stories need to have emotion in them. you have to want to make the reader feel what you and/or your character(s) are feeling. see what you and/or your character(s) is seeing. you want your reader to care about your character(s) the same way you should care about them. you want who ever is reading your story to cry when your character(s) cries, laugh when they laugh, fall in love when they fall in love. make the person reading it sympathize and relate to what your putting your character(s) through. throw in some dialogue, add some emotion, really try and put yourself in you character(s) shoes and ask yourself 'okay, now what would they do?' if you treat your character(s) like they are living breathing people you will get better results with your stories and eventually you'll notice that certain charaters begin to take on a life of their own per se.
i could tell you about myself but it wouldn't change a thing. who i am shouldn't matter to you. what i write should. does my life effect my work? yes. does it matter? not really.