History is philosophy taught by example.

How many things have you done and lessons learnt that you could share with others. The challenge is in helping them understand the lesson without them having the same experiences. A wiser way for them to learn is from others rather than make the same mistakes in life as you. But how do you get these lessons across?

You have stories to tell

Stories can be told in two ways. Either from a technical or emotional point of view, very much in the way as shown in the old ’60’s television series Star Trek. Would you choose to approach a Life Story like Captain Kirk or maybe Mr Spock. Will you look at everything from an emotional point of view or will you look at things using the cold calculating methods of science and engineering.

Both systems are valid and depending on the topics, times in life and your personality, you may vary your approach from just explaining the facts to expressing the feelings and emotions that you have. Maybe it’ll be an ebb and flow of different styles even within a topic, depending on the points that need to be shared.

Most often it’s important to work with both of these methods. Sometimes there are experiences in life that bring with them emotions that can impact in negative ways if they are rehashed again. In these cases having a cold calculating attitude of “that’s just the way life sometimes is” can enable you to work through the issues and move onto getting the facts out so that others can understand the situation.

Then there are the times when talking of situations without any emotion misses the very essence and importance of those experiences, when all they needed was to include the creative aspects of emotion and description.

Sharing the lessons of life

There are many times in life where we all make mistakes and wish we had known better but that’s the way we’re told life is. We have to learn from our mistakes! But what if we can be told that the stove is hot rather than having to touch it.

Now that you’ve had some experiences in your life and learnt from others, you have the opportunity to share the lessons that you know. The trick is to explain and hopefully enable others to learn from your experiences. But how do you explain in a way they can grasp enough to learn from.

Lessons through the ages

Throughout the ages, myths and legions share the knowledge of how things are and how to live life. Some of these stories are designed to cause you to conform to the social norms, while others are to help you learn lessons from the past. Some are based on real stories, some are fabrications but all are designed to grab your attention and create an emotional response. It’s this emotion that causes you to take notice and hopefully learn from what is being shared.

Remember the story of the Pied Piper of Hamlin. A story filled with graphic descriptions of a rat plauge, followed by an opportunity to rid the village of the rats by the Pied Piper. If you remember the town folks eventually refuse to pay the piper, so he steals the children away never to be seen again.

That story if told to young children with all the graphic horror of the middle ages would cause an emotional response that would teach them a lesson to pay their dues or else there may be terrible ramifications. Sure, in this day and age it seems cruel to tell stories of stealing children but the power of emotive storytelling, in getting a lesson to be understood is still practiced with all great films, plays and television today. The emotional triggers used today teach you to learn the lessons of everything from drink driving to what toilet cleaner to use. So why not use the same story telling emotional power in sharing the l...