A memoir is a story about you. The memoir is not your entire life story, but an illumination of some corner of your life that can act as a reflection on who you were and who you are now. While other people will populate the your personal individual story, you are the focus of that story and your memoir should never lose site of the importance of that story.
You are unique in many ways and your story needs to extract the unique qualities to put them in the forefront of the reader's mind. At the same time you as memoirist need to find that common bond that helps the reader better identify with your life and you as another citizen of history.
When looking at your life as the topic of a memoir, also look at other lives to see what you have in common with them as well as how your life is different. The story of you should be unique, but not so unfathomable to others that they cannot clearly understand the experiences you've been through. The goal of the memoir writer is to draw readers into the life experience and not leave them scratching their heads and walking away in disinterest.
You need to be you, but you also need to be at least a little bit of us.
Have you ever encountered a story in which there was absolutely nothing to which you could relate and perhaps even stopped reading because of that? What are some things that you as a memoir writer might focus on to connect with your readers? Would you prefer reading stories about people who are completely unlike you in every way?
