Whether you’re applying to college, writing a scholarship application or completing a class assignment, knowing how to write a personal essay can help you tell your story effectively. Most of the essays focus on discussing a topic using facts or research, but in personal essays, writers share their personal experiences and perspectives that help in connecting with readers.
A strong personal essay shows readers why a particular experience matters and what you can learn from it. It helps readers relate to similar situations that occurred in their lives. This guide will explain what a personal essay is, how to write one, tips for writing a strong personal essay and how to write a great conclusion for it.
What is a Personal Essay?
A personal essay is a kind of short autobiography that explores a writer’s real-life experiences, incidents or short stories. These essays are often compared to novels due to their similar nature of storytelling, but they are different. The events discussed in novels are mostly fictional. Whereas the events explored in a personal essay are nonfiction. The goal of the writer is to use vivid descriptions, dialogue and storytelling techniques to share their personal experiences engagingly.
These essays help in establishing an emotional connection with the readers, while revealing your personality, values or lessons learned. Additionally, the writer must use truthful experiences and no event in their content should be made up at any point. The goal is to explain to the readers how your past experiences shaped your present self.
How Long is a Personal Essay?
Personal essays are typically 500-1000 words long (2-4 double-spaced pages). But the exact length depends on the purpose and context of your writing. For example, college admission applications are usually between 250-650 words in length. Similarly, graduate school essays are 500-1000 words long. And, general creative writing is 800-1000 words in length.
Furthermore, the exact length for personal essays depends on your assignment requirements. If no word count is specified, then a personal essay should ideally be 500-1000 words in length. Furthermore, if you’re unsure about meeting the word limit, use our Sentence Counter tool to instantly check the number of words and sentences in your essay.
Why are Personal Essays Important?
A great personal essay helps writers reflect on their past experiences in a way that cold logic and facts cannot. They help readers connect with you and learn from your experiences. Furthermore, these essays reflect how well you describe your events in a more personal tone. Everyone is unique in their own way, having their own personal experiences and stories to tell the world.
But sometimes the way they describe those events might bore some people. In these cases, personal essays help you develop strong communication and storytelling skills. This way, you can make yourself look more interesting to people.
Personal Essay Structure:
For personal essay writing, the structure is the same as most other types of essays. First, you create a draft outline to organize your ideas smoothly and logically. Then, your essay follows the standard three-part structure. It is divided into:
- Introduction (containing a strong opening line and thesis at the end)
- Body paragraphs (containing the main idea of your essay)
- Conclusion (summary of the essay including the lessons learned)
This is the standard structure for a personal essay. Following a clear format helps you meet the word count as well as keep the content coherent.
How to Write a Personal Essay?
Writing a personal essay isn’t just about describing a memorable experience. Writers must tell a meaningful story, explain the lessons you learned and describe how a particular moment changed your whole life or shaped a new perspective. Whether you’re writing a college essay, creative nonfiction (lyric essay) or a personal narrative essay, you should follow these steps to write a strong and impactful personal essay.
1. Understand the Assignment Requirements:
First, understand the purpose of your writing and your target audience. Your purpose of writing and target audience will affect your entire writing process. Understanding the purpose and who you’re writing for will help you decide which experience to share and how to narrate it effectively.
2. Explore an Impactful Real-Life Experience:
Now, you need to recall an incident that really changed your life forever or at least changed the way you think about the world. For example, you could write about:
- Overcoming a fear
- Learning from a mistake
- Achieving a specific goal and explaining the struggle behind it
- A hobby, passion or interest that influenced your life greatly
These are some examples that you can use in your personal essays. Remember that your essay should focus on what you learned from the experience, rather than on the event itself.
3. Identify the Main Message or Lesson:
Every essay out there has a main idea around which the entire content revolves. Therefore, your content should have a main message or a central idea that you want the people to remember at the end of the essay.
4. Create a Simple Outline:
After deciding what to write about, create an essay outline. For example, you organize your essay into an introduction, body and conclusion. Then, you need to decide how many words to dedicate to each section.
Typically, 20% of the word count is allocated to the introduction and conclusion (10% each). And the other 80% is allocated to the body paragraphs. Then, calculate accordingly how many words should be written for each section based on your prompt’s requirements.
5. Write a Strong Introduction for the Readers:
Once you have created the entire content plan, start writing the introduction of your first draft. The introduction should begin with an interesting moment, an attention-grabbing question or a vivid description that naturally connects to your core topic.
6. Develop the Body With Specific Details:
After finishing your introduction, draft your body paragraphs. Your main body should include as subtle details as possible. Like, you should use exact timelines, a comprehensive description of locations and explain how the event affected your later life. But avoid adding so many details that it becomes irrelevant to your core idea. The details must still be related to the event itself.
7. Revise, Edit and Proofread:
Once you’ve finished your first draft, review it carefully for clarity, grammar, spelling, and organization. Remove unnecessary details, improve sentence flow, and make sure each paragraph supports your central theme before submitting to make your essay publishable. After making sure that everything looks great, finish your final draft. This ensures that all the mistakes are filtered out in the earlier version so that your final draft is polished enough for publishing.
How to Write a Conclusion for a Personal Essay?
It’s often said that the opening line of the introduction and the last line of the conclusion are the strongest parts of an essay. The opening line of an essay helps the readers decide if the content is worth their time to read. The last line of an essay explains the purpose of the essay or inspires the readers to take a particular action. Therefore, your conclusion should be strong in your personal essay.
A strong conclusion shouldn’t repeat what’s already discussed previously. Instead, the conclusion should restate your thesis or core idea and explain the significance of the experience that you shared. End with a thoughtful closing statement that feels natural and memorable. You might connect your experience to a broader life lesson, express how it continues to shape you, or leave readers with an idea to consider.
Conclusion
How to write a personal essay? Writing a personal essay is more than just reflecting on past experiences. It is one thing to have meaningful experiences, but another thing to describe those experiences in a way that keeps your readers engaged till the end. Therefore, you should understand your assignment requirements.
Decide on a meaningful past event to share. Identify the main message that you want to convey to your readers. Then, create a simple content outline and prepare your first and final drafts. Lastly, your hook and the last line of the conclusion should leave a lasting impression on your readers. What personal experience would you choose to turn into a compelling essay?
