I met with my Academic Advisor this week and a dream is becoming a reality. I will graduate in the spring from South Mountain Community College, receive my Storytelling Certification, and head onward to Arizona State University in the fall of 2016. When I began my second phase of academia, I wanted to be a Counselor and continue in the field of behavior health, a field I had given my life to for almost thirty years. Then the SMCC Storytelling Institute became my home.
In the summer of 2013, I needed a class that could be fun and easy-peasy. I took my first storytelling class as an easy humanities. How hard could reading “The Three Little Pigs” to little kids be? How far off could Disney have been in telling the story of Hercules and his labors? Mrs. Doubtfire had nothing on me.
My first course was the Art of Storytelling and it was life changing. I’m not the first to feel that way. I also realized with a tear in my eye that Personal Stories is my last storytelling class. I will begin my storytelling practicum in the spring of 2016. Where has the time gone by?
I have been a storytelling student for a bit more than two years and during this time I have come to know myself deeper and with more appreciation. I have come to know an amazing group of storytellers and mentors who have shown me so many new possibilities for this phase of my life but what I’ve enjoyed the most is redefining my responsibility to my community. I’ve learned that embracing my responsibility as a storyteller begins with my listeners and accepting their interaction with humility and grace.
It grew with the crafting of personal stories. Going back home to the good and the bad and being proud of my ancestors and honoring them with a story and growing forward as an Elder myself. From folktales to this semester of learning to craft personal stories I have been celebrating and defining my future in story. What an astounding journey. Sometimes I was the hero, sometimes the problem, but I learned that change is good in order to make life normal again, even if but for a moment in time.
The joy of learning to tell a story isn’t memorizing a script or that the performance is about me. It’s about knowing my audience and making the connection with them! I was grateful to have this insight in my storytelling toolbox at a recent Arizona Storytellers event devoted to tales of sisters. Generally, the stories are targeted audiences for 13 years of age and up. I had explicit curse words in my story that lent realism and authenticity, however as I looked out I saw a young girl most definitely not thirteen and changed the wording and direction to respect my audience – I took my cue from them. It wasn’t about me. It was about the story engaging the audience.
I’ve learned the meaning of “listen,” “to listen,” and “listening,” and that has laid the ground work for continued growth as a storyteller. I’m learning what I like and don’t like to tell. I’ve learned the importance of the making a connection with the listening audience and to respect the story as well as them. I’ve enjoyed refining and enhancing my values and sense of ethics as I grow forward as a storyteller. I had to open up, dump the old, so I could be ready for the new possibilities that await me in life and as a member of the storytelling community. I have so much to experience and so much to learn and so much to share. It is exciting to be free of old tapes and to develop new ones. Like my classmate Sally Borg, I’ll be back several more times to repeat beloved courses and keep fresh and to laugh!
I leave you with my new mantra, in the form of a parable: “A Cup of Tea.”
Nan-in, a Japanese master during the Meiji era, received a university professor who came to inquire about Zen. Nan-in served tea. He poured his visitor’s cup full, and then kept on pouring. The professor watched the overflow until he could no longer restrain himself. “It is overfull. No more will go in!” “Like this cup,” Nan-in said, “You are full of your own opinions and speculations. How can I show you Zen unless you first empty your cup?” Indeed!
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