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Voyage and Return

It is 5am, and I’m downstairs on the couch, sitting right up against the front window. I reach my fingertips out, and feel the remains of the night chill on the glass. It’s beginning to get light outside, but there isn’t any colour yet - just a vague pastel blue grey. There’s a tree by the street, every leaf still and monochrome like a pencil sketch. I know that each minute that passes now will lift those leaves into more vibrance, along with the sky, the streaky clouds, and the limestone wall along our garden bed. And sometime between now and then, the sun will have risen, and the day will become distinct.

January to me feels like this time between first light and sunrise. A no-mans-land of vagary and indistinct shapes, each new day bringing a little bit more colour and clarity to the year, but, who really knows when the sun will actually crest the horizon. After the mad hustle of December, January is a reprieve for some, a recovery for others, a reward for yet other others.

I don’t know if it’s because I have kids, or because I'd shot weddings for so long, or both, but January was never any of those things for me. It was just, messy. School holidays meant a kind of responsibility-overload, paired with the hourly deadlines of editing the outstanding weddings of the last 8 weeks, and then topped off with all the existential questions one asks of oneself each new year:

“where am I going?”
“what really matters in life?”
“did I live a life worthy of living last year?”

In those past years, the only way to survive was to compartmentalise. In this moment, I am fully present with the kids. In this next moment, I am fully present with my editing. The next moment, going for a walk, spending time with loved ones, laughing at a thing.. It went moment by present moment, each of them disconnected from the other.

It’s not like that anymore, thank goodness. For something unsustainable, I sustained it for too long. But, January is still messy.

This year, I’m finding it useful to assign a plot archetype to the month of January. For me, it’s a VOYAGE AND RETURN plot. A protagonist heads out into the big world, experiences some things, and returns changed somehow. There’s a transformation, or an elixir brought back, or whatever else. So I’m looking back over the month as if I have just returned from a great voyage, and I’m sifting through my pockets of experiences, searching for elixirs.

With the sun already warming up the sky, and the leaves across the street bright and dancing in a new breeze, I find that my pockets are full of elixirs. I have a hope here, that I feel so deep. It will support us the whole year I reckon. Rach and I have communities that we can work with and play with, who love us and believe in great things. I find so many vials of encouragement, gifts from distant lands reminding us that we are all connected, and all valuable.

January hasn’t been a mess. It has just been a journey, and we have returned with dusty clothes and happy kids, a renewed focus and a burning drive to create things in the world.

We’re tired, but we are together, and we are as excited about the year as those dancing leaves seem to be about the new day.

On joining a gym

A month ago, Rach and I joined a gym. I’ve never been any good at these things.

I tried a gym once when I was nineteen, and it was a disaster. I would put my headphones on and stride into the place like I saw the guys in the movies do, and just start loading up the weights. After three dumbbell curls my arms hurt too much to lift them, and a few leg presses later I was exhausted. I didn’t have a trainer or anything, and I didn’t know how to ask for help, so five minutes in, I’d be packing up to leave. And that was really my only experience with gyms.

That, and the time I was hit on in the gym pool by a much older man. Being alone and wearing very little, while a large hairy stranger describes how attractive he finds my body, was definitely a strong reason to never, ever return.

Anyway, 20-odd years later I'm trying again, and this time everything is better. Rach and I would go together, our own little team, every second morning at 7am. There were no monster heavyweights strutting about looking down on us, no spectacularly beautiful bodies demanding that we go harder and faster and better and one day we'll look like them. There were just everyday humans in pretty good shape high-fiving and encouraging us to do our best, but not so much that we throw up. It's been really great.

This morning, halfway through the session, I noticed something that's probably quite obvious to everyone else. I was hanging from a bar, trying to lift my knees up to my chest for the fortieth time, sweat running down my face like acid rain, and I realised that all of this, really... hurts.

Like, every moment of our 50-minute session involved some kind of pain, each muscle group getting their chance to endure a bit of hell as we moved around each station. Swinging from that bar, I looked around the room, and each face wore its own version of agony. There were grunts, gasps, panting, the occasional expletive. Everyone was feeling it. Actual pain, and the worst thing is, we had all chosen it for ourselves.

I got my knees up that last time, and dropped to the floor with a little "oof," and crawled over to the burpee station. Before I had a chance to think anymore, I was off on a new journey of pain.

I do know how exercise works. We exert some effort and the endorphins kick in and then we experience some kind of "high." Honestly, I haven't felt the high yet, which means I may not be pushing myself enough or something, but what I really, really appreciate is what happens to my mind during that hour:

When we start the workout, the rest of the world, with all of its pressure, anxiety, uncertainty, and busyness, fades away. Our attention is completely present, in this moment of our next breath, nothing beyond the routine before us. We're not forecasting or fearing the future. We're not retrieving or regretting the past. We're not processing intellectual arguments or emotional conundrums or responsibilities or anything else.

Within this 50-minute timeframe, we are at peace. There is pain, but there is also peace.

And for me, I also feel a sense of freedom. Which is strange, considering the amount of restrictions and limitations that the workout demands, but nonetheless, I feel free. By choosing the path, by clicking "attend session" on the app, I create an oasis for my mind, a reprieve from the overwhelm. For one hour, the entire world is held back. It can go wait for me over there, by the door, while I do my thing.

Stories are often crafted around a three-act structure, where Act 1 pushes a character into the conflict, Act 2 describes all the conflict and transformation, and Act 3 wraps it all up with a resolution and ultimate transformation (for better or worse).

The interesting thing about Act 1 is how difficult it is for the character to make that first decision, the one that forces them into the big story. It's a comfort-or-conflict choice, and the rest of the story hinges on the answer. But, once the decision has been made, the work begins and the character doesn't struggle with that choice anymore: life is too exciting now.

I feel like that with these workout, and I often feel like that with the rest of life. It's the hardest thing to click "do it!" on the app, and lock myself in to a session, but once I have, my mind relaxes, and I just go and do the work.

After the decision, there is peace.

Within the limitations, there is freedom.

Though there is pain, there is also pride, and transformation.

I'm absolutely not an exercise junkie yet, and I still dislike pain. But, I'm finding myself more and more looking forward to these sessions, and will even tap "yes" to them now with a tiny bit of joy.

Plot choices

Since January 1, there have been three specific subjects that have leapt to the surface of all the conversations I've been having. On both sides of the vax fence, across the wealth and privilege spectrum, and with no regard to age or gender, these three threads of consciousness keep spiking up, like a heartbeat monitor, or a FaceBook ad. Ordinarily I might have overlooked them as, well, pretty legitimate concerns given the world we're in right now. But, the three threads together caught my attention, so here we are.

The first thread is this:

"It's a new year, I must plan my days, make some resolutions."

The second, not surprisingly, is this one:

"The world is so uncertain right now. I feel more fear than hope. I don't know how I'll actually get through this year."

And the third, probably due to my role as a Story Coach, is this:

"I'm not a storyteller."

Maybe you can see already how these three ideas connect, but it took me a while. I had to close my eyes and just type it out - freewriting the tangled mess of thoughts and intuition in my head. As I typed, I realised I was feeling some anger, and frustration, and some hope.

I'm frustrated at most of humanity, to be honest, including myself. Every time we say "I'm not a storyteller" or "I don't have any good stories to tell" or "I just live a normal boring life" it jars my soul. Because we are ALL storytellers. We are constantly telling and retelling our stories, to ourselves, to our friends and family and kids and social networks. We go to sleep telling our stories to ourselves, making things mean this or that, blaming this person or that person, validating this hurt or elevating this piece of ego. We are prolific storytellers.

This is the whole reason I do what I do: I think EVERYONE needs to share their stories. I think it's vital for humanity, that the rest of us hear what you have discovered about the world we're all scrambling through. We are all built to consume stories, and we are all, always, telling them. And while my job is to help people craft their ideas in a way that is meaningful, the paradigm goes far beyond books and presentations. We have the power to craft our life stories in the same way.

But, when our crafting ends up on auto-pilot, our stories end up just feeding our ego, or our pain, or our pride. Even though they have such great power to nourish our souls with deeper elements like meaning, peace and hope.

(I guess this is all sounding a bit mad by now, but stay with me. I'll either bring this home, or completely lose my way. It's really 50/50 at this stage...)

For me, what connects the three big ideas together - making plans, fear and uncertainly, storytelling - is CHOICE.

A writer is constantly making choices about the events that are included in their story. While absolutely EVERYTHING might happen to a character, not everything deserves equal weight, and the writer will elevate some events, diminish others, and even cut some scenes from the book, in order to keep the focus on what is important. And we do the exact same thing in our lives. When we retell our stories, and when we are right in the middle of living a story, we will unconsciously elevate certain events and diminish others. I do this all the time, and very often I end up with a story that feeds my own ego: "here's a story of my day that shows how awesome I am..." or worse, "...how tragic my life is."

The power a writer has, and the power we all have in life, is this: We have the agency to elevate or diminish the impact of an event in our lives. And we can craft the telling of these events in such a way as to transform ourselves, and those around us.

