Storytelling
I’d have to say that I agree with Jean Juc Godard the French film director when he said “Sometimes reality is too complex. Stories give it form.” I love stories, film, hearing about a friend’s day, and relaying my experience in a nicely packaged story with an anecdote is one of the great joys of my life. I love listening to storytellers in their flow, the assonance, prosody, alliteration, inflection, tone, body language, and with all dancing together to create an imagined tapestry of unfolding events. I love how a story can take the pieces of an ineffable human experience and relate the complexities of life in the theatre of connection. Stories are the foundation and the underlying grammar of how our brains make sense out of our experiences.
Have you ever heard a story that changed your life? Have you ever told a story about how your life changed after an event, insight, or revelation? Why are stories so powerful?
Well, on a neurological level our brains love detecting patterns, and some would say that we are hardwired for stories. From birth we begin to recognize faces, figures, lines, shapes, sounds, and to organize the never ending flow of information we are being presented with. From birth we begin to feel safe with recognizable patterns, and that is really all stories are. Stories are recognizable patterns and how we make meaning, sense and understand the world when, in truth, there is little meaning to be made out of the random chaos. When we recognize patterns we feel safety in structure. We are hardwired for story telling.
In 2009, Rob Walker set out to to answer a question. Is storytelling the most powerful tool of all time? We don’t usually think of story this way, but storytelling is a technology. It is what John Vervake and other call a psycho-technology. A technology that is the basis of how we relate to the world. Think about it. You get home from a long day, and someone asks you how your day was. It has a beginning, middle, and end. Stories are how we experience the passing of time. By the end of your recount, you give your day value based on how it fits into a story. Did you grow, have fun, connect, face adversity, suffer, triumph, or watch it go by like a river? Storytelling shapes our world and our experience of ourselves and others. When we listen to a story, our brain may release any combination of major neuro chemicals. Our brains release dopamine, oxytocin, and endorphins when we listen to or share stories. Increased dopamine makes us more focused, motivated, and helps us remember information in neatly organized packages. Increased oxytocin increases generosity, trust, connection, empathy, and feelings of contentment and relaxation. Endorphins help us laugh and make us more creative, relaxed, and focused.
Technology and tools help us achieve goals and solve problems. A psycho technology is the application of a technology for psychological purposes. Storytelling takes human experience and helps us grow, learn morals, live in community, reflect about our experiences, behavior and outcomes. Stories help us connect, grow, relate, and share the overwhelming and dynamic experiences we live through. In the end, stories help us feel less alone. Have you ever heard a story that you connected to? Have you ever had that feeling when you are listening to or reading a story in which you feel seen for the first time?
I’ll never forget reading James Joyce’s “Portrait of an Artist as A Young Man.” The loneliness and isolation that Joyce portrayed in Stephen Dedalus, the internal struggle between the pleasures of the flesh and the connection with God, the fear and confusion, and the deep love for beauty and art made me feel like I wasn’t alone or crazy for feeling like the church, my family, and experience were paralyzingly intense at times. I felt seen and connected to a person I would never meet, I felt seen in a way I had never been by a person I would never meet, and I felt reassured that I could continue to live in a world of paradoxes and find meaning.
I remember reading, or being read “Where the Wild Things Are” and feeling a deep connection to Max. I wanted to go to a place where only things you want to happen happen. I wanted to start the wild rumpus. I felt safe knowing that, “Inside all of us is Hope. Inside all of us is Fear. Inside all of us is Adventure. Inside all of us is...A Wild Thing.” I wasn’t alone at night in my room because I knew Max was somewhere alone in his room and that when he shut his eyes and when I shut my eyes we could go anywhere and imagine anything. Connecting with “Where the Wild Things Are” taught me that I, like Walt Whitman, contain multitudes.
Stories have the power to instruct us, to connect us, and to liberate us. However, stories also have the power to bind us, restrict us, and limit us. The stories we believe shape our world, our experience of ourselves and others. Once upon a time I believed that I would never jump out of a plane. Time after time I was told that I was always scared of heights, time after time I relived the story of how long it took me to go off the diving board at the pool, and time after time I believed that I wasn’t capable of jumping out of a plane. Until, one day, a new story presented itself to me. Yeah, I jumped out of the plane. Please read, “Last Rites in Lodi” for the full story.
So, why in the hell put all this in a long ass blog on my website? Well, because Turning of the Bones and the work that I am doing here relies on story. Connecting, healing and sharing stories is a crucial part of the human experience and how we combat that nagging feeling that we are hopelessly and utterly alone. From stories we grow, heal, connect, and get all kinds of cool neurochemicals released that improve our sense of well-being. Looking at stories, analyzing them, seeing ourselves in them, listening to them helps us reflect about the stories we believe about ourselves, others, and the world. Stories shape our experience.
Thanks for joining me here at Turning of the Bones, and I look forward to sharing stories and hearing stories from you.
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