falling action.
Hopefully we can all agree we’ve grown up and at least sort of figured out who we are in college. That is all the climax is about, the excitement of discovering yourself and sharing it with the world (or small college campus). The only problem is that the climax is short. The story must go on, but the reader will lose interest if the climax continues on for too long.
Graduation is the start to our falling action. The plot outline shows the falling action as a downward diagonal line, but do not let that fool you, focus on the “action” portion. Your falling action is the part of your life and story that leaves an impression on the world, not just your college campus anymore. During the falling action, you have the chance to create something beautiful; show off the amazing person you’ve evolved into since your introduction.
Every story has a resolution at the end. I think of this as the part of our lives when we are no longer writing our own stories, but writing someone else’s introduction and helping form their rising action. It does not have to be the end of your life, but rather the point where you’ve left your reader satisfied and you are ready to focus on another story.
Think about this way of looking at your life, maybe try it for a while and see how much brighter your days become. Make your story interesting, thrilling, romantic, go for a New York Time’s Bestseller. Most importantly, make it yours.
