A storytelling moment is an underestimated way of bringing the quiet back into our noisy and busy lives.   My own personal observation as a professional storyteller, as I have watched hundreds and thousands of people receive a story, is that the benefits of a storytelling moment are incredible!  As adults, perhaps what some of us could use is a little bit of story time on the rug!
When we are truly listening to a story—engaged in an oral storytelling moment where we take the position of listener—the possibility is there for a deep breath and some restoration.  And oh, how we need this today.  We live in a state of constant announcements and ringing and buzzing and vibrating… of instant information and virtual contact.  And some of what that does is so good and some of what that does is that it leaves us with little room for quiet.  An anxious undertone pervades our over-connectedness so much so that we can end up feeling a bit disconnected.  I appreciate the way one person explained their own personal phenomena with being very connected—“I can email, text, check messages or my Facebook anytime, anywhere I am, but I still feel like something is missing.  I feel this restlessness.”
When we lean into a story on purpose, without critique, simply receiving it, a bit of us is restored.  We have quieted—“Shhh-ed!”—the noise and now the power of a story can do its work:  the hard day we’ve experienced can now be replaced with a feeling of ease and calm, the worrisome things can disappear (for the moment), and perhaps that part of our own story that is starving can be nourished in the short moments of a story.
You don’t have to take my word for it.  You can test this out today and see what happens when you tell a story.  With courage, find a children’s book you loved or some really good human interest story from the newspaper, the internet or a magazine—something worth lifting off the page and reading aloud that contains a beginning, middle and end.  Read it through at least once and remember why you loved it in the first place.  Then, go find an audience—a family member(s), a friend(s) or a willing common group.  Face-to-face would be my first choice.  However, if for your storytelling moment it’s phone-to-phone or skype-to-skype, it’ll still work.  Invite them in with “I have a great story I want to share with you?”  Then simply read it and observe what happens in this experience.  I think you will be pleasantly surprised how good it feels to be the teller—the giver of the goodness of a story.
Now, I know I can hear at least one person saying, “But I can’t tell a story like you Melea.”  Here’s the magic.  Here’s one of the secrets to good storytelling—care about your audience and tell this story as if it were the most important story you had to tell them.
All it takes is one committed teller and one committed listener, but what can happen in those few moments of a story is simply amazing… and relaxing… and a restoring of the quiet.

© Melea J. Brock, February 14th 2009
Right-Side-Up Stories
Visit Melea’s website (www.astory4.com) and take a look at her new book and CD “Step Inside… Where Stories Come to Life” or navigate to the store page where there are other book and audio products, too.