Spinning Stories
I’ve been thinking a lot recently about narrative. I’ve realized that I want to be a storyteller. To me that means giving meaning(s) to the things that we do and the things that happen to us. I’m not so well-read in philosophy, but I do know about Kant’s idea of causality being a category of the human mind, something we assume in order to live and act in the world. I’m probably comparing oranges and apples, but I connect that to the loss of the meta-narrative (a overarching story that we use to govern our lives as a community and a society (for most Western’s used to be the Bible)).
The idea that comes out of that is that narrative is all we have. It’s an awkward phrase, but although narrative is fiction, is something “made-up”, the same way that causality is fabricated by the human mind. The difference is that we have some ability to change our narratives, as individuals and as groups. That’s what this book is about - therapists helping clients (I hate that word) examine the narrative of their lives (ie. the story they tell themselves and usually the ones that people tell about them), deconstruct them, and pick up the pieces of events, history, relationships, and construct a story that better helps them live their lives. To me the really interesting thing about that is that the search doesn’t have to be for a more accurate, or “true-er” narrative. That doesn’t matter. What matters is 1) is it believable to the client (can they invest in it?) and 2) will it help the person live their life “better”?
This is what I love about sociology. Well, one of the things. That it can be a form of storytelling. Basically taking a view of something (macro or micro) and telling a story about it. I realized that when I read “The Forethought” of W.E.Dubois’s “The Souls of Black Folks”. I was reading this colloquial story of one guy’s version of the black history in the US and I was told that it was sociology, that this guy was a respected sociologist and that he was allowed to talk like this. I was pretty stunned.
I’m reading this book right now, which is bringing up all of these thoughts (very interesting book).
On a side note, that is what I think is the key to ISF. That is the currency with which we “pay” volunteers. By giving them another bit of a story, of meaning, to add to their lives. (not that their lives aren’t full of meaning and stories already - that would be impossible. It’s just that the “meaning” we have is pretty sought after). Another disclaimer - I don’t hand out this “meaning” to other volunteers, it is something we create together and give each other.
April 6th, 2004 at 9:03 am
Stories as currency
Nice bit of insight into what people get out of volunteering, by Michael Lenczner: “That is the currency with which we “pay” volunteers.
April 13th, 2004 at 1:33 am
You’re right on the mark…story is the fabric of our lives. Every relationship, every object, every experience is stored in the mind as a story. Story is the oldest most proven way we humans learning information, make sense and meaning of our world. Now…we have the choice to choose the right stories for whatever reality we want to create. Memory (past), dreams (future), and identity (present) are three dimensions of story that one can consciously work with, at both the individual and organizational levels.
If interested, check out the 4th annual Smithsonian conference on organizational storytelling going on this weekend April 16-18th in Washington DC (which I’m helping to organize)
http://www.stevedenning.com/Smithsonian04.html.
Also launching on Thursday, April 15th with be http://www.storyatwork.com - a web site for our community of practice on organizational storytelling (GoldenFleece) with a compendium of resources, tools, examples, consultants, etc…relevant for the fields of story-based approaches to knowledge management, branding, marketing, strategic planning, fundraising, social change, etc…
Also check out “The Story Factor” by Annette Simmons - one of my favorite recent books on org story.
Story is indeed a social connector and the juice by which we connect, exchange, transact, belong, inspire, and ultimately transform our world.
April 13th, 2004 at 2:59 am
a friend was saying something yesterday about memory that makes sense in this conversation.
something about “how modern neuroscience is researching the ways in which memory is in fact constantly erased and redefined as a normal part of the act of remembering”. Basically how the act of remembering something destroys the memory and recreates it (slightly altered).
http://www.flinknet.com/theflink/archives/000036.html
April 17th, 2004 at 7:52 am
Telling a Story
The weblog as a project management tool.
http://udell.roninhouse.com/bytecols/2001-05-24.html
It’s a great article. I’ll post about it later.
April 19th, 2004 at 6:14 pm
Been reading hannah arendt’s The Human Condition - and she speaks of the stories that are an individual’s life, and created by the web of human relationships as well as the grander narrative of social history. Worth noting is her comment “nobody is the author or producer of his own life story.” as she continues to further explain that we, as individuals are born into a larger story, and so agency is simply that - the owner of one’s own story perhaps but not the author. She further goes on to talk about Platonic views of the same subject, but I can’t imagine doing it justice at the moment. Overall its a great piece.
[Chapter 5 - Action - pg.175-247]
Arendt, Hannah, The Human Condition, University of Chicago Press, 1958
April 20th, 2004 at 1:52 am
Thanks Kelly,
Maybe I could borrow it from you, . . or we could discuss it over that drink that never seems to materialize.
After exams . . .
October 23rd, 2005 at 10:57 pm
the DLF
I was joking with friends the other day that I was going to start the DLF. The Data Liberation Front. We would walk around Montreal with high-powered magnets and wipe people’s hd’s clean. For their own sakes of course. It…
February 9th, 2006 at 3:20 am
imagining
i’m not even going to try and make this intelligible. i’m writing this for me and whoever wants to slog through it. I’ve talked about imagined communities before. And I’ve talked about narrative therapy and our role of imagining our…