Storytelling at Work
October 25, 2020
What Stories Will You Tell Today?

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Here's a story you can probably relate to: You are walking down the street when a friend, coming the other way, stops and asks "Whassup?" It's a question you've heard a thousand times before -- the default, open-ended salutation. Your choices are many. You can answer any way you want, from the predictable "Fine, whassup with you?" to an elaborate monologue on any number of topics: the weather, your vacation plans, the economy, the latest terrorist attack, local politics, your job, and the latest viral video.

In that moment, there is no correct answer. You get to decide what story to tell. What you don't get to decide is the impact your story will have. That's up to the listener. But know this: your story will have impact. Everything you say, everything you do has impact, even a seemingly casual moment of passing a friend on the street.

If you watch TV, you can see this phenomenon playing out daily. With an almost infinite number of topics to report on, the news TV reports on is mostly bad news: war, violence, political unrest, terrorism, famine, corruption, plane crashes, murder, scandal, disease, gossip, and unemployment with an occasional human interest story thrown in for good measure.

68% of Americans believe that TV news broadcasts focus way too much on bad news and yet we keep tuning in. The impact? Our state of well-being declines. We become sadder, more negative, more hopeless and depressed, exacerbating whatever personal worries and anxieties we already had before tuning in.

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I'm not suggesting that news outlets airbrush the negative out of their reports. Nor am I suggesting they stop reporting on the bad stuff that's happening around the world. What I'm suggesting is that they find more of a middle path and make more of an effort to change the narrative to honor what's good and holy about being alive.

You and I are also news stations. You and I are also reporting on what's going on in the world. Like the TV executives behind the scenes, we also get to decide what stories to tell -- even on the street when a friend asks us "Whassup?" That is our moment of truth. That is our broadcast.

Will our stories be local versions of the nightly news, skewed to what's bad and wrong, full of gossip and complaint, or will we choose to tell a new story, one infused with possibility, progress, insight, awareness, and hope?

Storytelling for the Revolution
You are a universe of stories
Wisdom Circle Training

Posted by Mitch Ditkoff at 12:36 AM | Comments (0)

October 10, 2020
HOW TO USE A STORY TO SOLVE a TOUGH PROBLEM: The 18th Camel

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Storytelling is the swiss-army knife of transformational catalysts. Done well, it can be used to build community, inspire, delight, transmit tacit knowledge, share wisdom, educate, inform, change behavior, and spark elegant solutions. The following story (a re-telling of a classic tale), accomplishes many the above, but is primarily about sparking elegant solutions. When you come to the end, I invite you to take a few minutes to reflect on the questions that follow.

THE 18TH CAMEL

Once upon a time, in Egypt, there was a much beloved camel merchant named Hamid. Hamid was known throughout the land as not only a connoisseur of fine camels, but a kind-hearted, generous, and wealthy man. So, when, one hot summer day, at the age of 55, he had a sudden heart attack and fell off his camel, the entire country went into mourning.

In no time at all, thousands of people gathered at his estate for the funeral and celebration of his life. When the gathering was over, Hamid's Chief Executor sat down with the camel merchant's three sons for the ritual reading of the will.

The boys were stunned by the size of their inheritance, but of all the treasures bequeathed to them, the most precious were their father's prized camels -- 17 of them, which he requested be divided in the following way: one-half to his eldest son, one-third to his middle son, and one ninth to his youngest.

But since 17 cannot be divided up equally in this fashion, the three sons began arguing, then pushing each other, then wrestling on the ground . Realizing they needed help to resolve their disagreement, they called for the local wise man.

After listening to each of the three sons make their case, the wise man explained he needed some time to think about the matter and would return, God willing, in an hour.

Sixty minutes later, the three sons, in the middle of yet another argument, look up and see, off in the distance, the wise man, riding a very large camel, approaching them.

"Boys," he exclaimed, upon dismounting, "I have so much respect for your father that I've decided to donate one of my own camels to your inheritance. Now you have eighteen.

"Let's see..." he said, stroking his beard. "Half of 18 is nine... so the eldest of you will inherit nine camels. And... hmmm... one third of 18 is six, so the middle son will inherit six... and one ninth of 18 is two which means the youngest of you will inherit the remaining two.

Then he looked up at the sky, paused, and spoke again.

"Based on my calculations, 9 + 6 + 2 = 17 -- which is the exact number of camels your father bequeathed you. That leaves one camel left over -- mine -- so i guess I'll just get back on top him and continue on my way. May Allah be with you, oh sons of Hamid. Enjoy this fine day!"

FOOD FOR THOUGHT: Every problem has a solution, even if the solution may not be immediately obvious. Your challenge is to think about your problem differently than you usually do. It's possible. It is. You just need to let go of some old assumptions, go beyond the status quo, and look at things from a fresh perspective.

