Vocality, AI and soulful mushrooms with David Sewell McCann

🍄In this episode, I speak with David Sewell McCann about the directionality of voice and stories, the importance of bodies in connection, how being a dunce might be the only way forward, and about the mighty radiance of our mycelium soul. In short, a conversation for the ages :)

🧭 Find David online:
Website : https://howtostory.org
Instagram : https://www.instagram.com/storyingwithdavid/
The storying project : https://thestoryingproject.com/about/
Medium : https://storyingwithdavid.com/

📚What we talk about in this episode
Ivan on the stove : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sivko-Burko
John Duns Scotus : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duns_Scotus

Get notified when the Silken Mirror membership opens in 2023 : http://eepurl.com/dxzCk9

Follow us on Instagram @moonlitpathchannel

This podcast is hosted by Laure Porché: http://laureporche.com. You can follow me on Instagram @laureporche
If you're enjoying the podcast, consider sharing it or leaving a review on Apple Podcast :)

Transcript

[00:00:00] Laure: Hello, everyone. Today on the podcast I am honored to welcome David Sewell McCann. David has written, published over 1400 original stories and has decades of experience helping educators leaders, elected officials and anyone who wants to say important things. His current work focuses on teaching Restorative Storytelling to Change Makers and working with children around the world at Story Steps Education.

[00:00:35] I also want to add some credit. There is a whole section of this podcast where I speak about how we attune to each other with our bodies in a group. And I just wanted to say that all I know about this, I learned from my teacher Jane Peterson who was on the podcast a few months ago. 

[00:01:00] And now without further adieu and for your enjoyment my conversation with David. 

[00:01:08] Hi David. Thank you so much for coming on the podcast.

[00:01:11] David: Hi Laure. I'm really looking forward to this. This is gonna be fun.

[00:01:14] Laure: So I'll jump straight into it and ask you the question of this podcast, which is, what's your favorite story? And what do you think it says about who you are?

[00:01:26] David: I told myself that I wouldn't prepare or give that question any thought, but would respond in the moment. And strangely, the, the story that's bubbling up, I don't know if it qualifies as a favorite story, but it's the story that's at hand. It's a Russian fairytale. It's actually a character in a number of fairy tales, and I'm pretty sure the character is lazy Ivan. Lazy Hans or Ivan on the stove.

[00:01:58] Laure: Mm-hmm.

[00:01:59] David: And so this is a character that is analogous to, in other fairytale traditions, kind of what would be called the Third Son. You know, so the first, the first two are very clever and will go off into the world with their various weapons and tools of cleverness and strength and very traditional ways of, of making your way in the world.

[00:02:26] And then the third, sometimes considered the simpleton, sometimes considered lazy. But usually kind is a, is a pretty standard quality in this character. And the laziness was always interesting to me. So I I, I was an elementary school teacher for a number of years and you know, I would, would use the fairy tales, tended to be mostly the Western fairy tales. Later on I got more interested in, in other traditions. And this character always confused me because it was this third son, this third child that was lazy and simple, managed to win the day and generally did so by being kind to a magical being, you know, like the old gray woman in the woods or something like that, and share his lunch or do something along those lines and then would be empowered out of that act of kindness with some magical item there. So, I'm meandering my way and sorting out what this may have to do with me, and I think that what's happening recently, I'm in this in between phase where I'm leaving Austin, Texas and moving to Massachusetts. I'm experiencing a lot of stillness these days and a lot of quietness and the fruits of that are bountiful. And I am historically a very hardworking person that fills all the hours with productivity. I have a history of of, of being very productive, and that has been great too. But I think I'm entering into something new that Ivan on the Stove has something to teach me.

[00:04:11] So we can start there.

[00:04:13] Laure: That's lovely. It's kind of the opposite of hustle culture. You know, and that, that kind of productivity and capitalism and all of that, what I like is that this character exists in pretty much all traditions. It's one of these characters, like archetypal characters that you find in Japanese fairy tales or Russian fairy tales, like everywhere.

[00:04:35] And it sounds like a lovely kind of movement for you. To kind of move into that, cuz there's that notion of space which I find interesting and I, I hadn't necessarily planned to talk about that, but like space and storytelling and, you know, how important the space within the story can be or like the, the silences and how much space you make for the people to hear what you're saying. For me that, that kind of brings me into that way of thinking.

