Sharing Our Stories

We are more alike than we are different. And we each have our own story. Our own history or herstory of success, of failure, and all those gray experiences in-between. Life is such an extraordinary mystery that we each live one day at a time. One moment at a time. Everyone, living their important lives, all at the same time.

I love biographies and autobiographies. I enjoy learning about how other (sometimes famous) people maneuvered their way through this lifetime maze. Funerals can also be learning moments; so many times, I am impressed by the story of a person’s life after his or her passing from this life. These aren’t usually objective tellings of the events of a person’s life. We don’t hear about the shortcomings at most funerals, though the occasional biography will include them. And how people handle the difficulties can be the most instructive elements of their lives. History, too, is incomplete, though. “The winners write the history books” as they say. It’s hard to get the actual story of what happened in people’s lives and in the country’s “life.”

These next two story-telling shows attempt to tell an intimate and often honest version of life experience:

Storycorps‘ mission is to preserve and share humanity’s stories in order to build connections between people and create a more just and compassionate world.
We do this to remind one another of our shared humanity, to strengthen and build the connections between people, to teach the value of listening, and to weave into the fabric of our culture the understanding that everyone’s story matters. At the same time, we are creating an invaluable archive for future generations.”
It’s also a podcast and the interviews are archived at the Library of Congress in Washington.
In a recent Storycorps interview, Vernon Dahmer’s family recounted his last days fighting for voting rights for Blacks. His statement that “If you don’t vote, you don’t count” was a powerful message that I wish all U.S. citizens would take to heart.

On Being is a Peabody Award-winning public radio conversation and podcast, a Webby Award-winning website and online exploration, a publisher and public event convener. On Being opens up the animating questions at the center of human life: What does it mean to be human, and how do we want to live? We explore these questions in their richness and complexity in 21st-century lives and endeavors. We pursue wisdom and moral imagination as much as knowledge; we esteem nuance and poetry as much as fact.”
There’s a podcast and a mobile app, which I use.
Listening to Krista Tippet interview people reminds me of the importance of the skill of listening. It’s really the Rodney Dangerfield of English class. She affirms what people say, she asks to know more about the off-hand comment, she hears the feeling with which the words are said…she’s a listening pro and that magnifies her interviewing skill. One of my favorite interviews of her is when she interviewed the founder of Storycorps, David Isay; it’s called “Listening as an Act of Love.”

Other websites that share stories and opinions:

Youth Voices

Letters2Trump blog

Letters to the Next President

Soundcloud

The Remembering Site

The Life Stories Project

Biography.com
http://www.biography.com/

Open Library
https://openlibrary.org/help/faq/about#what

Some of my favorite biographies:

Dreams in the Mirror (about e.e. cummings)

Born Standing Up (Steve Martin’s autobiography)

Kiss Me Like a Stranger (Gene Wilder’s autobiography)

The Life and Wisdom of Gwen Frostic

Humans of New York

The Boys in the Boat: Nine Americans and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics

One of my New Year’s Resolutions is to listen more. Reading biographies and autobiographies are one form of listening…listening to another person’s life story. I invite you to listen, too.

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