Even with all the uncertainty, we can still ask ourselves questions like "what is valuable in life?" "what do I believe about love? Hope? Beauty?" And then we sort through the mess of life events, elevate some and diminish others, and slowly craft a story that resonates with that message.

The way we shape our stories can bring hope, encourage a fresh perspective on life, contribute to a deep insight of the world, all of those things. When we don't have so much control over the events, we still have control over the telling of the story, and it's my hope that all of us take up the "storyteller" mantle for ourselves, and curate our experiences in a way that will nourish our souls, and eventually, perhaps the soul of the world too.

Looking for the exits

Last year, I wrote about Rach's shakti mat. It was all about distributing conflict, so as to avoid one piece of discomfort becoming so sharp and urgent that it takes over our whole life. It's a great read, I think (and you can find it at nathanmaddigan.com/blog) but it turns out, I'm not done with this damn shakti mat.

Yesterday, I was lying on it again. And it hurt so much.

First I tried to ignore the pain - you know, think happy thoughts, tell myself stories, replay a tv show in my head - but that didn't work at all. So then I tried to get away from the pain somehow. I'd sit up, try and roll over a bit, arch my back so that less tiny spikes were stabbing me. But nothing helped.

It was exhausting, and frustrating, and somehow, the pain kept hurting. And it felt broad, like it was everywhere. Any mental exit I ran to was suddenly blocked by the pain. Happy thoughts, stories, the tv show, they all had this cloud of discomfort that dropped between us, so that I couldn't find the door handle and escape.

My mind felt like it was rolling around in a soft panic, unconsciously pushing back against the pain, searching for a way out.

After a few minutes of this torture, I tried something new. I gave up.

I stopped looking for exits and just leaned all the way into the mat, and focussed my attention on the needles pressing into my skin.

It was a completely different experience. My mind cleared, the panic subsided, and I felt free to just put that pain into its own compartment. Once I allowed myself to focus directly on the pain, I could see its edges, and it wasn't as huge as I thought. It wasn't all-consuming.

It was there, but it wasn't EVERYWHERE. When I was ignoring it and searching for relief, it felt like it was everywhere, and it was trapping me, controlling me. When I looked directly at it, I kind of trapped the pain instead. I could see all the exits now, I had some perspective back.

As I kept doing this focusing-thing: eyes closed, attention narrowed to the pointy daggers in my back, I began to notice something else: the pain was becoming less. My body was getting used to it, my mind was observing it, and I began relaxing, softening.

It was doing its Shakti-mat-healing thing, I suppose. The pain was slowly replaced with a warmth, as the blood flowed to areas on my skin that needed it the most.

Whatever was happening there, five minutes later I was so comfortable I had a nap. Truly. Right there on a bed of nails.

Now, please, please hear me: this post isn't really about pain, per se. I'm in no way suggesting that I have some kind of zen-like solution to pain, especially debilitating chronic pain, and I'm definitely not playing it down. Experiencing ANY amount of pain sucks. It hurts, sometimes a whole lot. Sometimes it takes over your entire life, and every day is a struggle to keep going.

With deep respect to those who experience this kind of life, it would be daftly naive of me to profess to know how you feel, or give you some kind of solution. This post is not *that*.

If anything, this experience with the shakti mat might just be a metaphor for the way many of us deal with discomfort.

In storytelling, characters will always try and avoid discomfort. They look away, turn away, walk away, avoid, ignore, distract... It's human nature, and it's okay. If a character didn't do it, we wouldn't even believe the story. It would seem somehow false.

The problem is, while the characters try and avoid all discomfort, the writer is spending all their time focusing on it. Writers know that stories need conflict. That conflict drives change, decision, transformation, all of that. So the writer will be considering the pain in great detail, finding the best way to get it right up in the face of the characters so that they must engage with it, and respond to it somehow.

I hate discomfort. And conflict, and pain. I'd choose comfort every chance I get, just quietly.

But, this shakti mat helped me realise that when there does happen to be a pain, a discomfort in my life somewhere, things do NOT go well for me or those around me if all I do is run about in a panic, looking for exits. I don't treat people well, I don't think straight, and I often don't even know exactly what it is that is hurting me. I only know that it keeps getting in the way of my exit strategy.

It's only when I stop unconsciously reacting to the hurt, and deliberately look at the source, not the exits, that I find my way forward.

So, with all that Rach and I have on this coming year, I know there will be great discomforts, great challenges and conflicts and hurdles to get over together, and as a character I'm completely terrified of that.

But as a writer, I'm wildly excited about this story. This year is going to be great.

All words no pictures

I love this week between Christmas and New Year. Nobody seems to know what to do. Some shops are closed, some are open, most of the population have headed away from the city for their holidays, and those that are left wander the streets like kings of the apocalypse, owners of a ghost town. None of the usual rules apply.

It's a limbo week, as the year wraps itself up, and everything new is right there on the horizon. Fresh starts and open skies, just over that ridge. And as we walk towards the shiny lights, we discard the luggage of the year, letting go all the victories, the defeats, the joys and the hurts, so that we can start again.

This year for me was all words, and no pictures. For fifty-two weeks, I only wrote. As a photographer, who was only known for being a photographer, this was a different path, and certainly not one that any business coach would advise. "Leverage your imagery" they would say. "Don't waste that talent."

But, way back in January I wrote about "chasing ourselves" no matter the cost. That is, leaning in to who we are becoming - whenever we discover another piece of ourselves we chase it down, and we keep growing.

And that's really what I did this year. There were so many pieces of myself that resonated so strongly around meaning, relationships and storytelling that I wrote all year about it, and had the pleasant surprise of not running out of things to say.

I've loved every moment of this process. It was hard sometimes in those zero-degree mornings to get up and write, and it was hard after a 15-hour day to head out to a bar and write, but every single time I did it, I loved it.

Story theorist Robert McKee once wrote that when we experience a story, we are seeing the storyteller's own map of the hidden order of life. In all the things I've written, some of them simple stories, some of them a little more complex, what has risen to the surface are ideas around meaning, connection, conflict, relationships, identity, work, authenticity, truth, awareness, love, and whimsy. And all of it, wrapped in this frame of "storytelling," and "story-living."

If these elements were my personal map of life's hidden order, I'd be okay with that.

I'm excited about 2022. I'm excited to write more words, and perhaps also play with some pictures again. Or video. Or paint. Maybe some interpretive dance. I'm sure the medium doesn't matter as much as any of us think. But whichever form it takes, I hope I can keep accessing my map of life's hidden order, and when I share it, I hope that you will take only what is useful for your own world, at the right time.

Thank you for your encouragement over the year. Thank you for reading and commenting and sharing. I know I'm just writing for myself ultimately, but it's really fun to hear how these words resonate with others. We really are all in this together.

And Rach, thank you for giving me that soft but oh-so-powerful permission each day to spend the time.

With so much love, and giddy excitement for the new year.

The Christmas show

One year in my early twenties, I was in a Christmas production for our local church. I played Joseph, soon to be married to Mary, the mother of Jesus. I’m not sure how I was roped in to this role, but it probably had something to do with Mim.

Mim - Miriam was her full name - was the kind of human that was just born with shine. At nineteen years old, she was already completely fine in her own skin - confident, dorky, just as willing to get up on a stage as she was sweeping up the trash after a show. She laughed all the time, and she talked all the time, and her talk was filled with questions, ideas, and rants about God and boys.

Once, she was so into her monologue that she followed me into the church bathrooms, all the way in. She even stepped up to the urinal with me, at which point I waved a hand in front of her face, pointed down, and laughed “Mim. Urinal.”

“What?” She looks around like she just teleported onto the tiles, and her eyes go wide. “Oh shit!” she squeals, and careens away, like a baby giraffe on a slip-and-slide, “Ew! Ew! Gross! Ew!” Mim was great.

So, Mim and I were in this play. For a week leading up to Christmas we would act out the birth of Jesus - the Christmas story. Mim played Mary, and most of the days she got to hold a real live baby, which was pretty special for the audience. There were shepherds, and wise men, and a star, and a choir. We even had a real donkey. Just the one donkey, but it somehow represented all the animals in the manger, or something. What it did best was leave enormous landmines at the door of the church. But between the dumping donkey and the real-live baby Jesus, we had a pretty solid production going on.

What I remember most though, was the Thursday lunchtime show. The show where everything fell apart.

First, the baby wasn’t available. Double booked for a Huggies commercial I suppose. “Fine,” says Mim, “I can nurse a little watermelon or something."

Then, the donkey got lost, somewhere on the farm. Then two of the three wise men had forgotten to ask their parents for permission to be here, and were stuck at home. One by one, the cast dropped away, until our production manager Kelsey declared that we’d have to cancel. She said it was only a small group of parents anyway, and they could attend the Friday show.

Mim shrugged, and looked at me. “What else can we do? We can’t play all the roles ourselves, and I don’t have that many watermelons."

I looked back at her, and because she had asked the question, I felt I needed to answer.

“Let’s do it anyway.” I say.

“You’re kidding. With watermelons?” Mim claps her hands.

“Watermelons are expensive.” Kelsey states with a frown.