[00:05:07] David: Well, I, I teach this, I teach adults and I teach children storytelling techniques and these days, more story listening techniques. And I would say probably the most important tool, at least the one that has my attention most these days is the container. And so the the story event will have a storyteller, a person talking, a story, the content and then a listener. And what's occurring to me these days is that they're all mixed in together into the same container. And it's not a thing that I hear people taking very seriously or formalizing the idea that we're gonna create a container, we're gonna go into it, and then we're gonna leave it and it'll be over.

[00:05:58] It tends to be something either, you know more like entertainment where it's more casual or recognizing how profound it is, but forgetting to actually acknowledge and celebrate its edges. Which I think gets a little messy. So in order to really inhabit the space of a story experience and to allow for and potentize those precious moments of silence I'm finding that the, the containing process is becoming essential. We're beginning, we're ending.

[00:06:34] You and I are involved. There's a story that we're batting back and forth and sometime in the future, others are going to listen to this and they're a part of this process right now too. So formalizing it, it kind of changes the, the posture of the moment. You know, we, we feel the other people here. And when I was recording stories, and I've done this a lot, I could feel the listeners in the future listening to them.

[00:07:00] Laure: Mm. I love that idea. I love that idea. I feel that a lot when I record solo episodes where I feel that connection, depending on my state of the day and like how aligned I am. But if you, if I'm really, addressing people and not just like, you know, talking off the top of my head. I can definitely feel them. And that notion of container I think is really important and interesting. I'm a therapist, so I come from a lineage where container is really important and especially the way that I was taught because I do family constellation. So the, there's a lot of emphasis on the container and also my experience as a participant in general in experiences, whether they're online or whether they're in person how much space there is in the container for me to digest my own experience is capital, and it's so rare. It's actually so rare. Very often you get into a container, whatever it is, like, whether it's therapeutic, whether it's, you know, storytelling, whatever it is. And so much emphasis is put on content. And you know, like, okay, I'm gonna use this, we have this limited time and I'm gonna like, use this time to give you all the content that I can possibly can.

[00:08:16] And then, and it's not to say that this is a bad thing necessarily, but I find that very often there's an overestimation of what people can actually integrate and hear within a set time or set period of time. And I, I expect that with story is kind of the same. If you want the story to kind of reach people's bodies also because the body's pace is slower than the mind, right? So if you want the story, whatever you're saying, to reach people's bodies, you'd, you'd have to work in this space so that the body can actually get it.

[00:08:52] David: I agree. My experience as a storyteller, and this gets more nuanced when it's me by myself in my recording space, but at least these days with teaching, it's become really clear that I don't know specifically from a content standpoint what the listener needs or wants or is receiving. So what I've found, my job is to actually respond. And in order to respond, I need to spend a lot of time listening, paying attention, because the content, the words, the meaning of the words is a, turns out, pretty small percentage of what's actually being received and integrated by the people in the room. Studies that I've looked at will put the non-verbal communication at the highest percentage.

[00:09:47] So that's my bearing. That's the gestures, that's what my eyebrows are doing. That's my eye contact, that's my sense of space and energy. And and then the vocality of what's my voice doing. There are a number of people whose content I really like, but it's work for me to listen to them. I find certain sounds to be disruptive.

[00:10:13] Laure: Mm.

[00:10:13] David: And I also respond with resistance towards an incoherence in the communication. So the content is saying one thing, but their affect and gestures and the look in their eyes is saying something else. And I feel like a kindergartner that's in the presence of a, of a teacher that is putting on a calm face when I can tell that they're not calm at all. They don't wanna be there. And it's disrupting, you know, it's strange for me, and again, I'm not, I'm not even criticizing that.

[00:10:45] I don't think that there's anything wrong with that. It's just nice to know why my body is responding this way and be able to tick through. Oh, okay. So they're speaking wisdom that they don't necessarily practice in this moment or, you know, it's a completely coherent thought, but I don't like the message, you know, or, or whatever's happening. It's a wide spectrum of, of experiences that happen. So I'm with you and I do think that interactions are ultimately... what's the word I want? Well, I wanted to say therapeutic, but that's so specific. We're transforming each other in every interaction, and I enjoy becoming more and more conscious of that as I practice.

