CHAPTER TWO: Why we’re all  born storytellers

As we've seen, the stories we tell shape recipients in very real, measurable ways, but in telling stories, we also shape ourselves

Undoubtedly, my introduction to the world of psychology research was a pivotal moment in my professional career - one that set me on a new path and led to me founding my own company. As such, it’s an event I’ve revisited and related countless times.

There were other things happening in my life the day I arrived at Oxford. Things that seemed just as, if not more, important at the time. Any history of my lived experience would have to include it all.

But my life isn’t a comprehensive catalog when I am talking to others or reflecting to myself - It’s a story.

Narrative
psychology 101

Story is what brain does.

Will Storr,
The Science of Storytelling: Why Stories Make Us Human and How to Tell Them Better"

Narrative psychologists argue that the stories we tell about our lives are a form of identity. The events we choose to include, and the events we choose to edit out, simultaneously reflect and shape who we are.

As The Atlantic’s Julie Beck writes in her introduction to the field, “A life story doesn’t just say what happened, it says why it was important, what it means for who the person is, for who they’ll become, and for what happens next.”

For business leaders, all this begs the question: Does your brand have a story that fully reflects its brand “identity”? And how might you change that story to shape your organization’s future?

A language we all know

From childhood, we learn to interpret stories, whether they are visual or vocal.

As explored in the previous chapter, narratives we hear throughout life shape everything about us from our actions to our relationships. But stories can also safely expose us to creative ideas, new environments, and extraordinary situations.

In 2019, the BBC reported that children who have fiction read to them regularly exhibited more empathy than others, and could comprehend that someone might have different thoughts and feelings to us, which is essential for understanding and predicting other people’s behavior.

Growing and motivating through stories

Stories (especially those in which we’re the hero) can be a powerful form of self-persuasion and brand incentive in business, plus a push towards personal growth.

One study asked psychotherapy outpatients to tell stories about themselves, analyzed the nature of the stories, and tracked their sense of well-being.

The patients who told more coherent stories and made themselves the central actor in them showed the greatest improvements. Perhaps even more interestingly, a related longitudinal study found that people began to feel better after they began telling stories in which they took greater control of their recoveries.

This study, published in the 2010s, echoes the thinking behind narrative therapy, a practice pioneered in the 1970s and ‘80s by social workers in Australia and New Zealand. Narrative therapists seek to actively unearth and unpack the narratives governing their patients’ lives, to then help patients “re-author” more positive stories in their place.