college essay autobiography examples

20 FREE Autobiography Examples (Autobiographical Essay Templates)

The autobiography genre is one of the most robust nonfiction writing categories of today. Look at any bestseller list, and you will find several autobiographies from musicians, teachers, politicians, child stars, and the like. Why is this so? As a firsthand account of the life of the author, an autobiography allows a level of intimacy with the author that is unmatched anywhere else. But how do you write such a piece, and how can Autobiography Examples help? Read on to learn more.

What Is an Autobiography?

An autobiography is a non-fiction account of the personal life of the author, as written by the author themselves from their point of view. It is a subgenre of the biography – a much broader category – but biographies are written by someone other than the subject of the story, usually a historian or expert.

Autobiography Templates & Examples

How Can Autobiography Examples Help You?

As already established, an autobiography is a personal story about the writer’s experiences. Because it is based on facts that only apply to the writer, it can be difficult to draw inspiration from autobiography pieces. However, in the real sense, reading autobiography examples can help you write your own by, one, inspiring you to tell your story. You might feel bolder about discussing events in your life if you see that another author did it. Secondly, examples can help teach you about format structure and guidelines.

Autobiography Format for Students

Just as with any subgenre, there are many types of autobiographies from which to choose when writing about yourself. Here are the most common formats for students:

• Personal Narratives – This is an essay about yourself that generally focuses on one aspect of your life – i.e., one moment in time – then builds on it through dialogue.
• Vignette – This is a short chapter about one specific event in your life. Think of it as a brief episode or account of something that happened to you.

Note: Sometimes, an author will combine several vignettes to create a complete piece, but the pieces don’t exactly need to be interconnected or dependent on each other for context.

• Memoir – This autobiography talks about certain themes or moments in your life such as history, religion, philosophy, sexuality, etc.
• Script or Drama – This format uses stage or film dialogues to tell a personal story.
• Traditional Autobiography – This one covers the author’s life from birth till date.
• Graphic Novels – This format tells a true story through cartoon panels and drawings.

Essential Elements of an Autobiography Format

As long as you know what to include in an autobiography, you will not have a lot of trouble formatting your story. Here are some key elements of this genre:

• Title in bold font at the top of the page.
• Dedication describing who to whom you are dedicating your work.
• Table of Contents to help readers easily navigate the story.
• Acknowledgments thanking all the people that have helped you.
• Foreword containing all your reasons for writing your autobiography.
• Introduction that should grab and maintain the reader’s attention.
• Body Section containing a story based on events and locations and divided into subheadings or chapters for continuity.
• Conclusion summing up your final thoughts.
• Memorabilia such as medals, letters, pictures, etc.
• Index to help readers locate details in the autobiography.

How to Write an Autobiography (Step-by-Step)

Overall, the most accepted autobiography format is chronological – where the story is written in the order, it happened. Here are the steps to accomplishing this format:

• Start by recalling all the important events in your life and note them down. You can also reach out to family and friends that can flesh out the details.
• Collect mementos like pictures, letters, personal belongings, souvenirs, trophies, paintings, etc. They might jog your memory and remind you of some life events.
• Create an outline or some subheadings that you would like to shape your story.
• Draft a rough copy of the first chapter, which you will polish later.
• Fill in your story, writing in your personal style.

Key Points to Consider When Writing

Generally, there is no set-in-stone format for writing an autobiography, and you have the creative form to write your story in any form. The catch is that the story must be informative and written expressively. Here are some key factors to consider when writing:

• Always determine your motivation for writing. Do you wish to entertain your family, leave a legacy for your kids, or record an unusual event or achievement?
• Understand that it takes everyone a different amount of time to record their life. It could take you weeks, months, or years, so be prepared to see it through.
• You can tell the story exactly in the order it happened or use vignettes or flashbacks.
• If you encounter chapters that are too difficult to write without becoming very emotional, give yourself a break from writing and do something else.
• Always ask permission when describing events that involve other people.
• Some people might feel offended or hurt by your content. You can try to lessen this effect by notifying them of what you plan to write and how you will frame it.
• Alternatively, try to be tactful and diplomatic in your writing.

Dos and Don’ts

• Research certain periods from your childhood or youth by talking to relatives, old neighbors, local leaders, village people, etc.
• Use a writing style that matches your personality.
• Save your work regularly and back it up.
• Try to remember events as accurately as possible and show your enthusiasm in your writing.
• Connect parts of your story with well-known events that were happening around the same time. For example, ‘Alexander Graham Bell had just invented the telephone, and I was….’
• Write in a friendly and engaging way without coming off as narcissistic or self-absorbed.
• Include insubstantial information.
• Be overly formal in your language but also don’t use cliché phrases.
• Add embarrassing or personal details about another person.
• Leave out any pertinent information.
• Leave big gaps in the story.
• Ignore grammar, punctuation, word choice, and syntax.