[00:11:33] Laure: I love that you're talking about this. I actually just recorded an Instagram video on how much emphasis we put on meaning and how we ignore, a lot of the time, the energy that comes behind words, like everything else, basically, you know, prosody and, and physicality, and just the energy behind it. And how, for me, it's impossible to turn that off. Like, I can't turn that perception off. I can't rely on meaning, I rely on everything else. And so I really resonate with you when you say, like, some people are, it's difficult for me to listen to them, or... I have the same experience because I cannot not see it or I cannot not hear it.

[00:12:14] In a way it's great because for instance it's really hard to manipulate me. Because I can feel, even if the person makes total sense, I can feel everything else behind it. So I think I'm lucky in that way. But I love that you're talking about this and the way that you're talking about it also, and also the way that you talk about story and talk about voice. I feel that I don't think I've ever heard somebody talk about directionality in like the way you talk about story and voice is very directional. It's very space oriented and I think that's lovely because it obviously directly connected to the body because we are bodies in space. And the way that you talk about it immediately takes it out of the mind and puts it into a s spatial experience, which I'm really curious about. Like how you, you know, what brought you to that or like how you came to that vocabulary and way of speaking.

[00:13:15] David: Yeah, me too. It's an ever developing thing. It's very responsive the way that this is happening. So the most recent event has been the response on social media, on Instagram. So I responded by formalizing it because I only have my experience and I intuitively behave within the storytelling context in a way that has worked. And so for years and years, it was content creation by way of deeply connecting with remote listeners. So I was recording, I was writing, producing, and recording stories at a very high rate that were all responsive to something that kids were, you know, that was a challenge for children. And I would know this because they'd send in emails and say, you know, I love the stories and you know, this is going on in our house. I don't know if you have a story about that. And if I didn't, then I would, then I would create one. So I was responsive in that way and I would engage in a process. It tended like so many things to fall into this four step-ness. So I already had this way of producing that had a four-ness to it and the the four was widening and opening up my attention. Then being into and checking in with my body in this sort of inward, so it was kind of, it started outward. Notice everything. And then come inward and notice everything within, and then take action.

[00:14:54] You know, that would give me some prompt, the out and in would give me a prompt to move forward. And then recognizing that the whole thing is contained within this safety of an experience that had a beginning and end. And, and so that, that sense of the, of those four steps, which could be interchangeable and happened at different points, helped me with the production. And that was when I was the eldest son and I was going off with my tools and building houses and, you know slaying dragons and doing all the things and some real good content was created out of that, helpful, that gets reflected back, et cetera. Then as moving into teaching the formalizing of that four step now needed to be able to be something that I would transfer.

[00:15:42] And so the four steps showed up both in the storytelling, but more importantly in the story listening. And so they look different. I don't need to get into those unless we want to talk about that another time. So when there was this response on Instagram around me talking about Vocality, and the only thing I said was that this particular singer has fairies in her voice. And then suddenly everybody was very excited about this and wanted to know more. And so I sat with it and realized that when I listen to, to people or animals or the world, I tend to go into that up, down, forward back place again.

[00:16:22] So what is that with Vocality? And I realized it was the same thing, that in a voice, in someone's voice when they speak in a few seconds, you can hear a level of detachment and all the stuff that's flying around. So those are the fairies. So the content of what they're saying and their experience of wonder around the content can be very magical and very, very potently fairy like. And then the opposite direction down and in is this world of, you know, in the Tolkien universe would be the, the dwarves or the trolls in the mountain. Building, building, building, crafting, cutting. And the thing that came from that was a sense of endearing connection. So when I'm telling a story or listening to a story or just, you know, being in the world, I am genuinely interested in making connections. I, I like that. I think most people do. And so as opposed to being detached and aware of everything, now I am completely and utterly connected and I wanna maintain that. And that's the gift of the, of the troll, as I say. So we've got fairy content, connection, troll, and then a story. And voices are always saying something or making some sort of utterance. That's the action. That's the movement. That's the change. That's the forward movement. And I've ascribed that to the dragon. So hot and, and changeable and you know, with our voice, we have great power and so does the dragon. Left to its own devices, we've experienced vocality from people that, you know, it almost hurts. It can be so intense. So all three of those do well in the back direction being contained. And that's the container. And the container brings a sense of safety, a sense of solidity of, I, I know what this is, but it's also fluid and watery and it's like a glass of water, you know? It's just filled with everything that we need, but it's contained.

