Learning to tell a Different Story for Yourself

The story of your life might not be true.

At least not the way you’re framing it. Can you learn to tell a better one?

I believe you can.

What story are you telling?

The rules in which you play the game of life are rooted in the interpretation of stories real and imagined. The most compelling and personal of these narratives is the story of your life.

What story do you tell yourself about…yourself? About your life? Is it a globetrotting adventure? A romance? An underdog story? Think about it for a second.

Then ask yourself: Do I like that version of the story?

If not you can tell a different one!

Altering the prevailing narrative of my life is what I intend to do for myself by writing this memoir. I hope you’ll pick up a few ways you can do this for yourself by reading it.

From static to dynamic

Though our lives appear as a static sequence of events that we experience in the present, they’re more dynamic than that.

I like to think of my life as an empty geological landscape (sorta like the old Sim City games). It begins as a blank canvas full of brown dirt, dotted with spare vegetation and maybe a few bodies of water. Nothing more.

Like earth beneath our feet that land of unbridled potential can be populated by natural and human made beings and objects. These animate and inanimate organisms transform it from a desolate lifeless wilderness to a vibrant ecosystem.

This is a fitting metaphor for our lives.

The difference is (to an extent) we are the creators of the lands of our lives. While we may not be able to choose many elements of what goes on our inner world maps — we can’t pick our family, where we’re born, or our initial circumstances — but we can choose how we interpret them.

And that can make a monumental difference in how you relate your story to yourself.

Visit keithhayden.net for a continuation of “Intracartography: A Memoir for Mapping the Great Story of Your Life”

Read this post and more on my Typeshare Social Blog