♦ [STORY] Getting Your Story Onto the Page: Organize Real Life for Maximum Impact

Organizing life into a cohesive and compelling Story isn't therapy. It's design. And once you know how to sort scenes by emotional power—not just chronology—you'll never get the order wrong again.

Find Your Story: Organizing Real Life for Maximum Impact

This article is dedicated to Tara, a brave and gifted storyteller who's unafraid to look her truth in the eye, shaping it into comics that move and matter. Our conversation inspired this article.

Tara's willingness to face memory, pain, and truth with equal parts courage and curiosity reminds me of the power of stories. She has an ambitious story, and I can't wait to see it on the page.

So you want to turn your life—or someone else's—into a story that grips readers without a single exaggeration. Good news: You don't need to invent, embellish, or fudge the facts. You need to organize for emotional impact, not chronology. Here's how.

Here’s the first stage of plotting a story, in this case fictional. The goal here is to understand the “format” (a 24 page comic) and the breakdown of pages to make the plot compelling and to give it rhythym. This narrative structure is Dan Harmon’s Story Circle. © CMH

A step-by-step guide for translating the chaos of life into the well-ordered logic of Story:

Step 1: Brain Dump Every Emotional Scene

Start with the raw material. Write down every moment from your life (or your subject's life) that's charged with emotion, meaning, or consequence. The scene could be joyful, humiliating, terrifying, confusing, or triumphant—if it lives in your memory, it's in.

This is NOT the time to edit or judge. Capture everything. No scene is too small or too weird at this stage.

Step 2: Describe and Name Each Scene

For each scene, give it a memorable name and a one- or two-sentence description. This helps you get specific and keeps your "deck" organized. (Think: "College Rejection Letter," "The Night at the Hospital," "First Art Show Disaster.”)

Step 3: Rate the Emotional Intensity

Now, rate each scene for emotional intensity on a scale from -10 to +10.

• +10: Peak joy, success, revelation, or triumph.

• -10: Lowest low, despair, loss, crisis.

• Everything else: the in-betweens, minor highs and lows.

This isn't science—it's about how you or your character felt (or how it plays to a reader).

Step 4: Sequence by Intensity—Not Chronology

Here's the superpower: Sort your scenes by emotional intensity, not by date. You'll see a jagged emotional "curve"—big peaks, dark troughs, sudden swings.

• A compelling story needs contrast. If you cluster your highs and lows strategically, you create momentum and catharsis.

• Don't worry about the "real" order. Life isn't a story. The story is a design.

Step 5: Clarify Character, Want, and Need

NOW ask:

• Who is the main character? (You? Your parent? Your client?)

  • Deciding whose wants and needs are most clearly expressed is critical. Be honest; the best story centers on the person with the clearest desires and their profound battles to fulfill them. It might not be who you expected. Be open to surprises.

• What does she want? (External goal: to win, to heal, to escape, to belong…)

• What does she need? (Internal transformation: to forgive, to trust, to accept, to change…)

• For deeper stories: What is her purpose, philosophy, or guiding belief—and does that change?

You can't decide what's relevant until you know the answer to these. Your "want/need/purpose" becomes the rails your story runs on.

Step 6: Sort and Eliminate—Keep What Drives Inevitably Toward Success (even if they fail.)

Take each scene and ask:

• Does this move the main character closer to (or farther from) what she wants or needs?

• If YES, it stays.

• If NO—it's a tangent. Archive it for another story, but don't let it clog this one.

The best stories are laser-focused on the tension between what we want and what we need. That tension is expressed throughout the character's misadventures, specifically in the central character's path toward fulfilling them or failing to do so. Tangents sap energy, no matter how true or vivid the scene.

Step 7: Insert Context Only Where Needed (Flashbacks/Asides)

If your most intense scene needs context, don't hesitate to drop in a flashback or side note. Use it to amplify emotion or clarify motivation—not to satisfy chronology. Organization is an art and a science; context supports emotion, not the other way around.

Step 8: Map to Structure (Optional but Powerful)

Now, see how your best scenes line up with classic plot beats (HDSOMOCCR is mine, but choose your favorite framework). Here are some great ones: Dan Harmon's Story Circle, Blake Snyder's Beat Sheet, and Vogler's modified Hero's Journey. Structure helps organize experience.

• Where's the darkest low? (Crisis of Choice.)

• Where's the highest high before the fall? (False Victory.)

• Where does the real change happen? (Climax/Resolution.)

If you're missing a beat, look for smaller scenes to bridge the gap—or let the big swings stand alone for a more raw, fragmented narrative.

Why This Works

• Stories are engines for emotion, not diaries. Chronology is for historians; storytellers build dramas.

• Organizing by intensity guarantees engagement. The wildest swings create the sharpest memories.

• Every scene serves the story, namely your character’s driving desires. If it doesn't move your character toward or push them away from this story’s driving wants and needs, save it for a separate tale.

The Secret Superpower: Nonlinear Storytelling

When you organize by intensity, you can move scenes around like cards in a deck. Your story will pulse with energy, and you'll consistently deliver catharsis where it counts, where the STORY needs it. And if the reader needs to catch up, a smartly placed flashback does the job.

Real-life chronology is helpful, as it’s easier to follow. But, intentionally placing a resonant emotional truth so that it falls at the perfect moment within your story maximizes drama without deceiving the reader.

In A Nutshell

1. Don't just write what happened in order—organize experiences for narrative impact.

2. Sort your scenes by emotional intensity.

3. Identify your character's want, need, and (optionally) purpose.

4. Ensure each scene clearly expresses wants and needs. (Optionally, Purpose if your story includes it and/or has the narrative real estate to express it.)

5. Eliminate what doesn't advance the story toward achieving everything they hoped and dreamed.

Start organizing chronologically. Be prepared to rearrange scene cards to optimize for emotional resonance. Scenes can move around. They're incredibly portable. Killer stories optimize for emotions, not chronological logic. Flashbacks and Flashforwards are useful techniques to consider.

NOTE: Nonlinear storytelling is hard to wrap your head around. But if you've got a scene list and sort it by emotionality, you've made a map to get through the confusion. Tools, not Rules!

Tara, this framework is for you. It’s also for every other storyteller wrestling with the real. The messy and beautiful experiences that give life meaning. The intense moments are the only moments our brains keep. Among the billions of neurons dedicated to remembering, the ones that persist, that imprint, are emotionally charged, the ones that genuinely matter.

Courageous creators get their blood up and the ink down. Get it out there!

It's your truth; these tools are just lenses to focus your vision. I smile at the prospect of reading your story. The world needs it.

Charles Merritt Houghton

11 June 2025