Lately I have been giving a lot of thought to the nature of the world around me. It seems to me we experience our world entirely through stories. (Even our own subjective experience of the five senses is understood through the context of what we have heard or even the story we have created to explain it.)
We tell stories of the past (we call them history), we tell stories of our own lives and daily experiences, and we tell stories about the imagined future, often called science fiction. The weaving of these stories helps us communicate with others, and even helps us understand ourselves. Sometimes we even edit those stories to position ourselves in a better light, or to manipulate others into a position favorable to ourselves. So, even when untrue, the stories we tell become the reality of the world we live in.
Lately a frequent lament, from myself and from others, is that the world has its priorities wrong. That we should have bake sales for bombers and funding for education. That this transition of most of the wealth to the top 1% is an imbalance. We grouse about the circumstances, and we wonder how it happened. We sadly mourn our closing museums, lost historic structures, threatened ecosystems, and shrinking literary world. Sometimes we write a blog, or sign an online petition. Other times we meet up at the cafe and have fiery discussions about What Went Wrong. A few of us become politically active or give money to charitable foundations to swing the tide back. Even fewer of us stop shopping at chains, cut up our credit cards, and limit ourselves to local products we can obtain from a walk or a bike ride.
But it occurs to me, that to actually make meaningful change, the most important thing we must do is to tell stories. Instead of telling stories about how much money a leading sports player makes, we can tell stories about how much love a janitor shows her family. Instead of telling stories about the most profitable companies, we discuss the manager who made sure his sick employee kept her job. Instead of telling stories about the boy who had a mentor who kept him out of juvenile prison becoming a successful businessman, we can tell about the inmate who maintained a healthy relationship with his children despite the prison bars.
WE get to pick. WE tell the stories. WE can choose to live in a world that honors wealth above all other things--or we can choose to live in a world which honors kindness, trust, family and love. I know it sounds silly and impossible, but think of it--what if our stories insisted that kindness was more important than wealth?
