Six-Word Memoir Examples: 100+ Ideas by Theme (and How to Write Yours, 2026)

Here are more than 100 six-word memoir examples, sorted by theme, so you can find one that sounds like your life and then write your own. After the examples you’ll find 12 ideas to get started, the rules people argue about, and a five-step way to write one.

Quick answer

A six-word memoir is your life, or one chapter of it, in exactly six words. It has to be true. A few examples:

• One suitcase, two languages, three kids.
• Retired from work, not from life.
• Bought the treadmill. Great clothes rack.

The best ones have a turn: two halves that pull against each other, like before and after, or what you planned and what you got.

About these examples

I’m Arthur Cho, founder of Memoirji, a free tool that interviews people about their lives and writes up what they say. More than 250 people have finished a memoir with it, so I spend a lot of time with life stories, long and short.

I wrote every example on this page for this guide. None is copied from the Six-Word Memoir project, from Reddit or from a classroom, so you can borrow the shapes freely. I checked each one with a small script to make sure it’s exactly six words. Contractions like “I’m” count as one word, and I left out hyphenated words, so nobody can argue with the count. Where I mention a famous line, I say where it comes from.

What is a six-word memoir?

A six-word memoir tells a true story about the writer in six words. The form comes from SMITH Magazine, where editor Larry Smith started asking readers for their life stories in six words in 2006. The answers filled a bestselling book, Not Quite What I Was Planning (2008), and the project still runs at sixwordmemoirs.com, where teachers, writers and plenty of famous people have added theirs. Stephen Colbert’s, according to the project, is “Well, I thought it was funny.”

The idea borrows from an old legend. Ernest Hemingway supposedly bet friends he could write a story in six words and wrote “For sale: baby shoes, never worn.” Nobody has found any evidence he wrote it, and similar lines appeared in newspapers decades earlier. Either way, that line is a six-word story. A six-word memoir has to be about you.

100+ six-word memoir examples by theme

Six-word memoirs about life

• Born curious. Stayed curious. Mostly happy.
• Took the long way. No regrets.
• Lost the map, found better roads.
• Small town girl, big city heart.
• Said yes more than I should.
• Planned nothing. Got everything. Still learning.
• Seventy years, and still asking why.
• Ordinary life. Extraordinary people in it.

Six-word memoirs about yourself

These work well for a class introduction or the first day of a new job.

• Quiet in class, loud at home.
• Still figuring it out. Ask later.
• Middle child. Professional peacemaker since birth.
• I read the last page first.
• Overthinker learning to just jump in.
• Allergic to cats. Own three anyway.
• Born in Ohio, raised by books.

Funny six-word memoirs

• Went to the gym once. Once.
• Diet starts Monday. Every Monday. Forever.
• Retired. Busier than ever. Send help.
• Walked into rooms. Forgot why. Repeatedly.
• My grandkids call me tech support.
• Paid for college. Kids moved back.
• Bought the treadmill. Great clothes rack.
• Fifty years married. Still hiding chocolate.

Six-word memoirs about family

• Six kids, one bathroom, endless love.
• Sunday dinners held us all together.
• Mom’s kitchen table solved every problem.
• We argued loudly and loved louder.
• Oldest sister. Second mother. No pay.
• Different last names, same family recipes.
• The house is quiet. Kids grown.

Six-word memoirs about moms and dads

• Mom worked nights. I got dreams.
• Dad never said it. Always showed.
• Became my mother. Turns out, good.
• Single mom. Two jobs. Three graduations.
• Dad’s toolbox still smells like Saturdays.
• Raised four kids. Survived. Mostly sane.
• My laugh is my mother’s laugh.

Six-word memoirs about grandparents and grandkids

• Grandma taught me bread and patience.
• Spoiled my grandkids. Regret absolutely nothing.
• Grandpa’s stories got better every year.
• First grandchild. Fell in love again.
• Twelve grandkids. I know every birthday.
• Her recipe cards outlived her. Thankfully.
• Now I’m the one telling stories.

Six-word memoirs about love and marriage

• Met at a dance. Never stopped.
• Forty years. Same bench. Same hand.
• Second marriage. First real love story.
• He proposed badly. I said yes.
• We grew up, then grew old.
• Wrote him letters. He kept them.
• Divorced at forty. Found myself instead.

Six-word memoirs about grief and loss

• Still set two cups out. Sometimes.
• Lost him in March. Spring anyway.
• Her voicemail is my favorite song.
• Grief comes in waves. I swim.
• Learned to cook after he died.
• Miss you most on ordinary Tuesdays.
• Widowed at sixty. Started living again.

Six-word memoirs about retirement and getting older

• Retired from work, not from life.
• Every gray hair has a story.
• Finally have time. Can’t find glasses.
• Eighty years young. Still dancing badly.
• Traded the alarm clock for sunrises.
• Started painting at seventy. Never stopping.
• Older now. Wiser, mostly. Still stubborn.

