Stories.

Everyone loves a good story, right?

Our entire existence is a story. When we talk to a friend, we tell stories. Watch a movie or a television show, another story. Learn about historical events, just another type of story. The monologue in your head with negative self-talk or positive affirmations are all stories that we tell ourselves about ourselves. Entire civilizations are made and destroyed based upon the stories that are told or Sold.

Stories Pass on Information

Stories pass on information. This information can be true or false. It could teach us moral lessons or convince people to do great evil. Stories in and of themselves are neither good nor bad. In fact, on the deepest level stories do not even exist (unless they are events that are happening right now). They either inform us of what has happened aka a dead entity that we resurrect or what could/will happen in the future (a place that does not exist yet). The stories we tell ourselves and others has an impact on our psyches and thus our perceptions which informs our decisions.

What Information Are You Taking in? And Who is Giving You That Information?

But who is telling you the story? Who is selling you the story?

When you watch the news they give something called a “narrative”. Which is just a fancy way of saying a story.

Advertisers spend billions every year to try and sell you, their stories. That you need their products to be happy or fit in or whatever fear they are trying to sell you on. This works on most people otherwise there would be no mega corporations and they do it so well that they are trans-national now.  

Governments and politicians sell you their stories in something that is known as propaganda and yet we continue to trust these same politicians even though we know that they will not fulfill their campaign promises. Why do we still fall for this after thousands of such examples?

Religions and their religious leaders also have stories to tell, and just like any other story theirs could be true or false.

Do You Know who is Writing Your Story? Can You Safe-Guard Yourself From Those Who do not Have Your Best Interest at Heart?

Are you someone who knows how to author their own story? Or are someone who has fallen for the lies, propaganda, and silver tongue who does not have your best interests at heart? Would you even be able to tell the difference? After all some stories are so powerful and alluring that they have literally determined the fates of entire peoples, nations and cultures.

Some Stories are so Powerful That They Literally Define Our Species

Why do some stories last for thousands of years or even hundreds of thousands of years? There is evidence that kernels of some of our stories goes back before our species even existed in our modern form of Homo-Sapien-Sapien. Imagine that, a part of a story being told 800,000 years later and still has an impact on our world even to this day!

Do You Know Your Role, Your Purpose in the Story we Call Life?

Do you know your place in this story like that of King Arthur? Or are you like Icarus who flies too close to the sun and meets an early demise?

Do you know your role in it like that of the Sage archetype? Or are you like the wandering fool archetype who has no clue about anything?

Can you change your role like that of Odin who has more than 200 names? Or are you doomed to the same fate day in and day out like poor Prometheus having his liver eaten by an eagle?

Do you understand the power of your story and how it impacts everything that you do like Joan of Arc and her mission to save her homeland? Or are you like Odysseus who gets swept up by the winds of fate lost on the journey home?

If you feel that your life is meaningless and without purpose. If you feel that you are not living up to your potential, if you feel apathetic and lack a passion for life then you are not living your own story, much less being the author of it.