Why Sharing Your Story Might Save Your Life--Or Someone Else’s!
This global pandemic has isolated us and at the same time, has brought us all together like never before. Especially if you are in your 70s or older, you may be stuck at home, your movements limited. It’s a perfect time to share your life stories!
Luckily, the Stories to Last process works great using Zoom, FaceTime, the phone, and document sharing!
I’ve been helping people and organizations to share their stories in page-turning books and captivating videos and audio recordings for fourteen years. I want to help more people do this!
Why?
Sharing your stories is important. It truly can save your life and the lives of others.
How?
For one, to be candid, if you die without recording your life story, what is left are the few stories the family always tells. And those will fade with time too.
But there’s more!
Stories can actually make our lives better.
Sharing our stories benefits both the storyteller and those reading or receiving the stories in all these ways:
Stories help us understand and make sense of our world! At no time before in human history has it been more important to take time to understand the perspectives and actions of ourselves and others!
Stories create empathy! The act of sharing stories (for both the storyteller and recipients) actually produces a neurochemical called Oxytocin, which creates empathy, trust, kindness and cooperation.
Stories inspire and connect us! We all have an immeasurable influence on the people and the world around us. Sharing how you overcame obstacles, how you made mistakes and learned from them, how you found love and a career and your value system, these are life stories that can help generations to come.
We are all a part of history! Where were you when you first heard about 911? Where were you when Kennedy was shot. If you’re aged like a fine wine, where were you when you heard Pearl Harbor was bombed? Your stories make history personal, not just an abstraction in a textbook. Sharing your stories in historical context will help us learn from the past and hopefully not repeat the worst parts of human history.
Stories keep us sharp! Both when sharing and receiving stories, we tap into memories, imagination, conceptual processing. That’s like sit-ups for the brain!
Stories help you to belong. Whether sharing with family, friends, or a greater community, stories connect us to each other, fulfilling a need for all of us to belong with others. And we do! Sometimes in our silence and with the limits of our consciousness, we forget this.
It’s generous to share your stories! Some people mistake memoir as vanity projects. That couldn’t be further from the truth! When you share your stories, even those that make you feel the most vulnerable, that is a tremendous act of generosity. Some stories take courage to share. Those are usually the best ones!
Stories last. Material possessions and money certainly make things easier in a capitalistic society. But, as the old adage goes, they don’t buy happiness. Accepting your story, with all its mountains and valleys, its flaws and its beauty, and sharing your emotional truth with others, now that can bring you happiness.
So, give me a call. I can help you get started. There are so many ways! And you can pick the way that works for you.
It’s an honor to make Stories to Last!
Linda Hamilton, Owner & Founder, Publisher and Award-winning Author
