Who I Am

Truth, naked and cold, had been turned away from every door

in the village. Her nakedness frightened the people. When

Parable found her she was huddled in a corner, shivering and

hungry. Taking pity on her, Parable gathered her up and took

her home. There, she dressed Truth in story, warmed her and

sent her out again. Clothed in story, Truth knocked again at

the doors and was readily welcomed into the villagers’ houses.

They invited her to eat at their tables and warm herself by

their fires.

Certainly stories can be a form of entertainment—a book to curl up

with on a cold rainy afternoon, a movie to share with a best friend,

a video game to conquer—but stories can also be much more and,

as will be discussed at the end of the chapter, today stories can be

found just about anywhere. Furthermore, because stories can be found

anywhere from a movie theatre to a corporate boardroom, everyone

should know how to tell a good story.

In her book, The Story Factor: Inspiration, Influence, and Persuasion

Through the Art of Storytelling, Simmons talks about seven different

kinds of stories everyone should learn how to tell. One of them is the

“Who I Am” story. Simply put, a Who I Am story shows something

about its author, and this type of story fits into the genre of memoir or

creative nonfiction. Here is an example from Simmons’ book:

Skip looked into the sea of suspicious stockholders and wondered what might convince them to follow his leadership. He

was 35, looked 13 and was third generation rich. He could

tell they assumed he would be an unholy disaster as a leader.

He decided to tell them a story. “My first job was drawing the

electrical engineering plans for a boat building company. The

drawings had to be perfect because if the wires were not accurately placed before the fiberglass form was poured, a mistake

might cost a million dollars, easy. At 25, I already had two

masters’ degrees. I had been on boats all my life and frankly,

I found drawing these plans a bit . . . mindless. One morning

I got a call at home from a $6/hour worker asking me ‘are you

sure this is right?’ I was incensed. Of course I was sure—‘just pour the damn thing.’ When his supervisor called me an hour

later and woke me up again and asked ‘are you sure this is

right?’ I had even less patience. ‘I said I was sure an hour ago

and I’m still sure.’

It was the phone call from the president of the company

that finally got me out of bed and down to the site. If I had to

hold these guys by the hand, so be it. I sought out the worker

who had called me first. He sat looking at my plans with his

head cocked to one side. With exaggerated patience I began to

explain the drawing. But after a few words my voice got weaker and my head started to cock to the side as well. It seems that

I had (being left-handed) transposed starboard and port so

that the drawing was an exact mirror image of what it should

have been. Thank God this $6/hour worker had caught my

mistake before it was too late. The next day I found this box

on my desk. The crew bought me a remedial pair of tennis

shoes for future reference. Just in case I got mixed up again—

a red left shoe for port, and a green right one for starboard.

These shoes don’t just help me remember port and starboard.

They help me remember to listen even when I think I know

what’s going on.” As he held up the shoebox with one red and

one green shoe, there were smiles and smirks. The stockholders relaxed a bit. If this young upstart had already learned

this lesson about arrogance, then he might have learned a few

things about running companies, too.

This example shows some of the reasons why people tell Who I

Am stories. Chances are that if Skip had gone into this meeting and

said “Look, I know I’m young, but I’ve got a lot of experience, I know

what I’m doing, I’ve learned a lot from my mistakes. Just trust me,” he

would not have won over his audience.

Please keep this example and the basic definition of the Who I Am

story in mind while reading through the next section, which provides a little background and theory about the fine art of narration and storytelling.