The story
Last week, we gathered online for a lovely storytelling event. You can watch the intro in the video above and read the story here. We didn’t record the full session as we aimed to create a safe space for people to share their stories. And, oh – what a treat!
It was so powerful to listen to people share their stories. The stories were real, vulnerable and personal. We heard about personal transformation through connections to nature, how it is to experience the climate crisis and imagined futures through the perspective of the more-than-human world.
As Zlatina listened to the stories of others, she noted down elements of the stories that made them so much more powerful to hear. Hopefully, these tips can help you in your own storytelling:
About choosing what story to tell:
🌳Small things are sometimes story worthy even more than the big ones, it’s all about noticing and appreciating them
🌳 Describe the process of transformation when you start paying attention to something that you might usually take for granted, and explain how you find a new way of interacting with it
🌳 Talk about how the experience changes your perspective and makes you ask yourself different questions about the world and changed how you show up in the world
🌳 A speculative story (about the future) lets us imagine how to act today in order to make it happen or prevent it
About structuring the story:
🌿 Start with the motivation, what is your reason to take action and move forward in the story
🌿 Talk about the resistance you had to overcome before you step into action
🌿 Describe a moment of transformation or new insight that came when you took action
🌿 Talk about a surprise and unexpected turn of events
🌿 Our unique perspectives and beliefs about a subject can shape how we interact with them, we can choose which perspective to take when we tell a story
🌿 Start with a powerful concept and use a story to exemplify it. Then tell the story (and skip the concept, let people reach their own conclusion)
🌿 Compare with another story where the roles are reversed to emphasise a point or the impact a situation had and how there might be different sides to it
About the details:
🍃 Use humour to create lightness and engagement with your story
🍃 Use details and specific tactile examples to bring people along with you in the story
🍃 Make a parallel between what is happening inside of the main character (e.g. yourself) and what is happening in the environment around them
🍃 Connected your experiences to nature, it’s always a great source of inspiration
Do you have more storytelling tips, add them in the comments below!
If you’re feeling inspired, we’d love to read your story: Add your story
We will host more storytelling events in the future – so stay tuned!
