The Mindful Storyteller

"Imagination is the...priestess who against...the wishes of all systems and structures insists on celebrating the liturgy of presence."  - John O’Donohue, Eternal Echoes, p. 217.

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We may think of the dreamy storyteller as anything but present, but are they? As a teller of tales, I spend much more time listening for story than I do in the telling of story. Listening takes place in boundless spheres. Of course, we hear story in the books and articles we choose to read and in the films and shows we choose to watch. We also hear story in the conversations that we are privy to - whether it’s a two-minute exchange with an acquaintance in line at the coffee shop or intentionally sitting down with a beloved aunt for two hours on a Saturday morning. Where else does story touch us?

In one seminary class, our professor sent us outside - with notepads and with open eyes, ears, and hearts. The instruction was to go outside, listen, and come back with an original poem. It need not  be good, but it must be written. Did G-d speak to us? Did the campus pond, the sycamore, the passing squirrel whisper poetry in our ears? I can only say that “in listening, we heard” ...and recorded.

Of course, rather than some external source, it may be argued that we listened for our own imaginative musings. Debate about the source of the poem or story may interest your intellect, but of relevance to the storyteller is this: In listening, we hear.

And: Listening requires presence.

Every storyteller I have met is a mammal and mammals tend to enjoy being outdoors. There’s lots going on outdoors. Temperatures vary. Winds pick up or slow down. Birds are singing or silent or absent. The variety of species of insects within a mile radius of you right now is mind blowing. Storytellers, like most mammals, are very curious creatures.

They listen for story.

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Borrowing from my professor’s playbook: Grab a notepad and a pen or pencil. Put on your coat and warm hat if it’s chilly outside. Bring an umbrella if you wish, but get out there. Speak no words. Listen. Find a spot your drawn towards and, in silence, pay attention with your eyes. Listen with your eyes. Listen for at least seven minutes, then write (record) for at least eight minutes: a poem, thoughts, observations, maybe the beginning of a story. It need not be good - just listen, hear, and record.

(Music: Courtesy of Adrian Von Ziegler, "Sacred Earth." )

"Hope is the refusal to accept the reading of reality which is the majority opinion; and one does that only at great political and existential risk...hope is subversive...The language of hope and the ethos of amazement have been partly forfeited because they are an embarrassment...partly squelched because they are a threat...Speech about hope cannot be explanatory and scientifically argumentative; rather, it must be lyrical in the sense that it touches the hopeless person at many different points...The language of amazement is against...despair just as the language of grief is against...numbness...Hope is created by speech..." - Walter Brueggemann, The Prophetic Imagination, p. 65, 68-69 (1978/2001)

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“The language of hope and the ethos of amazement” have been the domains of storytellers for millenia. They still are. As tellers of tales, we are unbridled, not limited to the perceived limitations that ensnare and restrain the current “reality.”

Walter Brueggemann’s thoughts on hope grow out of his reflections on the prophets of the Hebrew Bible, but his observations on hope fit a much wider context. For example, scientists’ arguments about Global Climate Change have been largely ignored. While there are powerful forces at work attempting to undermine and muddy their scientific findings, it is also true that their arguments for change (i.e. their calls for hope) lack lyricism. Their scientific explanations and arguments do not “touch the hopeless person at many different points.” There is no lyricism of the poetic storyteller. We are left with either denial or hopelessness.

The work of the storyteller is not only to reflect who we are, but to mirror back to us who we can be. We are drawn toward inspiring stories. Why? What do they “inspire” in us? Is it not something better/greater/vaster/kinder/more worthy than what currently is? Our work as storytellers is to be agents of inspiration: You can do this. We can be this. This, too, is possible.

Saying some new reality is possible does not make it so. That is true. There is much more to it than that.

At the same time, saying and thinking that some better reality is an impossibility ensures that it cannot happen - at least until some subversive voice speaks with the “language of hope” and the “ethos of amazement.”