Difference Between Autobiography and Biography

As mentioned earlier, autobiographies are a subgenre of the broader category of biographies. Autobiographies are introspective and are written by the author about their personal life experience. Biographies, on the other hand, are written about other people of note by experts on the subject. Great examples are the Teddy Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln biographies written by Doris Kearns Goodwin.

Difference Between Autobiography and Memoir

While an autobiography documents the author’s entire life, a memoir captures a selected time or theme within the writer’s life. It is more focused and usually has a main theme, such as religion, philosophy, spirituality, health, marriage, etc.

Final Thoughts

Are you planning to share your personal story with the world? Start by reviewing some Autobiography Examples online and learning what to do or not do when giving an account of your life. Remember, writing a story is a relatively long process – even when the story is about you – so give yourself time to research and talk to people that can help. This includes relatives, old teachers, and the like.

How did our templates helped you today?

Opps what went wrong, related posts.

23+ Business Travel Itinerary Templates

Apology Letter For Bad Behavior – 7+ Samples & Formats

Restaurant Employee Evaluation Form

Peer Evaluation Form: Templates and Examples

Free Newspaper Templates

40 Free Event Program Templates

44 Open House Sign in Sheet Templates

22+ Free Packing Slip Templates

Thank you for your feedback.

• Skip to primary navigation
• Skip to main content
• Skip to primary sidebar
• Skip to footer

Autobiography Examples for Students That are Seriously Inspiring

An autobiography is one of the most important essays for students aspiring to get admitted into a college of their choice. Here is an article that will give you some examples and also tips on how you can write one for yourself.

As a student, an autobiography is usually essential when applying to colleges for higher studies. It may be the deciding factor for our admission. Hence, you have to make sure it provides those details of your life that are not visible in your grades, your application, and your letters of recommendation. Those details that inspired you to study what you have applied for, that have affected your life in some way, and have contributed to you becoming the person you are today, are expected in this essay. The examples provided here will help you develop a good autobiographical essay.

Examples of Autobiographical Essays

Aspiring to be an eco-friend.

What would we do without water? A question to which answers range from “drink coke” to just “die”. No one mentions the part in between: the long wait, which includes making the most of the little water you get, however muddy and mucky it is, and finally giving up hope, and then dying.

I come from India, a land that is as urban as it is rural, a land that is as advanced as it is behind the times. India is a country where one part of the city gets non-stop running and drinking water, while another has to wait for water; water, that is imperative to the sustenance of all human beings. While I was lucky enough to belong to the part of the city where we were blessed with continuous water supply, it is a school assignment that took me to the other side.

Our assignment merely involved spending a day in a slum and writing about our experience. But what I had there was not a mere experience, it was the facing of a harsh reality that slum-dwellers experience every single day. As we entered the area, my eyes caught a long line of women waiting with containers at a common tap, for water which was supplied only between 1 pm and 2 pm every day. Within one hour, water was to be collected for 500 slum-dwellers, which was to suffice for drinking, eating, bathing, and cleaning. I watched in horror as women ran to the front, trying to catch every drop of water and leaving disappointed because they didn’t make it in time. One of those women began weeping, because she had an ailing child at home, and she couldn’t even provide him with enough water to take care of him. I offered her the bottle of water I was carrying for myself, which obviously was not enough, but could be used for temporary relief. As I followed her home, I saw her son, writhing in pain and waiting for water so he could take his medicine. The cause of his illness was the muddy water that he had consumed a couple of days ago because that day, no water was provided to the slum. She went to him and took him in her lap, and gave him a sip of water from the bottle I had given her, with the medicine. It helped, but it was not enough. It was too late. As he writhed in pain, she and I watched helplessly. He succumbed within half an hour.

On that day I decided that I would do anything it took to prevent an individual from dying because of lack of water. I would make sure that people understand the importance of preserving and utilizing water resourcefully. It is with this burning desire that I apply for the environmental studies course at your esteemed university. It is every citizen’s responsibility to do their bit to help the environment and its richest resource, water. However, someone has to do more than their bit, and I aspire to be one of them. I want to ensure that first I, and then the world understands the value of every drop of water we drink, bathe with, wash our clothes with, and use to throw water balloons at others.

I request you to go through my academic profile and consider my request for admission to your prestigious course. I assure you that I will not fail your decision.

The Healer of Little Minds

Change is inevitable in everyone’s life. But when it comes at the age of 10, particularly when you have led a sheltered life, you don’t know how to deal with it; more so, when the person who sheltered you has gone. I am an only child, and I was hardly close to my mother. When my father passed away, she had no one but me, and I no one but her. That was one of the biggest changes I had to deal with at that time – the loss of my father, and building a real relationship with my mother. It wasn’t easy for her either; after all she also lost the person who sheltered her and did an exceedingly good job at that.