[00:18:38] And so I've been calling that the water nymph or the mermaid. So we've got fairies, content, trolls, connection, dragons, movement and change, and the mermaid, the container of it. And you can hear that in, in people's voices, different amounts of those four.

[00:18:56] Laure: Yeah, absolutely. And I remember when I saw this, I was already following you and I saw your video about fairies, the first one that went viral. And because I have a shamanic background, I wasn't sure if you were talking literally or not which you could have been. Cuz actually your definition of those qualities are pretty accurate in terms of the quality of those beings in reality, if you wanna go that way. But I thought it was kind of genius, the connection of those qualities with voice quality, which is so important in that also vocality is such a huge tool. When you were saying, you know, we transform each other when we meet, our interactions. And that also comes through the voice so much, I feel. The voice is incredible tool of regulation and dysregulation depending on how you're using it. And also it's really hard to hide anything, if you know how to listen. And if you listen to people's voices, you can hear their inner state through the state of their voice. I can hear my inner state in my voice, like I know that my voice is immediately affected by nerves or by, you know, however I'm feeling at the moment. Which I find fascinating.

[00:20:14] David: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yes.

[00:20:16] Laure: Yeah, and how you can regulate a room, and I, I think storytellers do that really well. But it's also a great therapeutic tool of how you can regulate a group just with your vocality and the sound of your voice and how you're using your voice, or how you can infuse energy into instance, in my case, like a, a constellation or something just by speeding up my pace or, you know, moving into a different voice quality. So those tools, I love how simply you are modeling that and you are creating a framework for people to understand that in a very imaged way, I guess.

[00:20:54] David: I think that's key that that's where my paying attention to how people respond is really helping me understand it better myself. Because like, for instance, the, the mermaid image can be confusing to people depending on what their context is with that. There's a fair number of stories about mermaids and dragons and trolls. Generally, you know, and it depends, people with Irish descent have a different relationship with fairies, you know, everybody's got the different context. So to, to land on a singular image is always a little tricky. So what I try to do is to actually say the words in a way that the listener can get what I mean in the vocality, rather than it being harnessed to the contextual narrative density that they hold around it. You know, a dragon is a very different creature, community to community. Held in, in awe and high regard in some places and, and you know, and the very representation of evil in other places. And so it's, it's tricky to do that, but if you couch it in the sound in a voice and what our bodies do in response to that sound, then I'm finding that people are, are. Are more comfortable with it, they can kind of transcend their, their context and, and be able to actually experience rather than understand what's being said. The one creature that I didn't mention that is still very much a work in progress. I've been experimenting with it in my own voice and working with others is the unicorn.

[00:22:41] And I wasn't quite sure where the unicorn went. I just knew that the unicorn needed to be involved. What a remarkable beast and it's the directionality and the focusing of it that has my attention. I don't fully get it yet, but I'm, I feel pretty certain that the unicorn can be used in any direction and at the moment, the best I can say about it is that it will narrow and intensify, which in the case of, say for instance the, the fairy, the gift of that is that fairies can be very dispersed. You fill the room, you know, all over the, I could see them all over in here, but uh, but the unicorn will kind of narrow it so that we can move into Dragon and actually, you know, tell a story rather than get lost in all the options. You know, I'm a very dispersed person and so I could use a little unicorn focus. Whereas like with the troll, we in the troll can really get lost on our own thing. And so the unicorn will help maintain that tether to the listener so that we can be responsive. And the dragon can burn a whole city with its power, so the unicorn will will give it a particular place for that energy to go and instead of getting completely lost in the waters we can use the unicorn to stay present to what's happening, what's going on, where we are. But like I said, I don't really understand it yet, but uh, it's fun to play with.

[00:24:17] Laure: I love that. Yeah, it's like an element of balance in a way. 

[00:24:21] David: Nice. That's helpful.

