[Applause]
to begin a traditional Jewish boat I’m
actually an adaptive pagan version of
one once upon a time Ruby the old witch
they done and in the morning her three
apprentices came into her room and they
took one look at Ruby and they said what
on earth is the matter and Ruby said I
have had a dream and I know the question
the great mother will ask me at the end
of my life Ruby you have been an
exemplary witch
what could you possibly ask you that
what have you so frightened I know that
she will not ask me why won’t you more
like Brigid loyal and devoted she will
not ask me why won’t you more like one
year faithful and strong and she won’t
ask me why Ritchie more like Lena’s
loving and kind
no she will say Ruby why weren’t you
more like Ruby and then what will I say
what could to be that truly a service
requires great courage and confidence
but more than anything it requires that
we take the time to know ourselves a
practice not a destination it requires
that we regularly contemplate the
age-old questions Who am I and why am I
here but these questions are often too
abstract for us to get our head around
and that’s where its storytelling
housing it’s the superpower we have that
grounds and reflections in our
experiences and allows us to explore
these questions
and then share them there’s a mountain
of evidence and research about the power
of storytelling in its impact on the
audience we are thus way third
entertained engaged connected and I want
us to accept as a given those powers of
storytelling is are going to explore
storytelling from a different angle from
the angle of its impact on the person
doing Italian I want to show you that
our that storytelling can support us to
these more satisfying lives by enabling
us to reflect upon and deepen the
meaning of our experiences but first is
were storytelling it’s a pretty rubbery
buzzword it’s a bit like creativity or
innovation to have many different
meanings the storytelling I’m talking
about has five core qualities the first
is that it’s oral and told live before a
live audience
without knives this memoirists
filmmakers audio storytellers they all
gain insight from their process but as
the emotions researcher the professor of
psychology Barbara Fredrickson says and
I quote true connection is physical and
unfolds in real time the second quality
is that the story is true and personal
to the teller it’s about their lived
experience the third quality is that the
story holds meaning it tells us about
the internal journey as well as the
external events experienced by the
teller and within the story is invented
a comment about life the fourth quality
is that it’s told in what I call
performance time which means that the
seller is not in to
they have the floor this allows that
teller to relax into their story but
also ensures the audience listens to
understand not to reply the fifth
quality is that the story is given as a
gift and this is what distinguishes it
from therapy because it’s given as a
gift the teller needs to ensure that the
story is complete and finished it’s a
satisfying whole it’s not something
that’s raw or confused or unprocessed so
in the best way I know how to
demonstrate the quality is to tell you a
story when I was 25 my sister came and
asked me if I would speak at her 21st
birthday and I said of course I would be
honored I had in fact been driving her
for about 10 years it was part of our
mother’s feminist legacy that we would
have a voice and we would ask women to
speak on our behalf were merely
opportunity and I had visions of telling
a brilliant speech it would be hard felt
people would laugh and cry before
stories would be moving but right up
until the day of the party I couldn’t
think of anything more than a list of
adjectives about my sister so I’m hoping
prepared at my mom’s house and I have to
take myself off to do some more work on
the speech and I sit down with a piece
of paper in her spare room and I I wrote
Amanda’s wonderful I love Amanda she’s a
great sister nothing else so I really
think my sister has lived an incredibly
dull life but the reality was I didn’t
come from
family I come from a political family we
would argue to or bloom in the face
about a policy but we didn’t tell the
stories so in that moment I decide I’m
gonna win it it’s done debating at
school I was studying the law I’ve been
told I’m quick on my feet it will just
emerge fully formed when it needs to
I don’t need that this is a righteous
cause I have womankind to support me and
I have love on my side so with that
settled I go back to helping prepare for
the party until the middle of the party
and I’m handing around drinks and food
and chatting to my sister’s friends and
all I can think of this each idea but
then I hear the tell-tale my mum has the
glass he stands up his welcome everyone
for coming she’s so proud of her baby
daughter she’s asked her big sister
Katie to say a few words
I step up and I think you all for coming
it’s a wonderful to see you all
Amanda’s a wonderful sister she’s a
really terrific wonderful woman she’s a
fantastic person she’s a really really
really I know pretty quickly there’s no
