LJ010: Stories [Foundations]

This week on the podcast, we're exploring the power of story. Humans are storytellers. We choose the stories we tell about our lives. In every situation, we can come up with a number of ways to tell the story of it, and they're all a version of the truth. But we get to choose which version resonates the most with us, which one feels better to us, and then that informs our actions moving forward. Getting curious about the stories we tell can be an amazing form of self-care!

We hope today's episode sparks some fun insights for you and we invite you to dive deeper with our Episode Questions. Join us on Instagram or YouTube to continue the conversation and share your reflections.

Let’s dig deep, challenge paradigms, choose connection, and live joyfully!

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EPISODE QUESTIONS

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1. What stories are you holding on to about yourself, your partner, and your family?
2. Where are the stories coming from? From your parents during your childhood? The outside voices of society? Somewhere else?
3. Do you see the story in your self-talk? How else might you tell that story?
4. How does it feel to realize that you get to craft your own stories?

TRANSCRIPT

PAM: Hello and welcome to the Living Joyfully Podcast. We are very happy you're here exploring relationships with us, who we are in them, out of them, and what that means for how we move through the world.

And in today's episode, we are going to talk about stories, both the stories we tell ourselves and the stories we assign to other people, meaning what we think they're thinking. And yes, it can get very messy.

Now, this episode is a bit longer than usual, but we think it's worth it. Stories are intricately woven into our relationships with the people that we love, and that's because humans are storytelling animals. It's how we make sense of our world. In the book The Storytelling Animal, How Stories Make Us Human by Jonathan Gottschall, he wrote, "Story is for a human as water is for a fish - all encompassing and not quite palpable." I love that so much, because story truly is everywhere. And the language we choose makes a profound difference, because the stories we tell ourselves become our self-talk. That is why we want to be intentional about the language that we're using.

And what's really fascinating is that for pretty much any situation, we can come up with a number of ways to tell the story of it and they can all make sense and all could truthfully tell the story of that situation. And the thing to realize is, we get to choose which one resonates most and feels better to us, which then informs our actions moving forward, which calls back to our conversation in episode seven about how every moment is a choice. Stories and choice are woven together so well, aren't they?

ANNA: Oh my gosh. So much. For me, truly understanding the role of story has been so pivotal. That awareness allowed me to step back and observe, so, where's this story coming from? Does it feel real to me and who I am in this moment? Is it serving me? And if I've held onto it for a long time, why? Why have I held onto that story? And who would I be without it? That's one I love to think about. Who would I be? What would it feel like?

Because there's an energetic feeling to that. What do I feel without this story that I'm telling about myself or these people in my life? And those questions really can only come about onc