Develop your story-telling arts to become a vastly more effective individual
Imagine life without stories to tell. Yes, that’s true – we can’t. Story-telling lives at the heart of humanity. The ability to think and communicate in narratives reflects the quality of our consciousness and connection to what is happening in and around us.
The Ancient Way of Passing Vital Knowledge From Generation to Generation
In tribal life story-telling is the main channel of conveying learning, wisdom and experience. The hunters, the healers, the foragers, the scouts, the warriors, the leaders, the mothers and the fathers sharing needful knowledge with each other and passing it on to the young by way of story-telling. Story-telling gatherings are special, magic times, where often the same story would be told time and again, each time with new nuances that fit the way of the moment.
Self-Awareness
Reflect for a moment on the time that passed since you woke up today. On the surface it may be just a fractal of history. Zoom in on a fleeting moment where a string of thoughts were passing through your mind about a matter of significance or on an encounter you had with another person. Tell yourself the story of that moment. Recount the nature of inner struggle, cascades of feelings, awareness, desires, urges and thoughts that were suddenly present, to then fade away – or perhaps not – into the background. Suddenly, a wondrous micro world opens up, with depths, perspectives and meanings – one of many that exist in your life.
Moments – The Building-Blocks of Living
Life is made of moments. Intimate moments; stretching moments; happy and not so happy moments; yes and no moments; moments of great spiritual depth and of care-free shallowness; moments of doubt and scepticism and of great certainty; moments of timidity and of courage; moments of insistence and of giving way; moments of drama and of boredom; lightning fast and agonizingly slow moments… Each with its special story. To pass moments by without pausing to tell their story in your own mind is like falling asleep while watching a great movie.
A Great Brain-Mind Stimulator
A well told story acts as a multi-dimensional brain-mind stimulant. The parts that convey imageries and intangible nuances and cadences impact – by preponderance – the right brain hemisphere; the parts that convey accurate, well-structured details, knowledge and instructions impact – by preponderance – the left brain hemisphere and the parts that convey deep meanings, implications and proposals impact the mind.
The process of listening to a gripping story activates and connects between clusters of neural pathways, creating wondrous tree-like patterns. The roots are analogous to the knowledge transfer that is intrinsic to the story; the stem to the main lesson of the story; the branches to the territory coverage and the fruits to the outcome and benefits.
Story-Telling as a Highly Effective Media of Learning and Communication
Xerox employ some 25,000 technicians to fix their machines. They used to have sophisticated, highly technical trouble-shooting instruction manuals to help the technicians deal with break-downs. Thanks to a bright chief-scientist, their knowledge managemt system went through a profound transformation: It’s now conveyed through a massive data-base of real stories that are based on their technician’s experiences and proven to be far superior to the system it replaced.
A well told story creates an essence – a resonating compound of live ‘codings’ and powers that hangs together – that re-creates the inner life and sequences of an experience for the benefit of oneself and others. Stories ‘transfer’ by speech and radiation, where people share with one another the essences of their experience.
Story-telling is:
- A powerful perception tool: Tell yourself the story of the times – be as comprehensive and detailed as you can – to perceive what is really happening. This is why story-telling is an indispensable leadership tool.
- A capturing media of values and qualities that would otherwise not be registered.
- A learning and development media that engages the whole of oneself in the process.
- A way to captivate an audience.
- A way to captivate yourself.
- A healing and energizing media: Stories are known to instigate and accelerate healing processes
…and much more.
One of the Greatest Arts
Every day has its story, made of many small stories.Your life is most possibly a much more special and unique story than you and others give credence to. Tell someone you trust the story of your struggle and listen to theirs to realize the uniqueness of each person. There is much more significance to our struggle than we may realize. And, it may not be as personal as we may think it is…
If you have not done so already, create the great habit of sharing with your loved ones a little special story of something that happened to you today. Something that you value, that you were impressed by, that you learnt from. Pick up on a moment that would otherwise be lost in the crowds of passing moments and find its inner message, to mine the gems of wisdoms that it may hold in store.
Tell a story to
- turn the seemingly ordinary into the inspiring special that it is.
- communicate your values.
- breathe excitement and life into seemingly dull moments.
- pay back for being given the magnificent gift of consciousness and ability to tell the human story – yours and other’s.
It is said that when an inspired human tells a captivating story, the universe listens…
Never waste a great moment. Tell its story…
David Gommé
28 February 2010
www.capabledynamics.com
Feedback, comments and enquiries are most welcome. Please direct to david.gomme@capabledynamics.com
World Copyright © David Gommé