“No, not watermelons,” I’m staring over Mim’s shoulder to the television in the corner, some talk show is playing on mute. “Let’s have a question-and-answer time. Mim, you and I can just be Mary and Joseph and let the audience ask us questions. We can still share the Christmas story, but it can be more casual, you know?"

Kelsey is still frowning, but I know she’d rather run something than have to cancel. Mim is nodding slowly, eyes bright, a little half-smile on her lips.

“Let’s do it!” Mim announces.

So, an hour later, before an audience of twenty, Miriam and I walk onto the stage, all dressed up in cliche Biblical attire, and pull up some stools.

—

Back then, I had no idea what the ingredients were for a successful story. I thought we just share information, and label it “story.” That was what our production had been doing all week: We were pretty much laying out the information about Jesus’ birth, with some actors reading some lines.

So when our first question, from a young mother on the front row, was “Um.. How was your trip to Bethlehem?” we replied with some information: “Oh, fine thank you. We took a camel from here to here, there was no room at the inn so we found a stable…” etc. Even as I was sharing it, I felt the energy dropping. Information-sharing isn’t the same as storytelling.

Another question followed, for Mim, “Mary, it must feel wonderful to have such a supportive man by your side, while you carry the Lord’s child inside you?”

It wasn’t even a question, but Mim responded with a smile, “Oh yes, it's really very nice."

Energy. Dropping some more.

What happened next was out of character for me, except that I was playing IN character, so it seemed to fit. A man in the back row was already asking another question, and I stood up, with my fake beard and funny robe, and I held out my hand, which stopped the question mid-sentence.

“Hold on.” I said, taking in the surprise on each face, and the concern on Kelsey’s. “I.. Um..” I looked at Mim, who looked equally surprised, but excited too - she gave me a little nod and a smile. “To be honest,” I continued, “it wasn’t nice at all. It was horrible.”

There were a few gasps, and Kelsey slapped her palm into her face, but in such a way that she didn’t even blink, which I thought was impressive.

“What was horrible, Joseph?” A grandfather at the side of the group seemed truly curious.

“The whole process!” I replied, sitting back on my stool and shaking my head. “How would YOU react to your fiancé suddenly and mysteriously becoming pregnant, and then saying the baby was God's?” Mim caught up instantly.

“It’s true, Joseph was a mess! He did not NOT take it well.” She crossed over to me and put her hand on my shoulder, still addressing the crowd. “He thought I’d cheated on him. Then he though I was mistaken, making it all up. We had some fights.”

“Some big fights.” I continued. “I mean, she’d never done anything like this before, but it was really hard to get my head around. I was so angry.”

“What were you angry at?” A tiny woman sitting on the floor called out.

“Well, I was angry at Mary, for being so calm about it all, and I was angry at God, for doing things in a way that I just NEVER understand, and I was angry at myself, for not knowing how to deal with it all.” I took a breath. "I wasn’t being my best self, and I couldn’t change it, and I hate that."

I had passed my hand over my eyes for a second, and when I looked up, everyone was staring at us. There were nods in the crowd, a few tears. Mim returned to her stool, and the questions after that became a lot more interesting. We talked about the Christmas story, sure, but we did it in a profoundly human way, with real emotions and conflicts and doubt.

We’d somehow shifted from the surface questions of “what happened?” to the deeper story-questions of “what did you make all that mean?” and “what do you believe about it?”

At the end of our hour, the audience applauded and many came over and hugged us. One man said that he finally understood something he’d been struggling with for a decade. The tiny woman on the floor shook my hand solemnly and said that she absolutely does not believe in God, but she thinks He did a good job when He created human emotions.

Another woman drew Mim aside and sternly advised her to raise the child well, and not let him ever be ashamed of his beginnings. Mim nodded sagely and thanked her with a hug.

I think I remembered that hour so clearly because, out of all the shows, this one seemed to matter. Whatever happened there wasn’t the usual information-sharing, with a bit of entertainment thrown in. It went deeper. The audience were moved. And we felt great playing our part in that movement.

I reckon this was what playwrights felt when they put a new play on the stage, and saw their audience engaging with the story. And it is probably why they write such elements into their scripts as vulnerability, honesty, conflict and beauty.

Because we want our interactions with others to matter. And all these elements of humanity - the vulnerability and the conflict - help to unearth the stuff that matters.

A social constellation

A few days ago, Rach and I found ourselves driving along the coast of Cottesloe, heading towards a party filled with people we mostly wouldn't know. The sun splashed sideways across the windshield, catching on every dust spot and unfortunate bug that had settled on the glass. Beach-pines lined the road on our left, creating a strobe of shadows and blinding brights as we cruised past the little beaches and ice cream shops.

"I might not last too long tonight." Rach says. "We've been up since five am, hey?"
I look over to her, awash in the flickering golden light, and want nothing more than to turn the car around, head home, and snuggle in to bed with snacks and a movie. "I'm with you, love. We can just drop in, say hi to our new friends, and then sneak away."
She nods, and smiles at me. I don't know if her smile looked tired, or if it was my tiredness that made me interpret it that way.

I sometimes wonder why we say "yes" to things. What was going on in my head that caused me to respond so positively to an invite from a stranger? By saying "yes" Rach and I effectively locked ourselves in to a commitment that would take energy, time and even money (we are bringing a plate and a beverage after all) for potentially zero returns.

On the rational surface, we both should have said "no." Our weeks are busy, our bodies tired. But there was something else in us, something deeper, that whispered "yes." Something aspirational, perhaps.

I slowed the car as we got closer to the address, looking for parking, and taking in the area. On our left was the ocean, on our right, our destination: an ageing apartment block, old - like 70's old - red brick and white cement, pretty run-down really. As we rolled past, I could see couches and rugs laid out on the grass behind the letterboxes. Low tables with cheeses and a little stage in the corner. It was neither a house party nor a beach party, being where it was right there on the verge. A border party, maybe. Switzerland.

We parked a bit further up, and started walking. There was a delicious barbecue aroma in the air, and some upbeat tunes in the wind. Around us, others were arriving, converging from all directions. I imagined what this would look like from high above, through a filter that only sees energies, and none of the geography.

I would be a pale blue line, travelling from there to here. Rach would be a yellow line, right now snaking alongside me, but will no doubt skew once we arrive at the party. And then there would be all these other lines - every colour in existence, all streaking across the landscape, heading towards each other. I imagine it would look a bit like a constellation, with each intersection of lines a tiny stardust explosion. Every crossing of one human with another, a potential connection point, a potential new creation.

The possibilities that these simple intersections carry are mind-blowing, if you think about it. Five years ago my line crossed with Rach's and we backtracked, crossed again, spun and danced and twined ourselves up so tight together that it must have looked like a supernova tied in a knot.

We step off the curb and enter the party - all these energetic lines slide past us, weaving, sparking, all smiles. A complete stranger in aviator glasses points at me from across the grass, waves, and nods his head knowingly before turning back to his conversation. I laugh, surprised by the gesture, and another stranger sees my smile and returns one of her own.

Something happens in places like this, places where all our lines converge. I'm sure it can go either way, but what I saw on this afternoon was a gathering of souls all attuned to the same intention: openness, grace, kindness, interest. We all thought the best of another, and gave the best of ourselves.

As the sun dropped below the horizon, the live band gave way to the DJ, and the picnic blankets became little dance floors. Neither of us wanted to leave. I was deep in a conversation with some new friends, and Rach was dancing with a diminutive ninja sporting an afro and a catgirl mask. We stayed for hours, laughing, dancing, connecting. The tiredness that accompanied us on our drive here had certainly not stuck around.

It's a strange dynamic, this give-and-take of energy between humans. Without any of the intersections, Rach and I would have lasted ten minutes at that place. But our lines collide with others, and in little starbursts of humanity we both light up. And we return with stories, experiences, new friends, even new projects to begin together.

When storytellers are crafting a meaningful story for their characters, they will use "conflict" as a vehicle to get their characters moving, growing, changing. But conflict isn't always painful: sometimes it's just the thing that pushes up against comfort. Technically speaking, it was harder work to go out and talk and listen and dance than it would have been to just watch a show in bed. But, once we were there, once we tipped ourselves out of the comfort and into the melee of life, we actually enjoyed the additional work.

It’s like we needed to be here, at this place we didn’t want to be at, because it would make our lives more meaningful. And in a story, the writer knows this. The writer knows what each character is capable of, and will place them in circumstances and interactions that will get them there. I think we can all have some measure of trust in our innate human ability, when intersecting with others, to shine.

This is why writers throw characters into difficult situations. It’s not cruelty. It’s omniscience.

Deus ex machina

This week Rach and I had lunch with our accountant, Hau (pronounced "how," just to save your brain for the remainder of this post.)

Hau is an incredibly generous, powerful and humble soul, who has taken care of me ever since we studied business and accounting together. In those classes, he was the A-grade student who would have his head down, scribbling furiously and soaking in all the information, while I was the art-brained student, clearly on the wrong career path, staring out the window and falling asleep on the desk.

I don't even know how we became friends, but decades later here we are - meeting over lunch to talk about family, love, tax and cryptocurrency.

