Story

The power of a story is amazing.  Somehow a story allows us to connect in a manner which facts do not allow.  I was confronted with this a year ago in a meeting I was participating.

In the meeting, I was asked to tell the story of my success.  I started off telling the facts about why I thought we had been successful. I talked about insight I held on the market I was working in, as well as the strategy I used to bid, the effort to maximize the work that the overhead I had working in the office could handle.  Then our facilitator asked me if rather than share the facts, could I tell my story.

I had to struggle to determine where to start, what to tell, but in the next few minutes I began to gain some traction and I told my story, the emotion I felt, the struggles I encountered.  When I was done we went one by one around the room and asked each member of the group which presentation they liked better.

It was overwhelming how much more power the story was described as having than the facts and strategic points of information.

I think often our stories allow people to see our humanity, our errors, and even our sins.  These are the things that make us real, within a persons reach.  They are inspirational, because we have found our stories have similar scenes, we can no longer disqualify ourselves for the errors that were in the success story we just heard.  That is why we become inspired.  I can do this too!