The task
Write the story of your career so far. Include everything that you think is important to you.
You can make it as long as you like, but it probably won’t be helpful if it is very short. If you enjoy the exercise, you can take as long as you like to complete it. However it’s unlikely you can do it properly in less than 20-30 minutes.
In deciding whether to write on paper or word-process, choose whichever will be least in the way of getting the story down. The workbook has space for this task but you might prefer to record it somewhere else.
If you’d really rather not write it, or you are unable to, it’s OK to tape record the story, make a video or use some other medium.
If it helps you to tell somebody else, or involve somebody else, then feel free to do that.
Stories can be written in the first person or in the third person: most autobiographical writing is written in the first person, using ‘I’. If you would rather write in the third person – as if you were looking at your career and writing about another person, feel free to experiment with that. You might find it helps you to look differently at your career if you look at it from the view of a person outside the story.
Some stories are written chronologically – in the order the events happened –but many are not. You can put the events in whatever order makes sense to you. People who have been through recent important change often want to start with that, and then fill in the past.
Try to include all the most important events and elements. Only you can know what is important.
Once you have completed this task, carry on to the next page.