On our way in, Rach and I were not doing well. We were shattered, heart-sore and bank-account-sore, to be honest. We are in the middle of a thing that demands all our time and all our savings, so each day is a battle to stay above the chaos. Our "thing" is epic - the destination is so exciting - but some days, the journey really hurts.

So we drove in silence. We took some deep breaths and sometimes reached for each other's hand. I couldn't get my words right, and there was a lump in my throat.

The restaurant was in the Crown complex, so we drove to the free parking area then started walking. In a few minutes we were surrounded by shiny lights, glass towers, theatres and bars. The casino was pumping. As we passed the entry, each gripping the other's hand a little too tight, I imagined just swinging in to the roulette table. "Five minutes," I'd tell Rach, and then I'd bet the car, or something, and win big, and walk out with a cool million in cash, and then finally be able to buy Hau lunch instead of the other way round.

Hau meets us with laughs and hugs, shaking his head at everything that's going on in his life. "Eat! Eat!" he tells us, "what are we just sitting here for?" And we head to the buffet. I'm still deciding which kind of rice should accompany my first scoop of curry and Hau swings past with a plate full of vegetables and greens and something that looks like salmon crossed with a dumpling crossed with a cucumber. "Come on Nathan! Fill your plate man!"

I'm still thinking about the casino. How great life would be if we just won a bazillion dollers. How much of the chaos could be removed.

—

In ancient Greek and Roman drama, there was a practice that playwrights often employed to resolve the chaotic plot lines in their stories. When everything got too messy, instead of working the characters through conflict, growth and change, the writers would simply have one of their many gods turn up to solve everything.

Literally, two minutes before the end of the play, an actor playing a god would appear, suspended by a crane over the stage, and they would fix everything.

In Latin, this was called “deus ex machina.”

God, from a machine.

We use the same phrase today in writing, to describe random acts or events that save everything, that come out of nowhere and just fix all the chaos and resolve all the conflict. It’s the weakest way to resolve a plot, and the audience feels it instinctively: all this conflict was built up, ready for some powerful story-moments, and then, poof! Any sense of meaning turns to disappointment, eye-rolling, frustration.

All that aside, I’d still be up for a super-improbable event to solve all my problems. Maybe a rich relative could leave me a mansion?

—

Hau is talking about crypto now. There was a big crash in the market recently, and many investors were left with nothing. Hau said that those who lost everything were the ones who put all their hopes in the one magical crypto stock that they hoped would take them to the moon. They stopped trying, growing, learning, he said, and instead they just waited.

I ask what stops him from becoming like them - content to just wait for the big rescue. He pauses to think, and then tells us that every morning when he wakes, he signs the cross, and gives thanks for his breath, his health, the sunlight on his face, the children in his household. He doesn’t demand or expect a magical rescuer. He just gets into the work, and remains thankful for any provision that comes his way.

I look over his shoulder to the flashing lights of the keno machines, and give a little sigh.

As we walk back across the parking lot, nothing has been solved. Hau didn’t fix us, we didn’t win a million dollars, and we’re already late for our next thing. But, Hau did give us a "next step," and we’re already talking excitedly about the work. We’re either foolish or courageous, but either way we’re not afraid to get back into the work, to keep going in the conflict.

I hope our audience never gets the chance to roll their eyes at us. I hope that we can keep going, keep engaging in the highs and lows. There is so much meaning to be found, moments to experience, good work to complete, and so many incredible humans to share life with.

We are capable of bringing our own order into the chaos, and if a "deus ex machina" moment happens, we’ll take it for sure, but it’s going to have to keep up, because we’ve got work to do.

Subplots

When I think of my life, I mostly see stories. The past, with its memories and experiences. The future, all hopes and dreams. And the present, where I try and direct my story so that I get things I want in life. Basically.

This isn’t a new revelation or anything, and we all do it. It’s fundamentally human to arrange our lives into stories, and it’s how we end up connecting with other humans: we share our experiences and we listen to others’ share theirs. I'll ask you about love, and you might start with something intellectual, but you’ll end up referencing a personal experience.

If I ask about shame, it would be the same thing. Or laughter, or God, or book reading, trees, swimming pools, fresh bread, sleep, Sonic the Hedgehog.. No matter what the subject is, you and I will both head to the library in our heads and find the book that connects to the topic, and we’ll share it.

I have friends who are amazing at accessing the right book at the right moment. For any subject or topic, they can just grab the relevant book off their mental shelf and share their story. They are some of the most entertaining humans I know.

I tend to meander through my library. I’m not quick to grab the obvious book, because for me there isn’t one. There are ten. You say “swimming pool” and I reach for the books about "gasping for air," “summer nights,” “whirlpools with neighbours,” "skinny dipping in Los Angeles" and "favourite kitchen designs."

And the older we get, the more stories gather in our mental bookshelves. Stories and opinions and insights and memories. We have galaxies in us.

But here's where it falls apart. As magical as our brains are at cataloguing all this data, it's still a bloody big bookshelf. And, if we're honest with ourselves, our cataloguing system is a complete mess. With every new experience, we toss another book onto the pile. It's easy to start looking at our lives as an eclectic mix of disconnected experiences.

For my story coaching clients, our greatest challenge is almost always this one: to craft meaningful plot lines out of all the random experiences and ideas of life. Without curating and arranging the stories, the whole thing becomes noise.

I have a dear friend who recently shared with me how much of her life feels like noise. She said she has been working on so many subplots in her life that she can't even find a central plot anymore. She had invested her life into the side-hustle of her children, for example, and suddenly realised she had lost her self in the process.

Kids are a big one, but it’s not only the “children” subplot that can take us over. We give so much time to our work, our hobbies, our partner, our responsibilities, our health, our studies, that it’s no surprise we lose our hold on a “central plot” for our lives. In fact, for many of us, we would struggle to even be able to define a Central Plot. We may have had aspirations at one time in our lives, but now we're just living in subplots, filling the gaps with smaller stories.

I'm not saying that living a life of subplots is bad. In storytelling, subplots exist to add dimension to our narrative, and to our identity. They keep our life stories interesting, they allow us to learn more about stuff and things. Subplots are awesome.

Except, when we lose control of them. Except when we forget they are SUB plots and start thinking they are our EVERYTHING plot.

What I mean is this: in a great story, every subplot will serve the overarching Central Plot. Ideally, a subplot would push us along the path of our Central Plot, with great pieces of conflict and challenges and choices to make. A really good subplot can even launch us into our Central Plot, and get our greatest life stories happening.

But, there must be a relationship between the plots to hold the story together. If the audience cannot find a unity between the subplots and the Central Plot, then it disengages, and the plots split into confusion. I've felt this way so often over the years. The confusion of disconnected plot lines.

I think we are called to BE someone. Not just DO a whole lot of disconnected subplots, but to BE someone. We are each valuable and powerful souls, journeying through this life growing into ourselves, daily becoming. Who we are, as individuals, matters to the world. Who we want to become, matters.

My own Central Plot is (of course) a work in progress, but I know that I am heading towards a greater capacity to love, and to receive love. To write, and create in a way that pulls humanity towards freedom and hope. To support, listen and empower others. To dive deep into story philosophy and then share the bits that matter when the time is right. To be a joyful wide-eyed soul in the world. All of that.

And there are subplots that push me along that path, that add meaning to my days. But there are also subplots that distract me, that split my story into confusion. Each time I discover one, I have to seek help, try to rewrite or remove it.

I know this is a strange post. You're probably trying to decide if it goes on the "self help" shelf or in the "confusing musings" corner. Wherever it lands in your library, I hope it can be helpful when the confusion arises, as a reminder that the things that matter to you, actually do matter.

Human(kind)

I am in a candle-lit corner of Mrs Brown, a late-night bar in North Fremantle. The sofa is at least a four-seater - I’m snuggled in to one corner, and way over on the other end, a stranger is drinking his wine very slowly, taking turns reading his phone and then staring up at the wallpaper, a tangled illustration of ivy and vintage lilies.

Across the room, an older couple are having what looks like a fascinating conversation, their noses about four inches away from each other. Their hands are as twined as the wallpaper ivy, and they look happy.

Against the wall two exceptionally good looking humans are drinking something bubbly and resting their chins in their hands, taking turns sharing stories and nodding with deep knowing nods.

Closer to me, a group of men are laughing hard, slapping backs and buying rounds. They were talking about redundancies and the price of gold last I listened.

I came in here a half hour ago to write, and I haven't written a thing. I tried to be intelligent, then funny, then whimsical, then disciplined, but, nothing. It’s hard to gather momentum at nine o’clock at night. Rach and I were up at five this morning, so I suppose that doesn’t help things.

So, here I am in my couch corner, drinking my own wine very slowly, with nothing to say. I reach for my headphones, close my eyes, tune out the voices, and turn up Phoebe Killdeer.

The bass line kicks me over the edge, and I start to observe instead of define. The flickering candlelight plays warm over faces, it lights up eyes, casts dancing shadows against the encyclopaedias on the bookshelves.

There are pockets in this place, not light-and-dark so much as thermal energies. Spiritual warmth, or something. The back-slapping guys are deeply interested in each other. Solid eye-contact, edge-of-the-seat leaning-ins, the works. Nobody cuts another off, they each take turns to speak. They are gentlemen souls, wrapped in rough exteriors. The older couple at the fireplace are themselves embers, holding a deep heat crafted over years of attention to the coals.