Six-word memoirs about work

• Thirty years teaching. Students taught me.
• Nurse. Night shifts. Held many hands.
• Farmer’s son. Farmer. Farmer’s grandfather now.
• Built houses. Never finished my own.
• Clocked in forty years. Clocked out.
• Changed careers at fifty. Best decision.
• Fixed other people’s cars, ignored mine.

Six-word memoirs about immigration and home

• One suitcase, two languages, three kids.
• Left home at nineteen. Built another.
• My accent stayed. So did I.
• Two countries. One heart, split evenly.
• Came by boat. My grandkids fly.
• Learned English from soap operas, honestly.
• Home is wherever my mother cooks.

Six-word memoirs about hope and starting over

• Fell down seven times. Stood eight.
• Sober eleven years. Every day counts.
• Cancer took a year, not me.
• Started over at fifty. Not finished.
• Bad start. Better middle. Hopeful ending.
• The worst year taught me most.
• Still here. Still trying. Still grateful.

Six-word memoirs about faith

• Prayed hard. Waited long. Answered differently.
• Front pew. Back row. Still here.
• Lost faith once. It found me.
• Grace showed up every single time.
• Choir every Sunday for fifty years.
• Counted blessings. Ran out of fingers.

Six-word memoirs for students

• Homework done. Dreams still under construction.
• Sixteen and already tired of algebra.
• New school. No friends. Then, Maya.
• Benchwarmer turned team captain. Never quit.
• Bookworm. Gamer. Future marine biologist, hopefully.
• Mom says I’m a late bloomer.
• First in my family to graduate.

Six-word memoirs about friendship

• Best friends since kindergarten. Still arguing.
• Moved away. Wrote letters. Still close.
• Few friends, but every one real.
• Sixty birthdays. She called every one.
• Met in a waiting room. Inseparable.

Six-word memoir ideas: 12 prompts to find yours

If you’re staring at a blank card, answer one of these in a long sentence first, then cut it down to six words.

1. The year everything changed.
2. The job you did the longest, and what it gave you.
3. The person who raised you, in one habit.
4. The house you grew up in: one room, one smell.
5. Something you’d never do again (and don’t regret).
6. What you’d tell yourself at 18.
7. The biggest risk you took.
8. What your family always teases you about.
9. The moment you realized you were a grown-up.
10. Your favorite age so far, and why.
11. Something you lost, and something you found after.
12. What the people who know you best would say.

How to write a six-word memoir in 5 steps

1. Choose the frame. Your whole life, one chapter (school, a marriage, a job, a move), or one relationship. “My life” is hard. “My thirty years of night shifts” is easy.
2. List 20 words that belong to it. Mostly nouns and verbs: places, names, objects, jobs, numbers. Skip adjectives like “amazing”. You’re looking for details only you would pick.
3. Write it long, then cut. Start with a full sentence: “I moved to Chicago at nineteen with one suitcase and built a whole life there.” Cut until six words are left: “One suitcase. Chicago at nineteen. Everything.”
4. Look for the turn. Most strong six-word memoirs have two halves that push against each other: “Planned nothing. Got everything. Still learning.” “Divorced at forty. Found myself instead.” If yours is flat, ask what happened next, or what you expected instead.
5. Read it out loud and count. Then show it to someone who knows you. If they say “that’s so you”, you’re done. If they ask “what does that mean?”, swap the vaguest word for a concrete one.

Six-word memoir rules (and the ones people argue about)

• Exactly six words. Not five, not seven.
• It has to be true. That’s the difference between a memoir and a story.
• Contractions count as one word. “I’m”, “can’t” and “Dad’s” are one word each.
• Hyphenated words are disputed. Some count “well-read” as one, some as two. For a class or contest, avoid them.
• Numbers count as one word, whether you write “40” or “forty”.
• Punctuation is free. Periods and commas don’t count, and they’re your best tool. “Single mom. Two jobs. Three graduations.” reads very differently with the periods taken out.
• A title is optional and doesn’t count toward the six.

Six-word memoir vs six-word story vs six-word autobiography

People search for all three, and they overlap:

• Six-word memoir: true, about you, usually about one theme or chapter.
• Six-word autobiography: the same thing, but people often mean your whole life from start to now. “Born curious. Stayed curious. Mostly happy.” is a six-word autobiography.
• Six-word story: fiction is fine, and it can be about anyone. “For sale: baby shoes, never worn” is the famous example.

If you want longer models after this, our autobiography examples include a one-paragraph and a three-sentence version, and what a memoir is explains how a memoir differs from an autobiography, with famous examples of each.