more words I was a really really great
person Thanks and there’s a balance and
my sister is a few words and there’s a
bit of polite cause and everyone gets
back to the party and I stand there
holding it together until my aunt my
mum’s younger sister with the flaming
red hair and
flowing robes makes a beeline for me
across the room and she says what was
that what are you thinking and I flee
the room and I throw myself in bed and I
cry my heart and after a while I pull
myself together and in the thirty years
once been asked to speak at a family
function and even though those events
drove my storytelling heart deep
underground I know now that it was in
that moment that my determination to
learn to sell stories was born human
beings are meaning at making machines we
are constantly making sense with our
experiences and the world around us
sometimes we assign meaning in an
instant like name sometimes it’s more
complex and we need to process events
and find a meeting that best fits our
belief systems and once we’ve assigned a
meeting we cast the diamond we take our
memories to bed and sometimes that’s
where they stay for the rest of our
lives but any historian will tell you
that meaning making is a dynamic and
unfolding process history study involves
two activities deciding what happened
and making sense of what happened
and one of them but particularly the
making sense part is always changing
when constantly
in history as the Australian historian
and a Clark says and I quote every
generation has written the history of
Australia quite differently without
historical revision we would still be
perpetuated the horrendous myth of terra
nullius that this land was uninhabited
when the English first arrived without
historical revision we wouldn’t be
celebrating the great contribution of
women whom had been written out of the
history records simply because they were
women it is right and proper that we
looked at history through the eyes and
mind of the present that’s how history
serves us it enables us to look at the
past in order to improve the present and
anticipate the future we have whole
departments degrees libraries museums
dedicated to various forms of history
but we don’t have a simple regular way
of understanding our own histories it
seems we’ve reserved that practice for
men Waris or people in long term therapy
but both of those apart from being
fairly monumental undertakings miss the
reciprocal communal aspect that is oral
storytelling storytelling enables us to
do many many things when I first started
to choose to tell that story about my
sister’s 21st birthday it was simply
because there was a storytelling night
where the topic was celebration and I
thought there’s a climactic moment I’ll
just tell that they might people might
relate to it but as I started to prepare
I had to ask myself are you ready to
tell this story I had to sit it aside
and do some songs to
some sell forgiveness in order to tell
the story not shrouded in shame but
telling that story you know wouldn’t
need to see how Shane was blocking me
from my own understanding of the gifts
that was in that failure telling that
story enabled me to understand my drive
to and fear of expressing myself and it
reminded me of my original intention to
speak well as something that’s a core
part of who I am
I told many stories since then and each
time it’s like welcoming home a part of
myself that I had long forgotten was me
it’s like spilling onto my bones in a
new and more satisfying way storytelling
enables us to stand before others and
say this is what I remember happened and
I was feeling and thinking this and now
looking back I can see how I was shaped
how this taught me and this is Who I am
today
this kind of storytelling the kind with
the five qualities are all told life is
no notes it’s true and personal in holds
meaning it’s told in performance time
it’s taught as a gift this kind of
storytelling it’s a bit like dream work
and like dream work it will lead us if
we let it to what we need to understand
about ourselves this type of
storytelling enables us to deepen into
ourselves at the same time expanding out
when we share
so if you want to understand yourselves
better and give your lives will meaning
then craft and tell your stories and we
open to the gifts and surprises along
the way tell the stories that are
nothing inside you to be told not the
ones you think you ought to tell and
embrace the messiness of the creative
process but most of all just have a
prank I always think the plan practice
and prepare but sometimes the best place
to start is simply to tell and if that
means starting a storytelling event in
your community your home your school or
your workplace then do that too and
remember that telling your stories well
will also review the benefits of its
impact on the audience where they will
be engaged connected persuaded and
understand you better
storytelling enables us to reclaim and
restore our history in order that we may
better know who we are in the present
and the future what will you say if
you’re asked why would you warm like you
[Applause]
to begin a traditional Jewish boat I’m