I watch the room from behind the rim of my glass, a curious wallflower, and I think back to something I heard Hugh Mackay speak about recently. He said that good news is everywhere, but it is the BAD news that gets the screentime, because good news isn't "newsworthy." He said that kindness is everywhere, happening all the time, but it will never make the news.

The distant man on the other end of the sofa stands to leave, and realises that I'm in his way. His looks down at me, momentarily confused, brows beginning to scrunch together, clearly stuck. I smile, tuck my knees up, and nod him past, and his face becomes human: wide grin, laugh-line-crinkles, nods of appreciation. I swear he almost hugged me. I didn't even take my headphones off and we could have hugged goodbye.

That moment won't make the news. Even though it proves our inherent human disposition towards kindness and connection, it won't be reported because it's just not newsworthy. It's commonplace, everyday. And we're all far more interested in the bad news.

And right here is the tension of my whole professional existence: I want things like kindness and human connection to be the news, to be talked about, celebrated, applauded and encouraged. But everything I know about life and story says that nobody will care. Hell, I won't even care - not if there is a "bad news story" competing for my attention.

As far as attention goes, conflict is king. Successful marketing demands we "start with the problem." Storytelling 101 says "a story needs conflict." News reporting needs conflict, or viewers will change the channel. Advertising first convinces us that we have a problem, and then it sells us the solution.

With all these influences, we have become attuned to conflict, to the drama of bad news, and we forget what we are meant to do with it. We forget why conflict even exists in the first place.

In storytelling, conflict exists to draw out a response. We call it an "inciting incident," that forces a character to make a choice, to respond in some way. We present our protagonist with some bad news, and see how they will react to it. If the response is kindness, then that kindness is more meaningful because of the difficult context.

The bad news calls the good news into action.

I think in real life we often stop too early in our story. We hit the conflict (ours or someone else's) and we stop reading, as if THAT'S the whole story. But that's the story just getting started. It's the next chapters that are transformational. How will the the character respond? Who will they become? Is there still hope?

As I walk out of the bar I realise I am surrounded by good news stories. None will be aired, but like Mackay said, these stories are everywhere. Kindness and connection are an inherent part of us.

And if I can remember all this when the conflict comes, then I might allow the kindness to be called into action, and perhaps I too will contribute to the greatest narrative of all: being human.

Giving voice to the radio waves

Hemmingway once said "write drunk edit sober," which I love. Not that I often do exactly that, but the idea of freewriting is a strong one - that open-minded, hold-it-lightly, stream-of-consciousness that just plucks words out of the ether and tosses them to the page.

So, this post is a freewrite. I'd normally refine it, simplify it, whatever, but after reading it I thought it would be most authentic to just leave it as is.

Enjoy.
__________

What if everything is just flowing through us like radio waves all the time?
Energy and creation, messages from God, voices from the past.
And what if most of us, most of the time, were just oblivious to it?

The few who are sensitive to certain frequencies would “see” something that others don’t. They would “feel” something. An intuition, a 6th sense, a premonition, a prophecy.

In the pentecostal church I grew up in, we were encouraged to reach our senses out, stretch our sensitivity to “discern” spiritual movements in the world. And we did, and we felt stuff. We saw things, and heard things, we dreamt dreams and saw visions.

I have a friend who sees feathers. Not “I see dead people.. and feathers” kind of thing, but she just notices them. A feather in the wind, a feather on the ground, a feather in a doorway. She is very aware of feathers, and she assigns meaning to them. It's never just a happenstance, when a feather appears. The moment is elevated, and my friend feels seen and known by forces greater than herself. I see way more feathers now too.

I have another friend who feels the darkness someone else is holding. He says it's like a black wave, like ink, and when he gets that feeling be becomes more interested in the person, more attuned to their words, their fears and masks. And when the time is right, he calls it out. He asks them about their darkness, and they respond with surprise and relief, and they leave with a lot less ink in their waters.

I’ve been wondering whether this might actually be the masterplan for us humans: That we each see different things, interpreting the same event in an entirely unique and personal way, so that together we can be a full-spectrum community. I see X in that event, and you see Y, and instead of arguing that only one is correct, we consider that both frequencies are valid. An attitude like this would allow us to paint all the dimensions of something that would otherwise be limited to our single-perspective shape.

Like, if a giant cylindrical pyramid landed on its side in the desert, and there were two groups of people, one at the south end, and one at the west end. Those in the south would declare that what they see in the distance is absolutely a circle. Those in the West would say it’s definitely without a doubt a triangle. If neither group moves, then no amount of conversation between them would result in a change of opinion. They both have the absolute truth, and therefore the other options must be false.

It’s a dimension thing, and a perspective thing.

The solution of course is simple. Somebody leaves their fixed viewpoint and takes a journey of discovery. They do a lap of the cylindrical pyramid and realise that there are other dimensions in play. And when they return, they can share with the others the new, broader, wider truth:

That both sides were true, and neither had the whole truth.

But in our lives, we often can't move. We're stuck in our spots, and when we hear of new perspectives it's very hard for us to shift our understanding to believe it. Even when someone who has taken that journey of discovery explains it to us. But I think it's our unique privilege to try.

Perhaps what makes us human is our ability to intuit, to NOT take a “fact” at face value. To ask of everything, not “what is happening?” but “what do I make this mean?”

To incline our hearts towards the radio waves, and allow everything flowing through us to have a voice.

In story, we know that truth is NOT the facts. Nobody really cares about the facts. The audience is not here for the facts. That is just information. What the audience is most interested, in, and what we all actually need the most from each other, is an understanding of what we made the facts mean.

Meaning is not found in a list of facts, but in every unique and differing perspective of humanity. None of us alone can build a complete picture of our world.

We need each other.

Flexing emotions

In my late teens, I discovered the wonderful world of gossip.

At the time I had no idea that that was what I was engaging in, but it absolutely was. I had friends who told me things, in private, to be kept secret, and I had other friends who asked me things about those private conversations. And when I shared these little details, my listeners became deliciously attentive. A sinister and attractive connection arose between us, where I would share information, and they would respond in wonder and delight.

“Nathan, you’re good friends with Beth, hey? Has she told you who she has a crush on? Is it Michael?”
“Uh, yeah, she’s been flirting with Michael, but he’s not the one she actually likes.”
(Gasping) “Oh reeeeally? Then, who is it? It’s so cool that you know, when none of us do!”
“Well, it’s Ben. She actually loves Ben, and is just using Mike to get closer to Ben.”
“OMG! Wow. Isn’t that so interesting? And gosh, poor Michael, because, doesn’t he like her??”
“Yeah, he does. He’s in love with Beth, but she’s in love with Ben, and.. you know what?”
“Yes? What?”
“Ben just told me he's is in love with Kate.”
“Noooooooo!!!”
“Yeah.”

And so on. I didn’t even consider the moral fallout. At 16 years old, I was still new to this world, I was still learning, I was naive. I was firmly in the present moment, and every other moment was just collateral damage.

These conversations went on for months, I’m ashamed to say. Beautiful faces with nice-smelling hair were paying me so much attention, actively seeking me out, pulling me aside, asking me what I know about others. And every time I shared something, their eyes would grow wide, their delicate hands would stroke my arm, and I felt warm feelings everywhere.

I had no idea that with each interaction, I was building an identity for myself. That I was becoming someone untrustworthy.

Anyway, with all the attention, and the warm feelings, and the pretty faces, I was never going to change. I was a wide-eyed deer enjoying all the shiny headlights. Until Maddie-day.

It was a weekend, and we had just finished our usual catchup: my friend Maddie is innocently asking me all about my friends’ secrets, and I'm spilling the beans. But then, instead of giving me the warm eyes and arm-strokes I’d become accustomed to, she goes dark. She pauses, with this smug smile on her face, and says bluntly,

“Nathan, you know that none of us girls would ever share our own secrets with you, don’t you?"

And it was my turn to go wide-eyed. I didn’t know what to say, but my foolish 16-year-old face forced a smile, and I asked “Why is that?”

“Because, dear, you are a gossip. All the girls just talk to you because you tell them your friends’ secrets. No one here actually trusts you at all.” She smiles again, gives a little “and that’s that” shrug, and trots off.

I was stunned. Every conversation from the past six months crowded back into my brain, and I started piecing together the looks, the hugs, the interest, and all the words I spoke so foolishly. She was right, of course, but in that moment all I could think was “Maddie is so mean. So rude. I hate her.”

I walked away, and stopped talking to her. But, I also stopped talking to everyone else too. The next time someone asked me to share some secrets, I would simply say “ah, that is a very good question, and one that is not mine to answer!”

For a long while, I didn’t get the excited looks from the pretty faces with nice hair. I didn’t get arm-rubs and eyelash-batting. I just wasn’t interesting anymore.

After another long while, things started to change again. New faces would lean in, and whisper their confessionals. I would nod sometimes, and cry with them sometimes. It became my hand that rubbed their shoulder, my eyes that grew wide, my head that would shake slowly. A soft trusting connection would form, and it was now me trying to make them feel warmer.

