The Power of Stories

 

When I was little I would read for hours. My favorite books were those about adventure and survival. I devoured stories with themes of overcoming and redemption.  I got lost in the lives of the characters. I wanted to be like them. I connected with the heroes that called out the humanness in me. I got lost in their world. My imagination carried me away, and when I was jolted back to reality there was this palpable sense of longing to stay in the pages with those characters. There was safety in those stories, and I didn’t want to leave.

I still believe in the power of stories. I don't read as much these days, but stories of struggle and triumph still captivate me. These stories weave heartache and hope into something that connects deep in me. When I get the opportunity to hear someone tell their story it awakens the story in me.

I've always had a story in me. My whole life I've had this almost desperation to tell my story. I  want someone to hear my story and read it back to me. There are so many words bouncing between my head and my heart that it's hard to pin them down. Pieces of my story swirl around in my mind, and when thoughts develop into words I feverishly try to freeze them. If I don't capture them right away, I'm afraid they will escape and it will be a struggle to find them again. But when I let them develop spontaneously it makes more sense. When I speak freely, without judgment, it becomes more of this organic art. 

The stories I want to tell get caught in the back of my throat. I want to speak and share my own experiences of heartache and hope, but I've believed a message that my story doesn't have value. It says I don't deserve to give voice to the stories that have shaped my identity. There is this internal pointing finger that mocks me every time I open my mouth.

But what if I talked back to that voice? What if I acknowledged its presence, but did not give it any more attention? I want to believe that there is someone beyond me writing my story. Someone that is the author and the editor and the publisher. I want to receive their input and take notes in the margins. What do I want to remember? What phrases are unnecessary?

 I believe there is power even in the rough draft. It's in the process of reading and re-reading my story that I can begin to share it with others. Maybe in sharing my story I can connect to the collective story that makes us human. First, I have to honor my own journey. I have to make space for my own humanness. I have to give voice to my own experience. It is a practice of self-compassion, of mindful loving-kindness, to sit and listen to my own story. When I can meet myself in the pages of my life without judgment that is where healing happens.