Phillip Berry Osborne said:

Ultimately, the key to personal-experience stories is change. Where our personal lives are concerned, in fact, change is probably the biggest single challenge we all face and share.

That’s why the best personal stories explore our transition in life—if only to encourage us to accept ourselves in some new context or as we’re becoming.

Such transition or change is vital to storytelling since it’s bound up with the overall message that underscores any good story – and yet, too often, writers fail in this one key area of change and, especially the message that comes out of it.

Without a message, a story is like an egg without a shell.

Many of us, as writers, neglect this fundamental requirement.