I really don’t know what made Maddie say what she did. I despised her for saying it, but in hindsight I see a deep intuition that neither of us were old enough to own. As painful as her words were to me, they were true, and they saved me.

I realise now that what I was doing was what story theorist Robert McKee would describe as “flexing emotions.” He explains that stories resonate in us because we all want to "visit another world, and be illuminated." We want to "use our minds in fresh and experimental ways, flex our emotions.” A story is a safe place for us to exercise all of the feelings, because in the end, it’s not really happening to us, but we can hold the feels for a while.

What the naive 16-year-old me was trying to do was really the same thing: I was holding other people’s relationships, feelings, lives. I was flexing my emotions vicariously through other humans' stories, like a commentator at a football game who never actually picks up a football. What Maddie did was force me into my own story. I had to experience my own emotions, with all the highs and lows that go with them. It was far more difficult than running commentary, but also, more rewarding.

Reading a great book, or watching an engaging TV series, or scrolling through everyone else's social media stories, all help us to flex our emotions. We visit another world, and try to find some illumination. Spending time listening and retelling each other's stories is exactly the same: we are in another's world, and vicariously feeling what they feel.

Our challenge, in fact one of our greatest challenges in life I believe, is to know what to do with the story once we have heard it.

A below-the-line response to a story is passive, reactive, gossip. We sit back and enjoy it all, and then we might perhaps reshare it, someone else's moment, and pretend that their feelings are ours.

But, an above-the-line response is entirely different. It's active. It seeks meaning and connection and illumination. It makes it personal. When it reshares, it doesn't need to share the story verbatim, but the insights gained from the story.

Stories are not meant to provide an ESCAPE from life. They are meant to help us FIND life. To find new perspectives and emotions and insights for our own lives and relationships. The goal of the storyteller has always been AUDIENCE TRANSFORMATION, and in our real lives, we can actively choose that path: every story we hear can transform us. From cinema hits to heart-journeys of loved ones, we can visit these other worlds, flex our emotions, and bring back some illumination.

And that illumination is ours, it is truth, and is exactly what the world does need to hear from us.

Tsunamis and shakti mats

A few years ago, Rach ordered a shakti mat online. She described it as a modern-day bed of nails, and was very excited about it’s arrival. I wasn’t so sure. Not because the science isn’t solid, because it is - distributed weight means less downward force means less pain - but because, at a very basic, carnal level, I don’t ever want to step, sit, or lie down on sharp pointy things. It’s just not comfortable for me to even think about.

As a kid, I stepped on a tack once. It was right under the arch of my bare foot, so it didn’t go all the way in before the pain registered, but it was enough to elicit a substantial squeal, a bucketload of tears, and a vow to never go barefoot ever again for the rest of my life. So I felt like my wariness of sharp things was at least a bit justifiable.

I remember when it arrived - a thousand tiny spikes hand stitched into what looked like a rolled-up doormat - and Rach was so excited. She danced downstairs, rolled out the mat, and promptly lay barebacked on the spikes. Her eyes went wide, and a she emitted a little gasp, but she didn’t get up. I started thinking about where the ambulance would park to most effectively collect her.

But ten minutes later, she was still on the mat, describing sensations of warmth, healing, physical restoration. I asked her if she knew where she was, and how many fingers I was holding up, but she assured me she wasn't delirious. This is just what happens with a shakti mat, she said.

Short story long, I tried it too, and yep, these mats are amazing. Because the pressure is distributed across all the tiny spikes, there’s enough pain to increase blood flow to the area, but not enough to actually break the skin and make a mess. It’s like Rach said - there’s a healing going on - something powerful and regenerative.

I think storytellers understand the power of a shakti mat. Not to heal their bodies while they write or anything like that, but in the way they distribute conflict.

In a really well-written story, the conflict is never singular. Storytellers know that if their story has only one level of conflict, then, like stepping barefoot on a single tack, it elicits too much pain for the protagonist to think about anything else. The story becomes one-dimensional: how do I find immediate relief from this pain? It's hard to hold the attention of the audience if that's all that's going on. But when the conflict is distributed across multiple levels, the story becomes richer, the protagonist draws deeper insights, and the audience is held for longer.

Take a story about a great tsunami that floods New York City, for example. Our singular conflict resides in the physical environment, and if that is the only conflict level the writer stays on, we’ll end up with a cliche action adventure full of disaster after disaster, and a cast of thousands either making it, or not making it, and an audience who may even start rooting for the wave instead of the people.

It's entertainment, but it's not meaningful. It kills the time, but there aren't really any lasting insights.

Distributing the conflict, however, would allow the writer to explore relationships, emotions, mental weakness, political failings, societal ironies, etc. This is how we connect, after all: we don't draw insights from the tsunami itself, it is how others respond to the tsunami that matters to us.

How did she manage to smile after THAT happened?
What did they do to keep their relationship so strong while THAT was going on?
Where did she find her strength in THAT moment? What made him do THAT? Why would she say THAT? How would I have dealt with that situation?

So, even in an epic tsunami movie, the writer could tell a simpler tale, perhaps with a cast of just three, and by exploring multiple levels of conflict, actually keep the audience engaged the whole way through, and come away from the story with their own insights into some of those topics.

And that's really the goal of storytelling: to hold the audience's attention, and to move the audience's hearts and minds.

But this post isn't about disaster films, or even about writing. It's about living.

I think at the core of it all, we just don’t give conflict the respect it deserves. When any discomfort comes our way, we immediately try and resolve it, remove it, avoid it. We hate discomfort. We get angry at the injustice, we feel terrified of the pain, we feel embarrassed, ashamed, abused, hurt, astonished, enraged, weak, destroyed. We feel bullied, controlled, manipulated, lost, desperate. All the things. So we put all our efforts into this one question:

"How do I find immediate relief from this pain?"

Which is an absolutely legitimate response to discomfort. In story and in life, a character will always seek to return to comfort when presented with conflict. It’s how we are wired, it’s automatic, genetic, natural.

The great tension of life and story, though, is that conflict is the vehicle that moves a character forward in their story. It’s the only way to make a character move.

Without discomfort, or conflict, a book's lead character would just stay on the couch binge-watching Netflix for twelve chapters and then the book will end, and and it won’t matter how it ends, because nobody is still reading it anyway. They’re using it to hold open a back door, or they’re scrunching the pages to get their fire started in winter.

Writers know this truth: We need conflict in our stories, in order to grow, change or move.

Which brings me back to the shakti mat, and the single tack.

If anyone steps on a single tack, and it jams itself full length into their heel, there is no space for insight, growth, or wise reflection on the discomfort. You just get that sucker out of there. The pain is intense, and the demand for relief is urgent. Nobody should "embrace" that sort of conflict.

But the pain from many tiny tacks, with all their points distributed, is not the same. The pain exists, but it is not as intense, it doesn't have the same immediacy. It allows for nuance, and healing, and learning, and change.

A writer’s challenge is to distribute the conflict. And our challenge, in living our real life stories, is to help spread that conflict out. To consider all the small pain points in our lives as pieces of our identity, artefacts of meaning. Before they get too big and sharp and urgent, we have the opportunity to work with the pain, to learn about ourselves, to choose our responses.

The pain points are there anyway, so we may as well acknowledge them all, roll out the mat of tiny spikes, and see what can be restored and healed.

Freedom, ambition and Jack Kerouac

This morning Rach and I woke early and walked into town. There's a hole-in-the-wall bakery called Little Loaf, and they make the greatest bacon and egg baps, and it was a great day for a bap.

We turn down Orient Street, which faces us directly into the sunlight, and we’re blinded - everything goes pale and bright. The colour washes out of the landscape, leaving a haze of watercolour impressions, and we have to drop our gaze, forced to focus on whatever is a few metres in front of our feet. We notice the cracks in the pavement, the single tulip by the gate at number twelve, the crunchy-crisp air on our skin. And wrapped in this brightwash, we turn inwards, to our private reflections:
Life is magic. Anything is possible. Am I doing okay? Does it even matter?

The moment stretches, floods, stops time, opens our minds. We can hear each other’s breaths.

There's a beautiful line in Jack Kerouac's book On the Road, where the protagonist, Sal, describes a week in Denver, all late night bars, and girls, and cherry trees in bloom:

“...the whole world opened up before me because I had no dreams.”

And I resonate with this so much. These sunlit moments of open skies and in-the-moment experiences. A part of me wants to get off the train, you know? Quit the stage. Just walk away from all the pressure and responsibility and flop on my back in a field.

But, what about goals? Ambitions? How do we get anything done in life?

I’m asking these questions because for the last few weeks, Rach and I have been filming an online curriculum, and it's really hard. We're not on our backs in a field, instead, we pointed to the top of the mountain and said "there!" and began to climb. We made some great progress up the slopes, and then lost our footing and scratched our knees and egos. Then we climbed some more, and slipped back a bit more, and found some paths around and around the mountain, everslowly gaining ground, still nowhere near the top, but now too far from the bottom to give up.

