How Our Stories Connect Us

It was 7 pm on a weekday, 7 years ago. I was walking to a coffee shop for a free storytelling workshop. The premise was simple: tell any story from your life and learn how to tell it better. I hadn’t been outside the house for days, possibly weeks. I was on extended leave from work to focus on my health. Burnout, possibly. Depression, possibly. Anxiety about burnout and depression, definitely. I needed a creative outlet. 

As I walked to the workshop, I agonized over my answers to every possible small talk question from the strangers I was about to meet – How was my day? What did I do for work? Why was I on leave? Ugh. I took the long route. 

When I arrived at the coffee shop, I found a group of people huddled around a small table. Everyone was listening intently as one woman was telling a story. I quietly joined. She was describing a heated exchange with her father during a long drive. I had missed the context, but I got the story: despite their differences over his religion and her career, she understood him. When she finished, the facilitator invited comments from the listeners. Some people shared what connected with them – the emotion, the language, the details. Some people asked clarifying questions or made suggestions on shaping the story. 

One by one, everyone got the same attention and thoughtful feedback. Some stories were deep and reflective, like the first one, and some were silly and hilarious. I hadn’t thought of what story I was going to share and wondered whether I even had any, but after each story I heard, a related memory popped into my head.  

When my turn came though, I unexpectedly started narrating an episode of being harassed by some older boys when I was 14. It was heavy, a memory I hadn’t thought about in years, but looking back at that episode as just one story from my life was strangely liberating. To break the tension, I weaved in some jokes and ended with lessons learned. The facilitator suggested dropping the humor that didn’t serve the story and discouraged me from spelling out lessons. “Trust the story,” she said with an encouraging smile. 

After the workshop, there was no small talk. Instead, we eagerly swapped more anecdotes from our lives. I walked out feeling connected to 8 strangers.

That storytelling community became my home. I attended workshops regularly and shaped so many memories into stories. It changed the way I communicated with my colleagues, with my family, and even with strangers. I was more open to sharing stories in conversations and genuinely curious to hear other people’s stories. The more stories I shared, the more stories I got back. When I told my colleagues about losing my engagement ring, I discovered how another colleague had accidentally flushed her ring down the toilet. When I told my grandmother about my first solo trip, she told me about her first trip and how it was cut short because her mother wrote her a letter faking an illness and calling her back! 

There are many reasons to tell stories from our lives. Our stories help us make sense of things, give us a fresh perspective, give us agency, empathy, and even inspiration. But the biggest value of our personal stories, I believe, is their ability to connect us. 

Our stories help us connect with ourselves and with others around us. I have experienced that over and over. Last year, a student at a school workshop shared the story of the day she lost her father, about how ordinary the day was until she got the news. She did not get emotional, but many of her classmates did. Another student in that class shared a hilarious story about trying to get her crush to notice her; many of her classmates nodded as they laughed. Before the workshop, it was easy to tell who was friends with whom; they all sat in clusters. After the workshop, the excited chatter transcended the clusters – the teachers were amazed. 

These moments of connection aren’t exclusive to formal workshops or classrooms. They can happen whenever we gather. Try swapping stories at your family dinners, your corporate lunches, your friend reunions. The stories don’t have to be about big, dramatic experiences. Simple moments that stuck with us are just as valuable. 

Here are some prompts to get your conversations started:

• Have you ever had a haircut you immediately regretted? 
• How many houses have you lived in? Which room do you remember most vividly?
• When did you first feel like an adult?  

Ask each other deeper questions about the stories you hear. See where the conversation takes you. Writer Patti Digh summarized it best: “The shortest distance between two people is a story.”