Maya Angelou once said in her novel "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings," "There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you."
As a writer, I am constantly pulled toward stories, real or not. People's memories lurk in my mind, gossiping, crying, laughing; their stories echo like drops of water off the cave walls of an underwater lagoon. I can hear every person who has ever entrusted me with a secret or a memory. These stories and feelings we once kept to ourselves are one day whispered to another soul, and somehow they suddenly belong to someone else. Or so we are led to believe.
Whenever I am starved of inspiration, I go back to those secrets. I listen to my friends pouring out their emotions, trying to remember what dialogue transpired, imitating the voices and sounds. I remember how I laughed and joked with them. I remember how I held their hands or cried. I remember every emotion: shock, intrigue, pain, joy. I desperately wish to share all of these experiences with the world, most often for the shallow reason that they are just so captivating as stories themselves. The friend whose journey with drugs could inspire someone else in such a struggle. The lover who wanted me to know about a marbled, ugly past. The neighbors who would sled down my hills in the snow and whisper stories about their families. I want to use my talents as a writer and share these fascinating narratives with the world.
But I can't. Or rather, I shouldn't. These stories are not my own.
It may be difficult to understand, but when someone shares a story with me, I don't believe that that story belongs to me yet in any way. Even if I am involved, I do not own these experiences. I feel a pull to write and express how it affected me, but I realize that I was only the listener. I am not the storyteller, and it is such as strange realization.
There are many stories I've been told and that I've lived that I can very much write about. But the personal vendettas, the mental agonies of others, the critical experiences and darkest struggles that someone wrestled with for ages before finally telling someone about--they do not belong to the listener. They can belong to the listener if the teller gives them permission. It does happen where a story-keeper wants someone with greater talent to tell their story but simply sharing the story doesn't give this permission.
To writers, I say this: do not share the stories that are not chained to your heart.
To story-keepers: have courage, be brave, and tell your story to the world. Write it, paint it, sing it, or play it. Share your story and be free of its agony.