How to use six-word memoirs with a group

Six-word memoirs are one of the easiest writing exercises to do with other people, because nobody has to write much and everyone ends up with something to read out.

• In a classroom: on the first day, hand out index cards, give five minutes, and post the cards on a wall without names. Students guess who wrote which.
• At a family dinner or reunion: everyone writes one, and the oldest person reads last. You’ll hear things nobody has said in years.
• At a retirement party or big anniversary: guests each write six words about the person being celebrated, and the person writes their own. Read them aloud before the speeches.
• In a senior center or writing group: use it as a warm-up, then give everyone ten minutes to write the story behind one of their six words. Groups that struggle with “write a page” usually manage this.
• After a loss: write six words for the person you’re missing. It’s easier to say something true in six words than in a eulogy.

The best part comes after the reading: ask someone for the story behind one word. “Six kids, one bathroom, endless love” gets a laugh. The story of who got the bathroom first on school mornings is a memoir chapter. If you’re doing this with your parents or grandparents, here’s how to interview them about their life stories, with the follow-up questions that get the best answers.

From six words to a whole memoir

A six-word memoir also makes a good outline. Take “One suitcase, two languages, three kids.” That’s three chapters already: the move, learning to live in a second language, and raising three children in a new country. Write the story behind each phrase and you have the core of a memoir.

If you want to go further:

• Our step-by-step guide to how to write a memoir picks up exactly where six words leave off.
• These memoir writing prompts give you a question for each chapter of your life.
• And if writing is what stops you, talk it instead. Memoirji asks you questions about your life one at a time, in your browser, on WhatsApp or on LINE, and writes your spoken answers up as chapters. It works in 10 languages and it’s free to start. Here’s how a memoir comes together in about 15 minutes.

Frequently asked questions

What is a six-word memoir?

A six-word memoir is the story of your life, or one chapter of it, told in exactly six words. It has to be true, which is what makes it a memoir and not a six-word story. For example: “One suitcase, two languages, three kids.”

What is a good example of a six-word memoir?

A good one has a turn in it, two halves that pull against each other. “Retired from work, not from life.” “Divorced at forty. Found myself instead.” “Mom worked nights. I got dreams.” Each tells you a whole situation and how the writer feels about it.

Who started the six-word memoir?

The six-word memoir as we know it comes from Larry Smith’s SMITH Magazine, which started asking readers for them in 2006. The project grew into the book Not Quite What I Was Planning (2008) and the site sixwordmemoirs.com. The idea borrows from the six-word story legend about Ernest Hemingway.

Did Hemingway write “For sale: baby shoes, never worn”?

Probably not. Nobody has found any evidence that he wrote it, and similar lines ran in newspapers decades before the Hemingway story appeared. It’s also a six-word story, not a memoir, because it isn’t about the person telling it.

Do contractions count as one word in a six-word memoir?

Yes. “I’m”, “can’t” and “Dad’s” each count as one word. That’s how almost everyone counts them, including teachers who set the assignment.

Does a hyphenated word count as one word?

People disagree. Many count “well-read” as one word, some count it as two. If your six-word memoir is for a class or a contest, avoid hyphens so nobody can argue with your count. Every example on this page is hyphen-free for that reason.

How do you write a six-word memoir?

Pick what it’s about (your whole life, one chapter, or one person), write down 20 words that belong to it, write a long sentence, then cut it to six. The strongest ones have a turn: before and after, or what you expected and what you got. Read it out loud and count.

What is a good six-word memoir about yourself for school?

Start from one true detail nobody else in the class has. “Allergic to cats. Own three anyway.” “Middle child. Professional peacemaker since birth.” “First in my family to graduate.” Specific beats clever.

What’s the difference between a six-word memoir and a six-word story?

A six-word memoir is about you and has to be true. A six-word story can be about anyone and can be made up. “For sale: baby shoes, never worn” is a story. “Widowed at sixty. Started living again” is a memoir.

Can a six-word memoir be funny?

Yes, and funny ones are often the most honest. “Bought the treadmill. Great clothes rack.” “Retired. Busier than ever. Send help.” The joke works because it’s true.

How do you use six-word memoirs with a group?

Give everyone five minutes and a card, then read them aloud with no names and guess who wrote which. It works in a classroom, at a family reunion, at a retirement party and in a writing group. Afterward, ask each person for the story behind one of their six words.

Can I turn my six-word memoir into a full memoir?

Yes. Treat each word or phrase as a chapter title and tell the story behind it. If writing is the hard part, Memoirji asks you questions about your life in your browser, on WhatsApp or on LINE and writes your spoken answers up as chapters. It’s free to start.

Write yours

Pick the theme above that’s closest to your life, write one long true sentence about it, and cut it to six words. Then, if you want the story behind them told properly, go to memoirji.com and answer the first question out loud.

Nothing to download. No password. No credit card.