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Recall a story that inspired you. It may be from a film, a book, or a tale someone told you. What was it in that story that touched you? Was there something amazing that happened in the tale? Have you shared this story with others? Are there stories you sometimes tell yourself to awaken hope within? Are there other tales you share or would like to share that hold the possibility of inspiring hope in others?

(Music: Courtesy of Adrian Von Ziegler, "Sacred Earth." )

"The house of the [Scottish] story-teller is already full, and it is difficult to get inside and away from the cold wind and soft sleet without...There are many present - men and women, boys and girls. All the women are seated, and most of the men. Girls are crouched between the knees of fathers or brothers or friends, while boys are perched wherever - boy-like - they can climb...The [storyteller’s] tale is full of incident, action, and pathos. It is told simply yet graphically, and at times dramatically - compelling undivided attention..." - Alexander Carmichael, Carmina Gadelica, p. xxviii-xxix(Introduction) (1900)

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We may be jealous of those cultures and times when storytellers seemed to abound. What would it be like to have a storyteller arrive at your door, walk in, sit by the fireplace, and entertain your family for the evening?

Of course, we are inundated with stories. We have the weight of stories on the news, through social media and television. Then, there are the stories deemed as “entertainment,” endless films and TV shows - some of these even hold the same mythic elements as we might have found in that Scottish storyteller’s tales - magical creatures, heroic action, dazzling beauty, characters with noble aims or sinister intent, choices, fumblings, adventures, resolutions, further problems.

With all these stories and all this storytelling, why might one still hold envy for that old-fashioned storyteller knocking on the door - asking for a bit of food and lodging while offering to bring a few old tales to life?

Do not be too hasty to give answer to the question. Let’s just sit with it...and perhaps add a few additional queries: What would it be - to have this person enter your living space and transform it with their words, gestures, and expressions? What does it mean - the physicality of this being who holds story and from whom stories pour? The teller might be able and strong or feeble, bent, and weak - but how is it that they could occupy space in your home - and, simultaneously, begin to fill space in your mind and heart? And what is your reaction to this storyteller in your home - are you entranced by the tales or are you worried that he may be a “thief in the night”? Or worse? How are others in your home reacting? Are children and loved ones bored? Smiling in anticipation of the teller’s next word or gesture? Relaxing into a wakeful half-sleep as the teller’s story rolls on?

We humans are incredible creators: automobiles, rocket ships, cures for diseases, microchips, bridges, works of art, stories. We don’t know what we are capable of making. The impossible and unimaginable often becomes the imagined and the real.

Is it possible, even today, to create a community where a storyteller might knock on your door and offer a tale in exchange for a bit of food or lodging. It is impossible, of course, right?

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We are creating this world, our communities, our meanings.

Imagine this: Someone learns to tell a couple of stories - maybe folktales, maybe original stories - and/or perhaps a song or two. They then call five friends (maybe some of these friends have young children) and say, “Imagine if some night next month, without warning or a call ahead, I just show up on your doorstep ready to tell a tale or sing a song? Will you let me in...and share your dinner with me, too?” One of the five (maybe more) says, “Sure,” and, once again, the solid world of impossibility crumbles under the light weight of the magician’s feet.

(Music: Courtesy of Adrian Von Ziegler, "Sacred Earth." )

"Go out and look: If you want to know the stars you have to go out as often as you can and look at the sky...The number of constellations is not overwhelming...If you know thirty constellations...you have a good working knowledge of the sky. Make the acquaintance of two or three each time you go out and you will soon be familiar with all thirty." - H. A. Rey, The Stars: A New Way to See Them, p. 18, 20.

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If we visit an ancient site like New Grange in Ireland, StoneHenge in England, or the Adena and Hopewell Indian mounds in my home state of Ohio, we can see that ancient peoples saw themselves as living in relation to the moon, stars, and heavenly bodies. Traditions and rituals associated with solstice and equinox are not simply celebrations of the Earth, they are festivities recognizing the complex (and repeated) relational harmony of the Earth and its creatures to a greater universe beyond our bounds of understanding or observance. They are celebrations of vastness.