actually an adaptive pagan version of
one once upon a time Ruby the old witch
they done and in the morning her three
apprentices came into her room and they
took one look at Ruby and they said what
on earth is the matter and Ruby said I
have had a dream and I know the question
the great mother will ask me at the end
of my life Ruby you have been an
exemplary witch
what could you possibly ask you that
what have you so frightened I know that
she will not ask me why won’t you more
like Brigid loyal and devoted she will
not ask me why won’t you more like one
year faithful and strong and she won’t
ask me why Ritchie more like Lena’s
loving and kind
no she will say Ruby why weren’t you
more like Ruby and then what will I say
what could to be that truly a service
requires great courage and confidence
but more than anything it requires that
we take the time to know ourselves a
practice not a destination it requires
that we regularly contemplate the
age-old questions Who am I and why am I
here but these questions are often too
abstract for us to get our head around
and that’s where its storytelling
housing it’s the superpower we have that
grounds and reflections in our
experiences and allows us to explore
these questions
and then share them there’s a mountain
of evidence and research about the power
of storytelling in its impact on the
audience we are thus way third
entertained engaged connected and I want
us to accept as a given those powers of
storytelling is are going to explore
storytelling from a different angle from
the angle of its impact on the person
doing Italian I want to show you that
our that storytelling can support us to
these more satisfying lives by enabling
us to reflect upon and deepen the
meaning of our experiences but first is
were storytelling it’s a pretty rubbery
buzzword it’s a bit like creativity or
innovation to have many different
meanings the storytelling I’m talking
about has five core qualities the first
is that it’s oral and told live before a
live audience
without knives this memoirists
filmmakers audio storytellers they all
gain insight from their process but as
the emotions researcher the professor of
psychology Barbara Fredrickson says and
I quote true connection is physical and
unfolds in real time the second quality
is that the story is true and personal
to the teller it’s about their lived
experience the third quality is that the
story holds meaning it tells us about
the internal journey as well as the
external events experienced by the
teller and within the story is invented
a comment about life the fourth quality
is that it’s told in what I call
performance time which means that the
seller is not in to
they have the floor this allows that
teller to relax into their story but
also ensures the audience listens to
understand not to reply the fifth
quality is that the story is given as a
gift and this is what distinguishes it
from therapy because it’s given as a
gift the teller needs to ensure that the
story is complete and finished it’s a
satisfying whole it’s not something
that’s raw or confused or unprocessed so
in the best way I know how to
demonstrate the quality is to tell you a
story when I was 25 my sister came and
asked me if I would speak at her 21st
birthday and I said of course I would be
honored I had in fact been driving her
for about 10 years it was part of our
mother’s feminist legacy that we would
have a voice and we would ask women to
speak on our behalf were merely
opportunity and I had visions of telling
a brilliant speech it would be hard felt
people would laugh and cry before
stories would be moving but right up
until the day of the party I couldn’t
think of anything more than a list of
adjectives about my sister so I’m hoping
prepared at my mom’s house and I have to
take myself off to do some more work on
the speech and I sit down with a piece
of paper in her spare room and I I wrote
Amanda’s wonderful I love Amanda she’s a
great sister nothing else so I really
think my sister has lived an incredibly
dull life but the reality was I didn’t
come from
family I come from a political family we
would argue to or bloom in the face
about a policy but we didn’t tell the
stories so in that moment I decide I’m
gonna win it it’s done debating at
school I was studying the law I’ve been
told I’m quick on my feet it will just
emerge fully formed when it needs to
I don’t need that this is a righteous
cause I have womankind to support me and
I have love on my side so with that
settled I go back to helping prepare for
the party until the middle of the party
and I’m handing around drinks and food
and chatting to my sister’s friends and
all I can think of this each idea but
then I hear the tell-tale my mum has the
glass he stands up his welcome everyone
for coming she’s so proud of her baby
daughter she’s asked her big sister
Katie to say a few words
I step up and I think you all for coming
it’s a wonderful to see you all
Amanda’s a wonderful sister she’s a
really terrific wonderful woman she’s a
fantastic person she’s a really really
really I know pretty quickly there’s no
more words I was a really really great
