Storyteller's World

Everyone has a story, or stories, that they are constantly telling themselves in their mind. These are the stories that we inhabit, these are the stories that clothe us because they shape how we feel about ourselves, and how we see ourselves in the world.

When I discovered my storyteller-identity, it was like falling in love, and being fallen in love with, all in one. It was like finding I could suddenly work magic, where previously I had only been reciting hollow incantations. Stories are powerful, and when you feel the power of the telling, it's intoxicating.

But it also felt very fragile. It was such an intangible, incomprehensible ability. I kept thinking it was somehow an illusion: that for some reason it had worked all right the last time; I'd somehow, unaccountably, got away with it, managed to fool people into thinking I was a storyteller. But any moment the spell might fail, their eyes would be opened and they would realise I was a fraud, a phoney.

Then I realised that the story I was telling myself in my head was The Emperor's New Clothes: where the Emperor manages to deceive all the foolish celebrity-following public that he is wearing a most beautiful suit that only the intelligent and discerning can see; to the rest, hoi polloi, it is just invisible. Until a little boy, who hasn't heard this rubbish and wouldn't buy into it anyway, cries out, "The Emperor isn't wearing any clothes!" And in this story in my head, I was the naked Emperor.

So I decided I needed to change my internal story. Until I find a better one, the story I'm telling myself is The Brave Little Tailor. Where the little guy, the common man, through sheer cheek and courage and confidence in his own ability slays giants and wild beasts, wins the hand of the Princess, becomes and remains a Prince 'to this very day'.