We live muted lives. Not “muted” as in unable to speak; no, we are quite noisy beings. We are “muted” as in muffled; we have put a damper on vastness. We speak little of the “light pollution” that has extinguished the stars overhead in our cities and suburbs, but the toxic consequences of this pollution are surely great. Amazing technologies enable us to explore the outreaches of our universe in ways unimaginable to previous generations. Ironically, our nightsky has been dimmed, so our eyes, minds, and hearts are less drawn to the heavens. Therefore, we are not moved with awe and wonder at the star-filled night.

It is no surprise that the constellations represented stories to our ancestors. To draw lines connecting dots of light in space, connecting these immense, blazing balls of fire, is to apply story and meaning to the unknowable vastness of the universe. Constellations represent myths and tales. Yet how many of us know the story of the Greek princess Andromeda, let alone the constellation tales of cultures beyond Greece and Rome? Even if we do know these stories, what relation do they have to the night sky? We are unable to see the dots of connection. The night sky has been dimmed.

There are probably state or national parks not too far distant from where you live.. What happens when we go camping with family or a few friends? You may not know many constellations or any stories associated with them, but, if you happen to camp on a clear night, you will probably look skywards more than you typically do. Take a moment and notice, in your body and mind, what you are feeling as you look up at that star soaked sky. Breathe in and out. Be mindful of what you are experiencing. It may be wonder and awe.

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Wonder and awe are food for storytellers. If a serious athlete must consume so many grams of protein, a formidable storyteller must taste a due measure of wonder. The starry sky was available to our ancestors each clear night of the year. Those of us living in cities and large towns are impoverished. We must seek the stars. So many souls are hungry. Be fed by the night sky.

(Music: Courtesy of Adrian Von Ziegler, "Sacred Earth." )

"First we are the apprentice, painstakingly learning the basics of our craft; then we become journeymen, trained apprentices who are able to travel from place to place practicing our craft; finally we become masters of our craft and are honored as repositories of skill."  - Caitlin Matthews, The Celtic Spirit, p. 73.

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In the year 1942, Ruth Sawyer stews over what can be accomplished with traditional storytelling in such modern times. She recalls an elderly upholsterer who visited her home in the 1920s to have some furniture recovered.

He told of his youth working in an upholstery guild of Europe in the mid-1800s. He said, “Money! We did not know what money was. We were sheltered; we were fed; we were taught. We lived only for our work - the rightness and beauty of it. We honored the guild, the master, and our patron saint. We knew if we were good, industrious boys we would be masters some day. Then it would be our turn to pass on to the apprentices the best of what we had learned, what we had invented for ourselves.” He laments that there is now neither pride nor honor in the work and that the young men want only “money - to earn and to spend.”

In a technocratic society that exalts speed, efficiency, money, and the latest technologies, elders are often seen as incompetent and superfluous, if not simply burdensome. One Tibetan teacher is blunt in his observation of Western culture, “In most areas, the grandparents’ wisdom is no longer needed, and they have no role to play. They end up in an old age home or a retirement community, and occasionally they come to visit their grandchildren and watch how nicely they play.”

Storytelling - and, even more so, Story Listening - represent radical acts of subversion. We do not have storytelling guilds with masters and apprentices like the European upholstery guild of the mid-1800s, but we do have elders and they do have stories. We can subversively choose to exalt slowness, inefficiency, and the old technology of a couple of mugs to hold our coffee or tea as we sit and listen and exchange stories with an elder.

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Is there an elder in your life that you’d like to spend some time with this month? (My 89-year-old mother still has her 97-year-old “big sister” - so your age may not preclude finding “an elder.”) Schedule a time to get together. Think of it as entering an old-time storytelling guild. The elder is the master. You are the apprentice. Appreciate their stories (even if you’ve heard them before). Note their tones of voice, their gestures (or lack of gesture), their facial expressions, their little nuances of speech. Appreciate their telling. Listen, enjoy, learn.

(Music: Courtesy of Adrian Von Ziegler, "Sacred Earth." )