Telling my Story

The Tangled Truth of Your Daily Narrative

We like to tell ourselves that life is a straight line. Wake up. Coffee. Work. Home. We structure our days as a neat, linear progression of events.

But let’s be honest—that isn't how life actually happens.

In this episode, we pull back the curtain on the "messy" middle of existence. We explore why we feel compelled to untangle the chaotic overlap of daily life into a tidy story, and why that narrative structure—while not entirely factual—is the very thing that makes our experiences coherent and intelligible.

Your life is a story, and it is far more complex than a to-do list. It’s a dynamic, multidimensional masterpiece. In this installment, we’ll look at:

• The Linear Illusion: Why our brains crave a beginning, middle, and end, even when reality is a tangled web.
• The Art of Configuration: How you actively turn chaos into the story you tell yourself and the world.
• The Protagonist Factor: Discovering the most essential, non-negotiable element of your life’s narrative—YouWonderfulYou.

Life isn't a sequence of events to be checked off; it’s a living, breathing story that you are writing every single second. Are you ready to see the true shape of your narrative?

Listen now to uncover the beauty in the tangle.

Stay tuned—this is just the beginning of how we’ll be reframing your journey together. There is so much more to come.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:06

Telling my story. We are creatures of story. Story comes naturally from the time we are very young. In fact, our brains are wired for story as applied to our life from the time we are one year old. Science even tells us it is psychologically necessary. Story is the social glue that brings people together around common values. Storytelling has been used time out of mind to pass on knowledge from one generation to the next in a way that has meaning that is universal. Yet it can be applied to a particular person or instance. Since no two lives are the same, then venturing forth into the imagined future is a perfect scenario for storytelling language. This kind of terminology allows it to apply to everyone, even though each person will interpret it as a singular story. I like this because storytelling comes to me naturally and has been part of my life from the very beginning. How about you? The narrative of telling our story, the words we choose to use, is equally tied to the imagery and symbols of the time and environment. The words we choose to tell the story of our life chart our path by telling our story as we journey. These words mark the underlying thought processes that determine human action in general. Our story, as well as others, provides a map, a map of events as they occur, and helps propel us onward when we tie them to our goals and dreams, as well as to what we know about the inner workings of our true, authentic self. The words we choose to use map our story. Telling our story with integrity involves more than what we might imagine at first. What does it mean to tell your story with integrity? It means that your actions match the attributes and characteristics that you have honestly designated as being the self. It also means that you have looked in the mirror of true seeing and been honest with yourself. It means you don't pretend. You don't say one thing and do another. The mirror of true seeing is one of our most valuable tools. Time out of mind, the hero's journey has included a crucial moment in the adventure that is life when the hero must look deep into an important, even life-altering mirror. Think about your favorite movies or books, and they likely had a crucial mirror scene. The mirror requires the hero to truly see, and not only that, but to remain looking. In some stories, it might seem like this is an impossible barrier, made only for the strongest of heroes, but this is not the case. The mirror of true seeing is about determining whether you are made of hero material. To be a hero is to be truly you, to endeavor to be your best self and accept yourself. There is but one requirement to successfully viewing the mirror of true seeing, to see your true self. Yes, it can be difficult. In fact, there is probably something wrong if it is easy. The mirror of true seeing is not a one-time thing, but rather becomes part of the process of the path that allows us to become a true, authentic self. This process gives us a relationship of integrity with ourself. The act of consciously choosing our path and then finding and claiming responsibility for the relationships that matter to us makes us accountable to ourselves. Thus, we own our decisions each step of the way, which allows us to possess ourselves. Learning to tell our story with integrity in a clear voice is not easy. It takes practice. Using the facts is important. Learning the words that accurately speak truth is also crucial. Becoming comfortable with ourself and with the story of ourself is an important step. Even as we say we own our story and claim ourselves, the self that we project in public creates an image that others accept as if they are experiencing all that we are. The more we are present with others, the more that image is solidified as we act with integrity, meaning our actions match our words. By leading a purposeful life and tenaciously claiming the right to tell our own story, we gain a powerful tool in the public arena. We establish the ability to secure control of our own story and thus our own space. The power and authority necessary to lay claim to the factors that direct our future are also set in motion. If our actions are contrary to what we say or are different depending on who