[00:24:23] Laure: But I love that. You know, I think partly also you were talking about the cultural difference between how people perceive you know, those beings and stuff. And I think partly yes, the fact that you're connecting it to voice is helpful. But I think it's also your own perception and understanding and embodiment of what those words or those beings are for you, that comes across cuz that's my understanding with words. I have a, a sense that words have a lot of dimensions. Um, I actually teach this sometimes. Any word would have like 10 or 15 dimensions. And everybody has very personal relationship and a very personal lexicon or vocabulary that is not based on meaning, but that is based on sensory reality, like what the word brings up in the body. And I feel like the more connected you are to that, to your own, embodied sense of words, if you will, or your own relationship to the many dimensions of a word, and the more you can literally take people with you. One word will have for me or for anyone, but people are not, not generally aware of it so you kind of have to bring them on that journey, a word will have like a thousand stories contained within, not connected to its meaning, but connected to how it feels in the body to say it or to hear it. And when you're connected to that, I find that you can literally take people and bring them with you in your experience of that word or what you were talking about. And I feel like because you've been working with stories for so long and just because of what I'm getting from your perception and your understanding of the world, I guess, I think that's something that you do uh, whether you know it or not, and that's probably also what allows you to use those images and kind of bring people into your own perception of what they are connected to.

[00:26:30] David: It is remarkable and fundamental power. It is a, a thing to take very seriously and with I believe with a sense of humility and service because I've experienced how this can be used for personal gain and I witness it happening quite a bit in circles of power. Noticing, oh, look at them, look at them using the same tools in order to get what they want. It's written in all the spiritual texts, you know, that, that we can quite literally change reality with our words. It's a generative, but it's also destructive. There's a term that I'll use, haven't seen it anywhere, but I feel like somebody else must be using this cuz it's so helpful for me. I, I used it once already. This idea of narrative density so that there are certain words or phrases that you can use that are incredibly dense and they're dense with context and their ability to transform. And it's different from person to person, but over time we become members of, you know, a network that respond to this word or phrase pretty immediately. And I noticed this being wielded in a presidential election where here in the States where one of the candidates, I watched the moment that it happened, discovered a word, and was practiced in reading the room and saw its effect and therefore continued to use it. And in my opinion, it's what won the election. And so it is a very simple thing that most of us just get swept up into without a, a measure of consciousness that that's what's happening. Is that there is essentially a magic spell being spoken, and it is sweeping us all along unless you have the counter to it, which is the ability to listen to it and know that it's happening and feel your body and say, oh, look at, look at me being pulled in that direction. And then you can choose whether or not you want to go or not. So this, that's my interpretation of what I hear you saying right now is is it, it's true wizardry, you know?

[00:29:03] Laure: Yeah. I agree.

[00:29:05] David: Mm-hmm.

[00:29:06] Laure: I agree. And I, I guess also that's why you're going in the direction of restorative storytelling and, you know, using this tool and this power for consciousness, which is what this podcast is all about, right? It's about how stories can change the world and change us. But yeah. I'm curious about what you see in the culture right now. Which is in your opinion, the most detrimental or the most you know, that that takes us further away from the restorative power of story and also the capacity to listen consciously.

[00:29:46] David: I don't know if I can necessarily speak to what is detrimental as much as I am seeing a trend that when I play it out, it's another step in evolution. And so or whatever the, whatever our development as a species or consciousness is headed towards, cuz it feels pretty tight and polar and hardened and you know, anxious, however, it also feels like the squeeze before something new happens.

[00:30:23] And so there's a advent that we're in right now, several, but one of them has to do with technology and Ai. And so Ai, artificial intelligence, even that phrase is now controversial but Is able to, from a storytelling context, able to write stories, good stories. And I don't know that it's quite there yet, but it will be there soon enough where an artificial intelligence will be able to tell those stories really well.

[00:30:52] So we storytellers like to think that storytelling is a, is a human thing. It, it's what makes us human. But if an artificial intelligence, if a robot is able to write and tell good stories, then what's the human part of that? And I believe that what the human part of that is, is the embodied way in which we connect. And so storytelling seems to me, back to the other conversation around us speaking existence into being, is that why we do that is not for riches or attention or even safety. I, I actually think that the reason why we do that is to connect. Whether it's with each other or the earth or an energetic impulse, and I'm not sure that AI is interested in that. And so maybe at some point it'll be designed to explore that.

[00:31:54] I don't know, it's hard for me to really see because I don't know what the benefit is. So genuine connection is not connection for a purpose. It's not connection in order for me to manipulate you or a connection in order for me to even serve you, it's just, you know, a forest connected with mycelium, you know, we just like it.

