CREATIVE STORYTELLING: TRAILBLAZING VIA TALEBLAZING

[continued from the Last Post.]

* inspire ‘internal branding’ about people getting things done;

* enable us to think, learn,communicate, and bond;

* help to create yearning, learning,earning organizations;

* infuse a human element into discussions (note that the crucial missing ingredient in most failed communications is humanity);

* help people feel acknowledged, connected, less alone, and more alive;

* tether us to something safe, thus acting as a life-preserver in a chaotic ocean of choice (which often leaves us as disembodied voices begging for attention);

* help us to feel more than just a dot on a bell curve!

The vital issues of this world are ultimately decided by the story that grabs the most attention and is repeated most often.

The Values Embedded in Storytelling:

For the individual:

* Inspires interest in life, stimulates imagination, sharpens intellect, and propagates innovation by enhancing our ability to: think, feel, listen, speak, narrate, communicate with empathy, and above all, to understand ourselves, and thus excavate meaning from life in order to bond with one another;

* Awakens our interest in other cultures, enlightens us with a deeper understanding of our own, and builds bridges across the oceans of consciousness that separate us through prejudice, bigotry, and fanaticism;

* Engenders ideas via subtle shifts in contexts, whereby a pinball effect of associations can lead one from breakdown to breakthrough;

For a community, an organisation, or a nation:

* Transforms and regulates behaviour by communicating morals, values, beliefs, and the infinite wisdom of the ages;

* Archives history, preserves tradition, and propagates harmonious evolution for future generations to learn from past wisdom;

* Propagates strategic thinking, leadership, innovation, and entrepreneurship via its inherent structure;

* Promotes group bonding through shared joys and sorrows;

* Nurtures empathetic leadership whereby leaders learn to communicate in response to diverse scenarios: through their powers of storytelling, they can calm a mob, energise a nation, and turbocharge conviction in order to realise a greater good!

[Excerpted from the 'Catalysing Creativity' edition of The Braindancer Series of book azines by Dilip Mukerjea. All the images in this post are the intellectual property of Dilip Mukerjea.]