Storytelling theory says that until a protagonist wants something, their story can’t get going. Characters needs to want things - ideally things that are worthwhile - and they need to want them enough to overcome great conflict to attain them. A meaningful story is found on the path of conflict, say the ancient tellers.

Still, who deliberately chooses conflict? I want Kerouac's open-world freedom. No dreams or ambitions, just the in-the-moment experiences of the beat generation he captures so perfectly.

Here’s how I think it resolves:

The world is open before us, like Kerouac writes. With all its options and possibilities and opportunities. And for a while we stand there, without dreams or fears, and just react our way forward, embracing all the wonders of life.

It’s not story, but it is beautiful. It is art, whimsy, a tossing about of our souls on the wind. We're kids dancing in gardens.

But eventually, somewhere amongst all that soul-tossing, we realise that there are, in fact, things we want. Specific things. Things that we want enough to fight for. Things worthy of prioritising above the myriad other possibilities that are out there. So we narrow our gaze, isolate our focus. In a world wide-open with possibilities we choose this one and we get to work.

Now we have a story. A character who wants something, and will overcome all sorts of conflict to get it.

But where does that leave the art? The beauty? The whimsy? Does the having of goals in life require us to give up the open-skies freedom of not having dreams or goals?

What I realised this morning, walking with Rach in the whitewash sunlight, was that when we choose this life of dreams and ambition, we are setting ourselves up for conflict, but the conflict doesn’t break us. It grows us, changes us, and becomes a kind of container that brackets these tiny moments, so that in the breaths between tension, in the sunrise light that blinds us whole, the world is still open to us. And with the sharp clarity that comes from climbing the mountain, we find eternity in every step.

Like-minded vs like-hearted

This week, I spent a lot of hours writing a thing. I had an idea, and was focussed on sharing it, pushing my opinion, convincing my readers that the idea is true. I was going to post it today.

But then I read it. And then I trashed it.

I realised that I was writing so that others would agree with me. Like-minded others who would rally to my side, while I shared a polaric opinion about something I honestly didn’t know enough about.

There is a great difference, it turns out, between being like-minded and being like-hearted.

Like-minded people gather together and agree, and rant against those that disagree. We form groups and sides, and double down on our beliefs and stances and our right-ness.

Like-hearted people, in contrast, gather on the plain of love, acceptance, and difference. We believe different things on the surface, we can disagree, and have totally unique life experiences. But we stay together to learn from each other: perspectives, opinions, wisdom from other angles.

I often find it difficult to engage with a single-minded writer. They either have me on their side, or they don't, and then they are just trying to convince me of something. That's fine for a science paper, but it's not STORY.

Storytelling is all about like-heartedness. All writers have deep beliefs and opinions, but the great ones never explicitly need to share them. They wrap their world views in a trojan horse of shared narrative experience, allowing their audience to walk with them and draw their own conclusions in their own time.

Storytelling invites everyone in. It may seem like the softest tool of revolution, but it honestly has the most power to actually change someone’s mind. Living like-heartedly means you don’t have to convince, win or own. You just have to invite, and listen, and share the stories.

On the road: Gnaraloo Station

Last week I joined a couple of friends for a drive up the coast to Gnaraloo Station. From Perth, Gnaraloo is a thousand kilometres away.

I had a seat in the back, pressed up against sleeping bags, wetsuits, and something that smelled like banana bread. For the two hours before the sun rose, I watched suburban porchlights streak past, all tungsten yellow, then the city lights, giant bug-zappers of brilliant white, then the northern fringe cities with their pale blues and intermittent fuel-station-golds. And then, nothing. Just a comfortable darkness, visited occasionally by a passing car or a stray streetlight.

Nick drove the entire way. For twelve hours he chatted and laughed and shared his stories and listened to ours. Ian is almost twenty years older than me, and engages with others as if we know the secrets of the ages, and just need the time to get it out in words.

My focus drifted from conversations within the car to conversations with the horizon. For hours it was dirt-red, then a splash of canola yellow, forest green, granite and limestone, then back to dirt. It was quite beautiful, an entire palette comfortable with her loneliness.

Gnaraloo is in the middle of nothing. It really is. It's a sheep station, but I barely saw any sheep. Wild goats, though, they were everywhere. They looked down on us with their proud beards and funny tails, like they owned the place, like they were running the show. A people-farm, run by the goats. The locals of Gnaraloo don't dissuade this idea at all: they are wild and earthy and distant, their language is the land and the ocean. People come here for only three things: to surf, to fish and to feel free.

A few mornings in, I asked Ian why he's here. Why it matters to drive all this way, peel yourself into a wetsuit, and take your board out into the hyperthermic waters to ride a few waves. He had just returned from the ocean, and was crunching through an apple, watching Nick finish up his last wave. I got out and leaned on the car with him, and squinted into the glare. Me with my notebook, Ian with his apple.

"Why do you do this?" I asked him.
"Because it's who I am," he replied, then paused, "but only as long as I'm actually doing it."
He talks like this a lot.
"You don't feel like a surfer unless you're surfing?" I ventured.
"No, I still feel like a surfer, for sure. But that identity requires some action, you know? The longer I don't surf, the more I become a person who used to surf, not a person who actually surfs."
I looked at him and blinked twice, and he took another bite of apple.
"It's about identity," he continued, "by doing this stuff, I'm revisiting my identity, empowering it somehow."
"Empowering it?
"Yeah, I'm empowering myself, my belief in myself. It's one thing to become who you want to be in life, but a whole other challenge to stay there. Over time we can start to question ourselves and our abilities, and we can start to doubt ourselves."
"And our identities can lose their way."
"Exactly. Our identities get blurry. And the only way I know to return to clarity is to act. To do something today that reminds me of who I am."
"And who are you today?"
He laughed. "I am a person who surfs!"

Nick appeared on the path just then, and we headed back to the homestead for breakfast.

-

In storytelling, there is always a tension between a character's aspiration and their reality. There is a version of themselves they WANT to be, or that they THINK they are, and then, there is who they REALLY are. It's a gold mine for writers, exploring those gaps, revealing to the protagonist their reality and pushing them off the cliffs that will grow and transform them.

A character can be amazing, but think they are nothing special. Or they can have some serious flaws, but think they are just perfect. In the end, what they, or others, say about themselves doesn't matter half as much as what they do. Like Ian observed: identity needs action.

After that conversation with Ian, I had to ask myself the same question: "Why am I here? Why did I travel a thousand kilometres to a surfing station when I don't surf or fish?" It was an identity question.

While Ian and Nick were revisiting and strengthening their identities as "people who surf", I found myself revisiting childhood memories. Hours of wandering in white-bright sand dunes, playing with shells, drawing in red dirt, watching the shadows from stones stretch out across my bare toes. Being at peace with the nothingness of those places.

By joining Nick and Ian for the trip, I became what I always thought I was, but perhaps hadn't acted on for a while:

A person who seeks wonder and beauty over comfort or progress.

It just took a few thousands kilometres to remind me it was true.

Vulnerable Storytelling

Earlier this year, Rach and I attended a dinner event. We barely knew anybody there, but they were the kinds of people that were important to our work, so we decided to pay the $150 per ticket and just see what happens. This is often how our business life goes - We step into a space with open hearts, and see if there are connections with others. We each share stories, perspectives, ideas, and look for a fit.

It was dusk, and the restaurant overlooked the river, whose surface danced with oranges and purples, and the city lights from the far shore. We sat at a table of six, everyone looked dashing and beautiful, and the wine was paired perfectly with the seven courses. It had all the makings of a truly enjoyable and meaningful evening.

I think the way a culture evolves is very similar to the way a conversation evolves. We all start off separate, nothing to relate to, outside of our geographical setting, and then we start to talk. And the more we spend time together, the more we learn about each other, the more we discover we have in common, the more interesting the other party becomes. We start to assign value to differences, considering where in our lives their pieces can fit.

Like a jigsaw puzzle, where we each have a pocketful of pieces, we’re all slowly revealing what we have, and together finding the right fit for each piece, slowly building the masterpiece.

The first course arrives, and the conversations begin. This magical potential to add some more pieces to the great jigsaw puzzle. Rach compliments someone’s choice of earrings, asks about the story behind them. I share about my day, some of the challenges I got through to get to this moment. Across from us, a doctor shares a dramatic story of life-and-death pressures at work, while juggling a young family at home. The earrings, it turns out, were chosen because the owner loves to paint. But she can’t find the time for arting, because of her myriad other commitments of life. The doctor, it turns out, struggles with expectations, and a feeling of never being good enough.

This is the evolution. We start at the surface, we find similar experiences or feelings, we build some trust, and then we dive deeper. And as the conversations become more vulnerable, the level of connection between us grows stronger, the potential for deep insight increases, and we start to attribute this conversation to be “meaningful”, or “worthwhile”.

Absolutely worth the $300 we paid for the tickets.

The trajectory of the evening was looking great. The way things were going, we might not only find ourselves in some really deep and meaningful conversations, but we also may end up with some work collaborations in the future. It seems simple: We share our stories, we increase the vulnerability and the connection, and we land on a meaningful experience.