[00:32:17] It just feels good and we're giving each other nutrients, and a tree dies and that's what happens. Another one grows. That's what happens. That just for me, in my experience of life, I'm glad I've been around this long because I feel like this is a recent thing that I've noticed is that I just like being here right now. And so if I can tell a story and be here right now or if I can listen to a story and be here right now or sit in silence and be here right now, that's really satisfying. 

[00:32:53] Laure: Yeah. And that asked the question of, you know, is real connection possible without a body? And I personally, I don't think so and I think that this movement towards AI and in general, like over technologization of the world is just a reflection of the denial of the body that, you know, has been happening. Where a lot of people are very disconnected from the fact that they have, you know, they are a body. We don't have a body. We are a body. Our body perceives like billion more information than our mind. Yet the society and the world around us want to make us believe that we're just like a head on a stick, right? And like that we are a thinking being. Which is totally untrue because even our interactions, 70% of our interaction goes through bodies in space. It's not about what we say to each other. So much information is already exchanged just from the way that we stand with each other or just from the way that we, you know, interact physically.

[00:33:57] And if you watch any kind of sped up video of a group, for instance, you'll see the bodies attuning to each other and starting to, you know, move in waves, totally unconsciously. But that's what creates connection, right? It's not, oh, we've all told something and we've all, but why do we feel that sense of safety that we can say something or be vulnerable is because our bodies have done the work to attune to everybody else in the group and be like, oh, okay, now we're in sync.

[00:34:28] Okay, now we can go. Now we, now we're one being in a way, like we're one physical kind of entity. And it's kind of sad for me that most people are not aware of this and that, you know, that that idea that AI can replace that in some way is, yeah, I can't, I 

[00:34:47] David: And it's in, in my experience, and I'm, I'm assuming probably in yours as well, it's not that hard to, to someone that's feeling completely disconnected, isolated, and you can see them. You can see them in everything that's about them. Boy, it doesn't take much to just connect with them and for them to transform before you in less than a second.

[00:35:10] And that, that's, you know, the pleasure of being a gardener. You know, you just, this plant's not doing well. I'm gonna pay attention to it for a little while and, and see what's there. There's nothing more satisfying for me. You know, whether it's somebody that I know or somebody that I don't know, they're being, you know, we get wrapped up in the specificity of our actions.

[00:35:31] Every street corner here in Austin has got someone panhandling looking really rough and the little cardboard sign and, and you know, can you help with this or that? And we can get all wrapped up into, do I give money? Do I not give money, do I interact, do I make eye contact? Do I talk to 'em, do I wave? Is that going to give them the wrong? There's all these questions, et cetera, on how to respond in that moment and like entering into the, you know, what's, what's your favorite story and what does that say about you? If you can withhold that for the moment and just kind of land in your body, your body will tell you what to do the next right thing, not necessarily way off into the future. And you may suddenly give them, the takeout that you had in the passenger seat, or you might suddenly just wink at them or not engage. These are all options and you can make yourself crazy in trying to think your way towards an answer. 

[00:36:42] I haven't had much success with that. I tend to create layers and layers of possibilities, whereas if I can as, as you say, if I can land in my body, there's a philosophy that, that I studied for a while because of the school that I taught. It was the philosophy behind the education and there was this, this concept of heart thinking, being the next stage of thinking that there was this mind thinking that, you know, it came from this idea of there being these periods of evolution in, in the development of the human being and that there was a time where we really needed to build our intellectual mind and really create logic and all of that stuff, and we did it.

[00:37:24] We nailed it. And so now we have that thing. We don't necessarily need to keep growing it. Now it's time to grow the heart as a decision making entity, as a communicator, as all of these things that we've, you know, focused on the brain. We're doing a new thing now. It's the heart. And I like that because it's embodied, it's coherent and for me, it's way easier, way easier than trying to think through stuff now.

[00:37:52] Laure: Yeah, I've been, I've been trying to go that direction too, even though my mind is very, very well trained. Especially because I'm French and right. Like that's, we think therefor we are in my country, which is terrible. It's terrible. So it, it kind of brings me to my next question of like that sense of evolution and which is also something that I ask everybody who comes on the podcast, which is, if your life was a hero's journey what would be the quest. If your whole life, just like the whole arc what do you think your, you are moving towards?