person Thanks and there’s a balance and
my sister is a few words and there’s a
bit of polite cause and everyone gets
back to the party and I stand there
holding it together until my aunt my
mum’s younger sister with the flaming
red hair and
flowing robes makes a beeline for me
across the room and she says what was
that what are you thinking and I flee
the room and I throw myself in bed and I
cry my heart and after a while I pull
myself together and in the thirty years
once been asked to speak at a family
function and even though those events
drove my storytelling heart deep
underground I know now that it was in
that moment that my determination to
learn to sell stories was born human
beings are meaning at making machines we
are constantly making sense with our
experiences and the world around us
sometimes we assign meaning in an
instant like name sometimes it’s more
complex and we need to process events
and find a meeting that best fits our
belief systems and once we’ve assigned a
meeting we cast the diamond we take our
memories to bed and sometimes that’s
where they stay for the rest of our
lives but any historian will tell you
that meaning making is a dynamic and
unfolding process history study involves
two activities deciding what happened
and making sense of what happened
and one of them but particularly the
making sense part is always changing
when constantly
in history as the Australian historian
and a Clark says and I quote every
generation has written the history of
Australia quite differently without
historical revision we would still be
perpetuated the horrendous myth of terra
nullius that this land was uninhabited
when the English first arrived without
historical revision we wouldn’t be
celebrating the great contribution of
women whom had been written out of the
history records simply because they were
women it is right and proper that we
looked at history through the eyes and
mind of the present that’s how history
serves us it enables us to look at the
past in order to improve the present and
anticipate the future we have whole
departments degrees libraries museums
dedicated to various forms of history
but we don’t have a simple regular way
of understanding our own histories it
seems we’ve reserved that practice for
men Waris or people in long term therapy
but both of those apart from being
fairly monumental undertakings miss the
reciprocal communal aspect that is oral
storytelling storytelling enables us to
do many many things when I first started
to choose to tell that story about my
sister’s 21st birthday it was simply
because there was a storytelling night
where the topic was celebration and I
thought there’s a climactic moment I’ll
just tell that they might people might
relate to it but as I started to prepare
I had to ask myself are you ready to
tell this story I had to sit it aside
and do some songs to
some sell forgiveness in order to tell
the story not shrouded in shame but
telling that story you know wouldn’t
need to see how Shane was blocking me
from my own understanding of the gifts
that was in that failure telling that
story enabled me to understand my drive
to and fear of expressing myself and it
reminded me of my original intention to
speak well as something that’s a core
part of who I am
I told many stories since then and each
time it’s like welcoming home a part of
myself that I had long forgotten was me
it’s like spilling onto my bones in a
new and more satisfying way storytelling
enables us to stand before others and
say this is what I remember happened and
I was feeling and thinking this and now
looking back I can see how I was shaped
how this taught me and this is Who I am
today
this kind of storytelling the kind with
the five qualities are all told life is
no notes it’s true and personal in holds
meaning it’s told in performance time
it’s taught as a gift this kind of
storytelling it’s a bit like dream work
and like dream work it will lead us if
we let it to what we need to understand
about ourselves this type of
storytelling enables us to deepen into
ourselves at the same time expanding out
when we share
so if you want to understand yourselves
better and give your lives will meaning
then craft and tell your stories and we
open to the gifts and surprises along
the way tell the stories that are
nothing inside you to be told not the
ones you think you ought to tell and
embrace the messiness of the creative
process but most of all just have a
prank I always think the plan practice
and prepare but sometimes the best place
to start is simply to tell and if that
means starting a storytelling event in
your community your home your school or
your workplace then do that too and
remember that telling your stories well
will also review the benefits of its
impact on the audience where they will
be engaged connected persuaded and
understand you better
storytelling enables us to reclaim and
restore our history in order that we may
better know who we are in the present
and the future what will you say if
you’re asked why would you warm like you
[Applause]
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