Everyone has a story to tell, a story that yearns to be written.
We hear it in the gusting of the winds, the falling of the rain, the splash of\u00a0the shower and in the space between wakefulness and sleep. We\u2019ve all lived\u00a0through powerful experiences and made it out the other side. Whether they were\u00a0triumphant or tragic, heroic, depressing or discomfiting, they\u2019re over now, but\u00a0as you think back, the details begin to take form: the colors, scents and\u00a0textures of that particular time and place. You begin to recall the things you\u00a0said and you want to tell your story, no, you need to tell your story so you can unburden your soul and feel lighter and more at ease in your body and in your heart. So why don’t you just sit down and write?<\/p>\n
There are a slew of reasons why we don’t just get on with it. We
don\u2019t want to upset someone with what we have to say. We feel ashamed of\u00a0something that we did. We can’t remember parts of what happened so we’re afraid\u00a0we won\u2019t finish what we started. These are all legitimate concerns but at the top\u00a0of most people\u2019s list of reasons to avoid the blank page is fear of mediocrity.\u00a0Fear of getting it wrong and being judged for what we did. Fear of being
embarrassed. Fear of being maudlin or unintelligent or being considered a waste\u00a0of people\u2019s time. I\u2019ve battled all of those emotions during my career, but from\u00a0what I\u2019ve seen, when people set out to do anything creative, it often starts so\u00a0poorly, mediocrity can be a step up.<\/p>\n
During Covid, when I was sorting through piles\u00a0of unconsciousness that were lying around my house, an object I found or a random
thought triggered an unexpected memory. That started me writing and as I did, I\u00a0began to recognize life patterns that had formed me, magnetized me, repelled me\u00a0and ultimately shaped me into the person I had become. I saw that I\u2019d lived a\u00a0full life and while I was proud of my victories, the races I won and the\u00a0rewards I earned, I tried to forgive myself for my failures and losses, for the\u00a0times I allowed people to abuse me, physically and emotionally, for the times I\u00a0abused myself and my unconscious actions that led to heartache and\u00a0disappointment.<\/p>\n
Finally, I had to accept the fact that my choices, good or\u00a0bad, and the lessons they had taught me belonged to me. As I sat at the
computer to tell my stories that made me who I am today, I was amazed at what\u00a0emerged from my consciousness, stories that I thought I had hidden away. Maybe\u00a0I had forgotten about them or maybe I had stashed them somewhere safe until I\u00a0had enough strength at my foundation to relive them. Whatever the truth was, as
they showed up, I wrote them down and each chapter became a story of its own, a\u00a0tile in the mosaic that reflected my life.<\/p>\n
The Native American\u00a0culture is known for its rich oral traditions. Instead of using a written\u00a0language to document their history, they use vivid narratives to educate the\u00a0younger generations. In this way, they breathe life into their tribal culture\u00a0and they entertain their people. When they were forcibly relocated to land that\u00a0was not their own, they depended on storytelling to remain connected to their
ancestry and their way of life.<\/p>\n
Clarissa Pinkola Est\u00e9s, a\u00a0Mexican Jungian psychoanalyst, who wrote \u201cWomen Who Run With the Wolves,\u201d a blockbuster bestseller, is a consummate story teller. She uses\u00a0metaphors and myths, folk tales and and fairy tales to bring to light her\u00a0particular teachings. She says, \u201cStories are medicine. I\u2019ve\u00a0been taken with them since I heard my first. They have such power; they do not\u00a0require that we do, be, act, anything — we need only listen.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cTell me\u00a0a story,\u201d children say before they go to bed. As a child, I cherished my\u00a0favorite books, \u201cThe Secret Garden\u201d and \u201cCharlotte\u2019s Web,\u201d and I saw life as\u00a0stories that I could treasure and become a part of them. Now, as an adult I value\u00a0story telling way more than long and boring statistics and dry explanations. More\u00a0than once, I\u2019ve read through one of my chapters, decided it was too tedious, scrapped\u00a0it and started over as \u00a0story teller, not an academic who wanted to teach somebody something. In that same spirit, I encourage my students to use stories to drop into the center of their emotions and ideas and utilize the things that have happened to them as a way to grow and learn.<\/p>\n
When I\u00a0feel lonely, uncomfortable and untalented, I try to think of my writing as a\u00a0sacred calling. I feel the rhythm of the words and it becomes a meditation. The\u00a0texture of the keyboard. The click of the mouse. The punching of the keys. The\u00a0flow of the paragraphs. The memories that come to light without my doing\u00a0anything to retrieve them.<\/p>\n
I remind\u00a0myself to stop thinking about excellence, being prolific or penning fancy phrases.\u00a0I just write, plain and simple, a story flows out in all its glory and I am\u00a0amazed at the beauty, creativity and inspiration that lives deep inside of me. I\u00a0really had no idea.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u00a0 \u00a0There\u00a0is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.<\/p>\n
\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0– – Maya Angelou<\/p>\n
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\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Everyone has a story to tell, a story that yearns to be written.We hear it in the gusting of the winds, the falling of the rain, the splash of\u00a0the shower and in the space between wakefulness and sleep. We\u2019ve all lived\u00a0through powerful experiences and made it out the other side. Whether they were\u00a0triumphant or tragic, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":2226,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2227","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.andreacagan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2227","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.andreacagan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.andreacagan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.andreacagan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.andreacagan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2227"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.andreacagan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2227\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2228,"href":"https:\/\/www.andreacagan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2227\/revisions\/2228"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.andreacagan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2226"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.andreacagan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2227"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.andreacagan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2227"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.andreacagan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2227"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}