What pressing problem of yours, these days, do you need to approach differently? To begin with, you might want to frame your problem as a question, beginning with the words "How can I?"

20 elegant solution-sparking questions

Storytelling for the Revolution
MitchDitkoff.com
Storytelling as the 18th camel

Posted by Mitch Ditkoff at 08:35 AM | Comments (0)

October 09, 2020
TRANSPARENT: Eva Snyder

Wonderful new release by up and coming singer/songwriter Eva Snyder. More to come!

Eva's youtube channel

Posted by Mitch Ditkoff at 10:04 PM | Comments (0)

October 02, 2020
The Afghani Cab Driver and the $250M Dollar Salty Snack Food

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I am getting into the back seat of a yellow cab, as I've done a thousand times before, having just tipped the too-smiling bellboy too much for holding open the door and inviting me, as he had been trained to do just last week, to "have a nice day."

Here, 1,500 miles from home, at 6:30 am in front of yet another nameless business hotel, I settle into position, careful not to spill my coffee on my free copy of USA Today.

In 20 minutes, I will be arriving at the international headquarters of General Mills, creators of Cheerios, Wheaties, and the totally fictional 50's icon of American motherhood, Betty Crocker.

My mission? To help their product development team come up with a new $250 million dollar salty snack food.

It's too dark to read and I'm too caffeinated to nap, so I glance at the dashboard and see a fuzzy photo of my driver, his last name next to it -- an extremely long and unpronounceable last name -- as if a crazed bingo master had thrown all the letters of the alphabet into a brown paper bag, shook, and randomly pulled them out in between shots of cheap tequila. Where he was from I had no clue.

"Hello," I manage to say, nervous that my driver with the long last name would end up getting us completely lost. "I'm on my way to General Mills. Do you... know where that is?"

"Oh yes," my driver replies with an accent I assume to be mid-eastern. "I know."

Small talk out of the way, I now had three choices -- the same three choices I have every time I get into the back seat of a cab.

I could check my email. I could review my agenda. Or I could continue the conversation with my driver -- always a risky proposition, especially with cabbies from foreign lands who were often difficult to understand, tired, or, seemingly angry at Americans, which, I am not proud to say, often led me to become way too polite, overcompensating for who knows how many years of my government's pre-emptive strikes -- a response, I'm sure (mine, not the government's), which even the least sophisticated cab driver could see through in a heart beat.

"Where are you from?" my driver asks.

"Woodstock," I reply. "Woodstock, New York. And you?"

"Afghanistan."

Deep as we were in the middle of that war, I am stunned, my own backseat brand of battlefield fatigue now gathering itself for the appropriate response.

"Afghanistan?" I reply. "What brought you here?"

I could tell by his pause -- his long, pregnant pause, that things, in this taxi, were just about to change.

"Well..." my driver says, looking at me in the rearview mirror, "I was out for a walk with my 10-year old daughter when she stepped on a land mine."

I look out the window. Starbucks. MacDonalds. Pier 1 Imports.

"So I ripped off my shirt and tied it around her leg to stop the bleeding. Then I went running for a doctor. But there was no doctor."

For the next 20 minutes, he goes on to tell me about his three-day journey through the mountains of Afghanistan, his bleeding daughter on his back, slipping in and out of consciousness. Villagers took them in, gave them food, applied centuries worth of home remedies, but no one knew of a doctor.

And then... a break. A man on horseback told him of some nurses from the Mayo Clinic who had just set up an outpost just a little way up the road. With his last bit of energy, he got there and collapsed -- the nurses managing to keep his daughter alive and flying her, the next day, to the Mayo Clinic in Minneapolis, where, three days later, he and his wife were flown to be by her side to enter into a year long rehabilitation process with her, so she could learn to walk with her new prosthetic leg.

"That will be $27.55", my driver announces, checking the meter.

Somehow, I find my wallet, pay, and hug my driver, lingering with him as long as I could in that early morning light.

I enter the well-appointed lobby of General Mills, get my security pass, and make my way to the room where I am supposed to set things up for today's salty snack food brainstorming session.

An hour later, fifteen 30-somethings walk in, checking Blackberries. I have a choice to make. Do I dismiss my journey from hotel to headquarters as a surreal preamble to the day -- one that has nothing to do with the work at hand? Or do I realize that my journey here this morning is the work at hand -- a story not only for me, but for everyone in the room that day?

Excerpted from Storytelling at Work
Storytelling at Work podcast
Idea Champions

Posted by Mitch Ditkoff at 05:53 PM | Comments (0)

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Storytelling at Work is a blog about the power of personal storytelling – why it matters and what you can do to more effectively communicate your stories – on or off the job. Inspired by the book of the same name, the blog features "moment of truth" stories by the author, Mitch Ditkoff, plus inspired rants, quotes, and guest submissions by readers.

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