storytelling

We’re apes. We think we’re all sophisticated with our toaster ovens and designer footwear, but we’re just a bunch of finely ornamented apes. And because we are apes, we instinctually measure ourselves against others and vie for status.

When a topic is complex, stories are like leverage.

“Things are the way they are because they got that way,” always loses out to a narrative centred around deliberate, conscious intention and design.

Holmes, however, has an idea. “Of course, this blood belongs to a second individual—presumably the murderer, if murder has been committed,” he tells the two policemen. “It reminds me of the circumstances attendant on the death of Van Jansen, in Utrecht, in the year ’34. Do you remember the case, Gregson?” Gregson confesses that he does not. “Read

It’s a human need to be told stories. The more we’re governed by idiots and have no control over our destinies, the more we need to tell stories to each other about who we are, why we are, where we come from, and what might be possible. — Alan Rickman

J. Pierpont Morgan observed, in one of his analytical interludes, that a person usually has two reasons for doing a thing: one that sounds good and a real one.

DO YOU HAVE A MEANINGFUL STORY? A. Viktor Frankl would be proud of me.

Having written a blog since 2004, I’ve long understood the power of unbridled honestly and unflinching vulnerability.

Matt’s Three Rules of Vacation Stories 1. No one wants to hear about your vacation. 2. If someone asks to hear about your vacation, they are being polite. See rule #1. 3. If you had a moment that was actually storyworthy while you were on vacation, that is a story that should be told. But it should not include the quality of the local cuisine or