we are with, we lose the authority to tell our story. Others will tell it for us. No one wants that. Discovering your archetype helps immensely with telling your story because it provides guidelines and assurances about your instincts. Because we are in tune with the day-to-day dealings of our life, and also because we understand our archetype, we can not only tell our own story, but knowledgeably choose which parts to share with others and know which parts belong to our private world. Consider learning about your archetype. We can remain conscious of the imagery that surrounds us, which we then also continually come to personify. The social conditions in our world form us because we react to them. At the same time, those circumstances provide the mechanisms, tools, opportunities, or limits that determine the stories that will be told about our life by people who surround us. Because I am not the only one who tells stories about me. You are not the only one who tells stories about you. Again, it is crucial that our actions match our words. When others report our story to others, that story needs to be consistent with who we truly are. Our story is not only about us as individuals. These stories will be collected and then heard by others. Each of us contributes to the overall story of humanity in the moment over time. A narrative develops with the self and others as part of society in the present. It's actually pretty cool. What is society? It is each of us blending together to create a community or a variety of communities as we contribute our part. Because of this, we tend to adapt our living, our journey, to society, to family, friends, and acquaintances as we live. In other words, each of us consciously adapts our actions to our evolving understandings of the situations in which we find ourselves, even as we are actively involved. How do you see yourself as part of the bigger picture of humanity? And how do you want to be involved in the unfolding of the world's story? Be the subject in your life story. To learn about and understand myself, the self, I must be the main actor in my story. Each day I live, and as I do, I tell myself the story of my life as I live it. Even in action mode, I am also narrating to myself. While I do something, I narrate the story of my doing to myself, and later I will tell myself and probably others what I did. I will do and say more than one thing each day. I will do and say oodles. Not only will I have a memory of myself doing and saying, but I will have an opinion about myself and what I did. I will interact with others and I will make an impact on the world around me. These actions and events will also become part of my ongoing narrative. Life is multilayered. I will deal with consequences from my actions, both immediate and long term, and will also need to follow up or fulfill expectations based on what I did and said. I will encounter distractions. Some of them will be obligations, and some of them will be obstacles. Some of these obligations and obstacles will be worthwhile endeavors that I need to add to my story. Because I am human and possess human emotions, there will be at least something that will weigh a little heavy on my mind, and sometimes it will not be little but a heavy burden that diverts me from my regular tasks. We know how this goes. Life is like a story, and we live it and tell it to ourselves and others. What I just described a moment ago is minimal for the average person who has many things to accomplish in any given day, and lots of people or entities who surround them in different ways. Each day has a beginning, a middle, and an end, and we tend to think of it and treat it that way. We automatically structure our days like a story. We use certain words as if the day is linear, with each event taking turns. Like this. I'm going to get up and wash my face and make breakfast and brush my teeth. I'll get dressed and check my schedule and go to work. I'll drop off the dry cleaning and get to work in time to prep for my presentation. And then I'll bet you're thinking of all the things I just left out, like checking email, taking care of kids or pets, the unexpected phone calls, the change in plans from work, the traffic daydreaming, the time to change my outfit because I spilled breakfast on my blouse. You know, all those little things that happen each day. The point isn't that the unexpected happens because we can plan for that. The point is that we tend to plan for the day in a linear fashion, but in a typical day, events and conversations overlap, get tangled up, and fall off the schedule or change places. We make room for the unexpected as a matter of course, and we do this with relative ease all the while, thinking of it still as the beginning, the middle, and end of our day. This kind of thinking makes an event intelligible, but it might not be exactly the way it happens. Instead, it's the way we structure it for understanding. Configuring our experience in terms of such multidimensional understanding is what makes our experience coherent. We say to ourselves, this happened, then that, and then the other thing, when in reality they probably happened all at once and wrapped around each other, tangled up, and maybe went back and forth. That's okay, it's normal to sort the events and turn them into an intelligible story that can be told to ourselves and to others. My life is a story, and so is yours. It's not just a daily narrative either, is it? The story began at birth and has continued up until this moment. All of it. What does it include? The most important element of all, and the only piece of the story that is necessary, of course, is you, wonderful you.