Storytelling is a very common art form in our life. It’s different from drama. Drama has more visual elements, but storytelling is mainly working on your inflection and facial expressions. It has less visual elements like body language and props. A successful storyteller can awaken the other person’s imagination and talk that person into the world that you have described through your words. It helps train the audience’s attentiveness, listening skills and make their brain dynamic.
In such a high-tech world, our visual sense has been trained so well by profuse entertainment, that we start to neglect or even kill our other senses or skills like listening and the ability to imagine. And this is very dangerous. Can you imagine a bunch of people who lose the ability to imagine, don’t know how to think and can’t stay quiet to listen to something or meditate on it. In Amusing Ourselves to Death, the author said what we like will lead us eventually to total destruction. What do we like today? We like videos, movies and pictures. What do we dislike today? We dislike reading, thinking and listening. However, we are born with a pair of ears to listen, a mind to think and imagine. So storytelling is a powerful tool which enables us to live out part of the meaning of our life.
I still remember when I was young, my dad used to tell me lots of stories: stories about my family history, stories about The Water Margin and The Romance of the Three Kingdoms and etc. I still remember it very clearly today because in my imagination I have depicted all of the characters’ appearance and their personality. It was a very interesting process. Storytelling is gift to make us more creative and arouse our imagination. Just imagine, in the future, you sit on a meadow, enjoying the warm and bright sunshine, cool breeze sweeping over your face, and there you tell your children about your life story or other stories. This is used to be an important culture or element in a healthy family. However, it’s beginning to disappear or it has disappeared in some families. If we don't defend this good culture and powerful tool, eventually we will lose it.
So, I want to encourage you. Please stay alert in such a high-tech world, and storytelling is one of the powerful weapons to keep you alert. Why not try it in your life?