[00:38:27] David: Oh well. There is a, I don't want this to come off as a, as sounding like a criticism of a mechanism. So the mechanism is the hero's journey model of the adventure. I have been for most of my life, so focused on that model and have more recently, in the last five years or so, started exploring a different model and I don't know what to call it other than the closest that I've found is, is in the recovery model. So it's not so much, you know I guess there's that shadow portion of the hero's journey where you enter in and fall and, and then are given the tool, given the elixir that you can then take into this final chapter. I'd like to take out of my story, any concept of winning and any concept of even leading as an individual.

[00:39:34] And the, the story that's bubbling up for me now really is the fool in particular the dunce. I'm probably not going to describe this correctly cuz I, I'm not studied in it. So I'm just going to tell you my story about what I learned and this thinker, John Duns Scotus, I think is the name, tail end of the medieval period, the beginning of Renaissance had this concept of the human being... sort of like the, the wave idea where we're everything, we're all God, everything rocks, all of it's God. And at the same time, we are given this ability to perceive that we're a singular thing. Neither are right or wrong, we're both. And the Renaissance came in and said: This doesn't make any sense. That's foolish. And the root is towards the individual and, and building this sense of self, building, this sense of logic. And it's through thinking that we're gonna arrive at the right place to go. The next right thing will be decided through individuated thought. Don't listen to that fool. He's a dunce. John Duns Scotus. Dunce. And so I'm doubling back and thinking, actually that's, that's my journey is to become a dunce and to not actually know what I'm doing. But to be really clear with that and say, I am a part of a system. I'm a part of a vast system, and I am you and I am this plastic recorder, and I am my dogs, I am all of these things and like a mushroom, I'm just temporary expression of that. And then I'm just gonna rot back into the soil again. And so while I'm up and about and people can see me and and say, Ooh, a mushroom, I'm going to to do stuff and spread the good news of being a mushroom. 

[00:41:54] Laure: Spread your spores.

[00:41:56] David: Yeah, just shoot 'em all over the place. I don't know what's gonna happen to 'em. I don't know what it, what the world's gonna do with these spores, and it's not my problem. And then I just am going back into the earth, you know, and taking full responsibility for every single one of those spores and while I'm here on the planet and, and just be this, this flowering, you know, and then it's gone.

[00:42:19] And so that's kind of where I'm at right now is I've got ambitions, I really think that restorative storytelling is, is an important tool for this time for us to be able to listen and speak with a sense of restoring ourselves back to the whole, back to connectedness. But you know, maybe someone, maybe one of my, of, of the people that, that learns this will actually be the one that takes it forward into the world. Or their student. Or their student. And I'll just have my little, my little part of the process. That image works better for me than than my understanding of the, of the hero's journey at this stage in my life.

[00:43:01] Laure: I love this. I'm not especially a fan of the hero's journey. I asked this question cuz it's, I think it's interesting. 

[00:43:07] David: And people know it. Yeah. They know what you're talking about.

[00:43:10] Laure: But I like that when it sparks something like your response, which is like I'm like moving towards something else. Cause I'm like, yay, that sounds better for the world. And so as, as this mushroom coming out of the ground and just being here for a little while however you understand the concept of soul, cuz it's different for everybody and I don't wanna impose like my own understanding of it, and I like that people answer from different places. When do you feel that you are closer to your own soul? And then when do you feel when you're closer to other people's soul, if it's different?

[00:43:43] David: Well, the word that comes to mind is when I am feeling eternal. So in that case, I go under the ground and get into the mycelium. That's kind of where my understanding of soul is. Like the mushroom, the little song and dance that I'm doing right now. This this, you know, beautiful flower that's fun and awesome.

[00:44:03] And I love my relationships. I love the people in my life. I love that I'm moving. I like my job. I like, you know, it's, this is a gas. This game that we're playing, it is so much fun and I'm going to enjoy it to its fullest. And while I'm doing that, I'm recognizing that, you know, the, what we call mushrooms are actually felted mycelium. So it's it's concretized energy, energy. That's buzzing around as a network of wholeness beneath us, but it like, gets all tangled up into a momentary blossom and we, we do our thing, you know, we start a business, I'm a storyteller, you know, or, or whatever. And, right, it's so fun. I'm gonna be the storyteller. You be the therapist, and let's do like an interview and we'll, we'll talk about stuff and then it'll end and we'll see what happens after that. It's, it's great fun. And meanwhile, we're sending these electrical charges into the mycelium, that who knows what's being fed by them. Who knows what we're up to. You know, that's, that's for me, the soul is, is that I get to be a part of something that's everywhere and always, and you know, I'll spin a few yarns while I'm on the surface.