She had to take care of me, ensure that I didn’t falter at any point in life because “she couldn’t take care of me single-handedly”, and take care of herself so she could fulfill her duties as my mother and my father. I didn’t know how I could help, except try to give her faith about the fact that I would turn out just fine. I missed my father, but I couldn’t talk to her about it, because if I did, it would hurt her more; it would make her doubt her abilities as a parent. But I did wish there was someone I could talk to; someone who would understand without judging me or my mother, someone who could tell me what to do when I felt I was inadequate. Insecurities are a part of every child’s life, but everyone deals with them differently. Some suppress their emotions, others vent them openly. I resorted to the former.

I wonder if my life would be different if I spoke to someone and did things differently, if I relied on someone’s judgment other than mine. I can’t change the past, but I do know that I can be that person that hears out children and their insecurities, and analyze how grown-up they are irrespective of their age. I am aware that child psychology is not merely about helping children cope with the loss of a parent. It involves a lot more, a deep look into the minds of children that we consider to be so little, but who are as disturbed or worse than those of adults. I understand the need for children to express themselves outside the family, without being pressured to live up to what their families have dreamed for them. I understand that they need to be allowed a channel for their emotions and why they suppress those channels. And I want to be that person they can talk to, the person who will listen, understand, and help mold their lives differently, for the better.

I have a strong affinity for children, which is evident from the fact that I have been babysitting for neighbors and relatives since I was in my early teens. Children open up to me quite easily, and that makes it all the simpler for me to communicate with them. As of now, I can only give you my word that I will do my best as a student of the course in child psychology offered by your university. I request you to consider my application and grant me admission to the course, a decision that I assure you will not regret.

Beauty is Truth, Truth is Beauty

“Art is not what you see, but what you make others see.” – Edgar Degas

This quote sums up beautifully what I believe about art. Those who create art know the kind of enriching experience it provides. Art changes a person, and that is the change I experienced when I chanced upon a graphic designing project for an assignment in school. It may sound trivial, even silly, but just about anything can be a window to a whole new world, and a whole new career.

Making diagrams was never fun, but when I realized that I could do it in a more efficient manner on a computer than by hand, I jumped at the idea. This was definitely simpler, and in the process, I realized I could do so much more with a simple software. I could create so much more. So much did my passion for “playing with the software” increase, that I started using it to create a host of unique graphics. This led to me designing a wedding invitation for my sister’s wedding, which surprisingly, the entire family liked and approved. Since then, I have been taking up several projects where I create traditional, eclectic, and contemporary invitations for various occasions. This simple process gives me a kind of pleasure no other activity gives me. The experience of creating something so special for someone whom it means so much to is exhilarating.

This is why I wish to hone my skills as a graphic designer. While art as a whole is easy to embrace, it is the little technical details that refine it and make it the beauty it is. I am confident that my basic knowledge of the art will serve as a solid foundation for my career in this field. My style is simple; I find beauty in simplicity and like to maintain it so. I believe that the lesser there is to focus on, the easier it is to embrace the wholeness of a piece of art. My attached portfolio will display exactly what I am capable of doing, and how much I am capable of learning. I hope this provides a suitable base on which you will grant me admission to the course in graphic designing in your prestigious institute.

Tips for Students to Write a Good Autobiography

Every college receives a thousand applications each academic year that it has to process. This also means they receive autobiographies in the same number. Yours must be worth a read.

• Avoid clichés. Talk about experiences that have inspired you to take the decision to apply for a particular course.
• You may be extremely passionate about studying something, but if that passion doesn’t reflect in your autobiography, you may be overlooked. You must explicitly portray your love for the particular field and how as a graduate in that subject, you can make a real difference.
• Start with a high-impact sentence and make sure the rest of your essay justifies the impact you create in the beginning. Avoid mentioning your name, age, and place of birth unless it is imperative to the experience you are going to talk about.
• Your autobiography should portray your growth and development as a student as well as a human being. It should be a window to your personality for the reader.
• While all your experiences may not be positive, the lessons your learn from them should. Conclude on a positive note explaining why you deserve to be a part of that particular course.
• Don’t forget to edit your essay thoroughly. Have it read by different people of different age groups and backgrounds so that they can give you their feedback and you can improvise.

The key to writing a good autobiographical essay is to let your thoughts flow rather than put them in a fixed format. It is only then that you will be able to evoke emotion in the reader and help him feel the way you do about your career.

Like it? Share it!

Get Updates Right to Your Inbox

Further insights.

Privacy Overview