But, what happens if some of us as the table choose NOT to share their stories honestly? What happens if, instead of vulnerability, they share dramatic self-aggrandising stories? Or melodramatic soap operas? Or judgemental black-and-white opinions?

..

By the second course, the conversation has already commenced its downhill run on the dark path of melodrama. Two of our party, long-time friends of each other, began to share their stories. Long, detailed accounts of their own lives, monologued at a “here’s what happened” level without ever allowing insight as to what they made it mean for themselves. They were so proud of their lives, that they lost sight of anyone else’s. And, by generating such a dramatic, surface-style story energy, they were essentially demanding that we all respond with this same style of story: If anyone is to join this conversation, they must bring an equally sensational story to the table. And then we’ll all decide who’s story is better.

Rach and I went quiet. The plates came out, one after the other, and the monologues ran longer and became more sensational. We couldn’t find the space to speak, nor the energy to turn the conversation. Our pockets were still filled with our jigsaw pieces. The others in our circle had pockets filled with jigsaw pieces. And on the table was the jigsaw, with just a handful of pieces from these two conversation vampires, being swished about as if they can fill all the gaps on their own.

We left at midnight completely exhausted. The food was delicious, the guests all looked beautiful, but the conversations shattered us. Like a facebook feed, we were just bombarded with drama and self-promotion. We did not evolve that night, and it took us a week to recover.

Aristotle writes that when storytelling goes bad, the result is decadence. I think he may have been referring to a decadence of ego. A story requires more than surface action: it requires vulnerability, emotion, a heart-response. Sharing our successes alone, without admitting the terrors and self-doubts and weaknesses that preceded the success, does our audience, and our culture, a great disservice.

Revealing our jigsaw pieces to the world takes courage. Sharing any part of ourselves with another is hard. But this is how we are built: The evolution of our culture, just like a meaningful story, just like my next conversation with you, requires more than the story of your success.

I need your honesty.

Dipping reality into whimsy

I’ll be honest with you, I’m a dreamer. I have an over-optimistic worldview that has often been criticised in the past. I’ve been attacked for being ignorant, for not having appropriate concern for reality, for not behaving logically, rationally, maturely. I’ve been told that I hope too much, that I believe in impossible things. That I’m too whimsical and romantic for real life.

While the engineers are building bridges, I’m the artist swimming in the sea.

Ever since I was little, I’ve seen the world with filters. I’m sure everyone has - The filters of their culture, upbringing, beliefs, values. My filter was spiritual, and magic, and wonder, and love. I grew up looking at the world through whimsy-coloured glasses.

I just don’t see why it’s so bad to rewrite our reality. When I was working the corporate office life, I would catch a train every morning, during peak hour. We’d all be jammed in like sardines, pressed up against shoulders and backpacks and windows, with all sorts of strange smells and sounds. The “reality” of that scene is pretty dull. A daily-nine-to-five-grind-get-me-out-of-here-as-quickly-as-possible reality that we're all familiar with.

I remember it a little differently:

It’s 6:23am and the sun has just made it up, but already it's lost behind cloud. The morning was chilly enough for a jacket, and my collar is still popped from the raw winds on the platform. I’m pressed up against the window now, right in a corner, with barely enough space to turn a page. Under my nose is an issue of Kinfolk, it’s clean page layouts a wide-open field to me. Tiny words and a heap of white space.

I’m reading an article about slow living, written by Carl Honoré, and it’s fascinating to me. In my mind, the world has slowed, vignetted away so that I am a rock in a stream, untouched by the eddies around me. I turn a page, my arms all praying-mantis-like, while even more people cram into the carriage and I am pushed further into the window.

And then all of a sudden, two things happen together: Our train reaches the bridge over the river, and the morning sun breaks through the low cloud. Vintage golden light is splashed over my page, over the shoulders and hats surrounding me, dancing over the river below us.

I look up from my magazine and squint into the light, and imagine it to be a cloud of magic, a portal between times, a conversation between God and me, and anyone else listening.

I breathe it in - the light, the warmth, the smell of eternity. I hear messages in the cloud - of love, of hope, of peace. It tells me that life is beautiful. Every moment of life is magic. Each scene is interesting.

And then it’s gone. Our train has crossed the bridge and is heading underground, the light is replaced by darkness and screeching of brakes on rails. But I feel like that moment saturated me, and ten years later I’m still damp with the sunlight.

CS Lewis writes that myth and fantasy are not retreats from reality, but rediscoveries of it. He says that when we dip reality into story or myth, it becomes more savoury, we see it with clarity and wisdom. The real things become more themselves.

When I dip reality into whimsy, I see things afresh. The dullness of familiarity is washed away, and I rediscover a life of joy, hope, purpose and meaning.

How should a human being lead their life?

Aristotle poses this question in his writings in Ethics, and it’s one we all ask ourselves at some point in our lives:

“How should I lead my life?”
“Why am I here?”
“What is meaningful? Worthwhile?”
“What’s the goal, outside of survival?”

I doubt there will ever be absolute definitive answers to these kinds of questions, but I want to share a storytelling perspective that I just find useful to life-hack some meaning into my days:

For some context, when writers and speakers craft their stories, they have certain intentions. They might want to move the audience. To elicit an emotional reaction. Or tell a story that is considered meaningful, memorable. Or they have an idea to unpack, a vision to share, an inspiring something that could spark change in the audience.

They essentially craft stories to describe their own beliefs and values, in such a way that strangers will be moved towards those values in some way. They have this crafting toolkit that allows them to build meaning and influence into their scenes. They have the ability to generate an interesting and engaging story, that forces an audience to sit up and listen.

It's a bit manipulative really, but a good storyteller will deliver their content in such a way that others’ attentions are captured, their interest held, their hearts awakened, their imagination alive, their minds intrigued and challenged. And when the story is over, the values of the audience may be slightly more aligned to those of the teller.

That’s a really powerful skillset. And no, I don't think the ability to influence others makes life meaningful.

What interests me is WHY storytelling elicits this engagement at all. Do we, the audience, respond to good stories because they are told well, or are good stories told in response to our natural predilection to respond to those deeper elements contained within?

The storytellers of old may have developed their craft out of necessity to be paid, but the chemistry works for a reason, and I think it’s this: We all respond to STORY because we are built to engage in the deep elements within the story.

Conflict. Meaning. Love. Loss. Transformation. Everything we respond to in a story is a reflection of what resonates in our real lives. The story is simply the archetype of a truth that we all deeply and intuitively understand.

For example, let's say we have a protagonist in a story who gets removed from office through a nepotistic process. The storyteller is describing an injustice, a bullying, and we the audience immediately feel it. Not because we have been specifically overlooked in favour of the boss’s daughter for a "logistics role" at work, but because in our deep human core of universal understanding, we have felt the same. The surface experience is different, but the underlying philosophical base is the same. On the surface, there are a billion different stories, but below, we are the same.

When searching for meaning, this concept really makes my heart leap, and it's at the core of my story coaching work: how to get past the surface differences, and realise that we are the same. We’re all in this together. We are human.

We need to get over, get past, get beyond our assumption that whatever is happening on the surface is all that is happening. The surface is not the truth. The surface is just “life”. It’s the stuff that’s happening. But below it is where the storyteller works: In the realm of what we make those surface experiences mean. This is the space I want to consider a whole lot more often: what did I make that mean?

So this is where I find meaning for myself. This is why I’m still learning and researching how storytellers craft their stories. Because within that crafting is a deep insight into the human condition, and a whole toolkit for creating meaningful life experiences.

These days, my question is this:

“By implementing the ancient tools of story in my actual day-to-day living, can I generate new life experiences that I and others would find interesting and engaging? Could I create life scenes that capture attention, hold interest, awaken hearts, revive imaginations, intrigue and challenge minds?”

And my answer is yes. I absolutely can. It will be a life’s work, and it will be infused with hope and love and conflict and mindfulness. But also, a little more meaning.

Transformation

In storytelling, there is always a great emphasis on making an audience feel something, or think something, or change somehow. We ask "how will this story transform my audience?"

But why is audience transformation important? Why bother considering who we are speaking to, or writing to, at all?

For many, especially in academia, considering one’s audience is not their highest priority. Their concern is for the integrity of the content, the completeness of the information. And that’s okay. They are doing exactly what they should be doing - accurately documenting a concept for historical record, for education.

The subtle (but actually enormous) difference between information-sharing and storytelling, is in the intent:

Storytelling intends to move others.

Storytelling is social change-making, idea-sharing in a way that is memorable and transformational. So, how the audience responds to your ideas does matter. A well-crafted story allows your reader or listener to easily take your ideas with them. Like a passenger on a road trip, your idea is driven to fresh places, introduced to new friends, shared and enjoyed.

It's transformation, not documentation.

Storytelling is a relationship. It seeks permission, it respects all parties, it builds trust. It opens possibilities for your audience, but doesn’t coerce change out of them.

Whether we are on a stage, writing a book or in a conversation, wherever our ideas are being shared it is vital that they are delivered with care and consideration of the audience in front of us. If we cannot make our audience care somehow, our stories will go nowhere.

When an audience is open to our message, then our ideas, our contribution to the world, have the best chance of making the personal, societal or relational impact they were conceived to make.