[00:45:30] Laure: I love this. I think this is possibly like my favorite answer that's ever been on the podcast.

[00:45:36] David: Oh, wow. I don't know what I'm talking about unfortunately, but...

[00:45:40] Laure: That's great. That, but that's the thing, you know, like I'm, that's, I'm aiming for that as well. Like, I'm, I'm a bit of a control freak, but I have hope then in another 20 years, I can live my life without knowing what I'm doing. That would be great.

[00:45:51] David: Yeah, it's great fun when once you recognize, oh, oh, I don't know what's going on. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:45:58] Laure: So I think you have a lot of trainings and you, you got a lot of stuff going on, so do you wanna talk a little bit about that? If people are interested to work with you?

[00:46:08] David: Yeah, I, I would like to work with people. I have for the last few years been teaching this restorative storytelling, and in the past it's been in a more traditional training model where I have a cohort and work them, and work with them for about a year and a half in three different levels.

[00:46:27] The first one is all about the storyteller's body and voice. The second level is about the actual telling of the story, and the third, which I think is the most transformative, is the listening. That's borne a lot of fruit and, and, and a lot of really great stuff has come out of that.

[00:46:42] And people have graduated from that program and they're now teaching restorative storytelling. And I've decided that instead of it being that model, because the people who have graduated wanna stay in practice. I'm doing a membership model that just doesn't stop. So you can hop on that train for as long as you'd like and have full access to all three levels, all the content and the tools, it's tool-based, and then be able to practice with us as often as you'd like.

[00:47:13] So those are the first two levels of membership and then there's a top tier membership where it's only gonna be about 25 people, so likely it will be filled. But I'm doing this thing called Golden Thread readings, and those will be available to anybody that wants to sign up. I only do a few a week.

[00:47:31] This is kind of the new threshold and something that I'm really interested in. It's something I've been doing, but not in a formal way and will be formalizing and and offering that come end of this month. And so when this launches, I think it should be in full swing. Where I will engage in the story and in the story that, that you have created. And you, whoever you are, will come to me with a question and then will use those four directions to actually engage in that from a distance. Looking at the actual story itself in connection where we both inhabit the story, contained, so that we can actually be able to see it both with some objectivity and then if there is a, an interest in transformation, we'll go we'll, we'll invite in the dragon and, and start that. 30 minutes lot can happen. And that's kind of the big threshold. But aside from all the adult work I also work with kids and we teach three different levels of storytelling with three different age groups. Tale spinners for the young ones. Free tellers for the I think it's 10 to 13. And then a adolescents are in the Understory Consul. That's super fun. Teenagers are amazing storytellers, and so we get into basic communication skills there, and all of this stuff you can find over at howtostory.org.

[00:49:01] Laure: Yeah, all the links will be below the episode, of course. And it does look super fun. I've been on your website and I really love all the visuals and like all the way that things are put together. It makes you wanna sign up to all the things.

[00:49:17] David: That's a good sign. Yeah, that's what, that's what I'm told is the, is the goal.

[00:49:21] Laure: Yeah,

[00:49:21] David: Yeah. Yeah.

[00:49:23] Laure: yeah, yeah. You figured it out. Yay. Yay. You,

[00:49:26] David: Yeah. That's, I'm gonna win.

[00:49:28] Laure: Hmm. You're gonna be the, the biggest mushroom.

[00:49:31] David: Oh, man. I'm gonna be, I'm gonna be so important. Yeah.

[00:49:36] Laure: All right. Thank you so much, David, for coming on the podcast. It was really, really great to have you.

[00:49:42] David: What a hoot? This is fantastic. I've, I've really enjoyed connecting with you and getting to know you.

[00:49:47] Laure: Cool, I'm glad. I hope we'll see you again probably in a couple years to see where you are at then.

[00:49:53] David: Great.