Even if your main focus is fiction or script writing, writing about yourself can be beneficial.  It can help you uncover why you are drawn to certain themes or topics, and help get things out of your head, clearing the way for you to write your fictions.

Depending on the topics covered and the way the writing is presented, it can also become a valuable part of family history.  I spent a goodly amount of time this week looking at photos, and some of them were from past generations.  They were unlabeled, and no one in the house knew who most of the people were.  Big swaths of the family history are there, but without context, it is difficult to figure out how they were important.

Just a few notes or a short personal essay is often enough to preserve an event for you — and if you desire, your family or friends.  I always put detailed captions with my Instagram posts to capture the moment, for what that is worth considering the impermanence of social media.

This pic for this post shows my bronzed baby shoes and baby spoons, which my mom kept and put on display. She also has my brother’s. I don’t know if anybody bronzes baby shoes any more. I asked some of my friends, and they’d never heard of it. But it does lend a unique note of permanence to bygone years.