yyjStoryteller

Dear friends, Every age faces its own kind of silence — the moments when truth gets softened, rewritten, or ignored altogether. Yet storytellers have always found ways to speak, even when it was risky to do so. This reflection is about those moments when telling your story becomes an act of resistance — not through anger, but through courage, honesty, and love for what is real. Not every story is told from the winner’s seat. For as long as humans have spoken, those in power have tried to shape the story that is remembered — and to silence the ones that are inconvenient. But truth has a way of finding its voice. Sometimes it comes as a shout, sometimes only as a whisper. Yet even a whisper, if passed from one heart to another, can outlast a shout. When the official story is false, telling your own becomes an act of courage. It might be as simple as standing up in a meeting and saying, “That’s not how I saw it.” Or as daring as writing down the story your grandmother told you, even ...

  When Grief Finds Its Voice “Stories are medicine.” — Clarissa Pinkola Estés “The human species thinks in metaphors and learns through stories.” — Mary Catherine Bateson A story told in grief is a step toward healing. Sometimes we tell stories not to explain, but to survive. When words finally take shape around our pain, the chaos within begins to find order. The act of telling—of giving shape to the unspeakable—can be a kind of alchemy, turning sorrow into something we can hold, examine, and perhaps even share. Grief isolates, but stories connect. When we share our stories of loss or hardship, the burden lightens—not because the sorrow disappears, but because someone else helps us carry it. In the listening, we are reminded that we are not alone. Storytelling, in its deepest form, is not about performance—it’s about presence. It’s a way of saying: I have been there too. I have felt the cold wind you feel now. And somehow, I have found my way forward. So today, I offer th...

    “Stories are medicine.” — Clarissa Pinkola Estés “The human species thinks in metaphors and learns through stories.” — Mary Catherine Bateson A story told in grief is a step toward healing. Sometimes we tell stories not to explain, but to survive. When words finally take shape around our pain, the chaos within begins to find order. The act of telling—of giving shape to the unspeakable—can be a kind of alchemy, turning sorrow into something we can hold, examine, and perhaps even share. Grief isolates, but stories connect. When we share our stories of loss or hardship, the burden lightens—not because the sorrow disappears, but because someone else helps us carry it. In the listening, we are reminded that we are not alone. Storytelling, in its deepest form, is not about performance—it’s about presence. It’s a way of saying: I have been there too. I have felt the cold wind you feel now. And somehow, I have found my way forward. So today, I offer this thought: Has a sto...

When you share a story, you build a bridge.” — Unknown In a circle, everyone holds the center for a while.  Political activist Gloria Steinem said that  “A circle is the oldest form of democracy.”  Being in a story circle  is not about performance, but presence. Some tellers say that you do not choose the story, the story chooses you.  The story you tell today may be the story someone else needed to hear. Something to think about... Who would you invite into your story circle today? What story would you tell? Leave a comment  below:

  “Fairy tales are more than true: not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us that dragons can be beaten.” — G.K. Chesterton “Myth is the public dream, and dream is the private myth.” — Joseph Campbell Thoughts: Folk tales are survival kits disguised as entertainment. The old stories are not old — they are timeless. We turn to fairy tales not to escape reality, but to understand it. A Question for you:  What story did you love as a child that still holds meaning today?

“I am my mother’s daughter, and the drums of her heart are within me.” — Rupi Kaur  “The stories we tell literally make the world. If you want to change the world, you need to change your story.” — Michael Margolis In every culture, women have carried stories at the hearth, the bedside, the kitchen table. Women’s stories often survive in whispers before they become public truths. When a woman tells her story, she claims her power. A  Question for you: What’s a story you inherited from a woman in your family? If you want to, you can share it in the comments.

What others have said: “Listening is an act of love.                                                                                                                                                                  Dave Isay “To listen is to lean in, softly, with a willingness to be changed by what we hear.”                                                                                  ...

Interesting Thoughts “The shortest distance between two people is a story.” — Patti Digh “Stories live in your blood and bones, follow the seasons, and light candles on the darkest night.”                                                                                                                                  — Patti Davis Some thoughts A memory untold slowly fades; a memory shared becomes a story. We carry our ancestors not in our blood alone, but in their words. Storytelling is not about recall — it is about meaning. Question What’s a memory you’ve shared so often it has become more story than fact? Please share that memory with us in the comments.. ...

  Somethings to think about: A story is not only what is told — it is what is remembered. The listener shapes it as much as the teller. Every family has “that one story” that gets told again and again. Pay attention to it — it is carrying a truth your people want to keep alive. Folktales endure because they give us permission to imagine beyond the ordinary. Sometimes a fairy tale is the most honest way to speak about life. Quotes from others “Stories are a communal currency of humanity.” — Tahir Shah “Those who tell the stories rule the world.” — Hopi Proverb A Question for YOU What is the one story from your childhood that still echoes in your life today?