Start with the story you feel like telling

An old photograph turns up while you are looking for something else. There is your brother beside a borrowed car, wearing a shirt you had completely forgotten. Suddenly you remember the whole afternoon: where you were going, who got the directions wrong, and why everyone was laughing by the time you arrived.

You feel like telling that story now. Starting with your earliest childhood memory can wait.

Tell It Your Way gives that impulse somewhere to go. It is a way to begin with a particular moment, follow what you remember, and leave yourself room to come back. For your family, that might mean finally hearing the story behind a photograph they have seen for years.

You can begin in the middle

A story does not need to explain your whole life to be worth sharing. It might be about the neighbour who taught you to garden, the first meal you cooked for someone special, or an ordinary Saturday that still makes you smile.

You can start with your own writing or choose an optional story idea. If a little encouragement would help, there are optional prompts, and you can use a question of your own. You can also begin from one uploaded photo or an eligible photo already in your guided writing.

The first passage only needs to give you a place to start. A few details about who was there and what happened can be enough to bring the next part to mind.

Leave yourself room to return

Perhaps you remember the beginning clearly but want to ask your sister about the ending. Perhaps the doorbell rings just as you get going.

You can keep a story in progress and return to it later. You can also have several stories underway, so a fresh memory does not have to wait until another one is finished.

Giving a story a recognisable title makes it easier to find again. Something like “The afternoon we took the wrong road” may be more useful to you than trying to settle on a perfect book title before you have written the first paragraph.

Decide when it feels ready

Adding passages lets the story grow in manageable pieces. When you are happy with it, you can finish it in your library.

Finishing does not mean you can never change your mind. You can return to edit, and those later edits become the finished version when you choose Update story. That gives you a clear moment to decide that the version you have been working on is ready.

Using a photo to begin also does not mean it must appear in your book. Including it in the book is optional and starts switched off.

Choose the kind of help that suits today

If you enjoy having themed chapters and questions to work through, guided Life Story offers that structure. Tell It Your Way offers a separate space for individual stories, with optional guidance when you want it.

The two approaches have separate access conditions. Tell It Your Way has annual access; a guided Life Story package should not be assumed to include it. Assisted guidance also has allowances. Check the access shown in your account before choosing your approach.

There is no need to decide that every memory must be told in the same way. Today, choose one moment you can picture clearly and begin with what you remember about it.