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Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/8008
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

When writers base fiction too closely on their own experiences, they can sometimes lose the ability to truly play with the story. I think this is because they are not consciously making as many decisions as a writer of "pure" fiction. They can be tempted to simply record what happened in real life (and to skip inventing material to fill in the gaps of their own knowledge about other people's motivations or bits of the experience that they didn't notice), instead of pondering how to best tell a good story. I've known writers whose story details should have been changed or expanded to better support their theme or create atmosphere, but who resisted the suggestion that they do so because "this is how it really happened."

Writing from life CAN limit your mental ability or willingness to be flexible with your story, and to shape the details in order to support your overall theme.

However, nothing is so convincing in fiction as material that the author truly knows. The ring of authenticity is valuable and definitely worth the pitfalls of writing from life.

Original score: 7