#181 – The Story Lives in The Lesson
Where to look for great storytelling
This is Adventures in Storytelling your weekly note with resources, insights, and actionable tools for better communication through storytelling. Enjoy.
If you’ve ever read an Aesop’s fable then you know that often, the story—your story—is in the lesson. Not just the experience (plot), or the perspective (voice) or how you share the story (tone and/or medium) but the impact. What did you learn that you are now revealing to others.
While reading “your wound/my garden” a book of poems by Alok V Menon, I started to reflect on what our experiences teach us. What they reveal about us and the world. And realized that I’ve never created a story where a lesson didn’t exist.
In brand stories the lesson is the need you’re feeling or the opportunity you’ve identified to help your customer. A good brand builder might ask themselves, what did you learn that lead to this product or bit of communication. You might call it the insight (which I define a truth uncovered that is interesting, relevant, and actionable in the context of communications), but really what it is is an activating understanding that pushes your story forward.
In a personal or career story the lesson you learn from a setback may where your story lies and how you share it.
At the end of Alok’s book, they finish with a piece titled “New Year’s Revelations” and they list 11 things that had been revealed to them as they entered a new year. This is something Alok does every year if you follow them on Instagram. Among them is, “4. Authenticity is an orientation, not a destination. live many lives. each one as true as the last.”
The list got me thinking about what 2024 revealed to me—the lessons I learned. I’m going to share them with you next week, but until then, please share in the comments what has 2024 revealed to you? What’s the lesson in your story of this year?
A Story Well Told
Poetry. Seek out and read poetry. Explore and be curious about it. There is no right or wrong way to experience and interpret it. Just like all art, some of it will move you and much of it will not. Find what works for you. A few poets that I enjoy: Alok V Menon, Saeed Jones, Rumi, Claudia Rankine, and Pablo Neruda. Give it a try. I find reading poetry, makes the way I think about and write stories better. Here’s one that I was introduced to last week and have already decided will be my next tattoo. It reminds me of the throughline in storytelling.
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