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Persuasion and the Art of Storytelling (Image: Inc.com)

Persuasion is not just for salespeople and their prospects… Often the most effective persuaders are your kids. Somehow they come by it naturally while you, the adult, has to work hard to find the persuasive path to success. ~ Kevin Daum

Kevin Daum (@awesomeroar), the best-selling author of Video Marketing For Dummies, knows a thing or seven about persuasion. He believes that really persuasive people share seven behaviors that guarantee their success when performed together.

Can you be super persuasive when you need to be? Or do you push too hard? Find out here: http://t.co/pjOqUNOJzL

— Kevin Daum (@AwesomeROAR) August 2, 2013

Here are five of the behaviors that also lend themselves to the art of storytelling:

• Listen “You can’t persuade effectively if you don’t know the other side of the argument.”
• Connect “You’ll persuade people much more easily if they are open and aligned with your desires.”
• Acknowledge Credibility “When you are persuading people, reinforce their credibility on facts and opinions rather than dismissing them outright.”
• Offer Satisfaction “Give ground where you can and hold your ground only where it matters. Choose being successful over being right.”
• Know When to Shut Up “Wearing people down is not an effective strategy.”

[Adapted from Kevin Daum. “7 Things Really Persuasive People Do.” Inc. 5000. Aug 2, 2013]

The Elements of Persuasion

Robert Dickman, author of The Elements of Persuasion helped bridge the story-persuasion divide in a Businessweek column by Marshall Goldsmith in August 2007.

a story is a fact wrapped in an emotion that compels an action which transforms our world… Take “All Gone.” We all told that one [as infants]. The fact was our bottle was empty. We wrapped that fact in an emotion—either annoyance because we wanted more, or satisfaction because we were full—and expressed it by crying or cooing. This compelled our parents to take an action—either getting another bottle or burping us and settling us down. Either way our world was changed. (“Storytelling and the Art of Persuasion“)

Despite my childfree choice and lifestyle, I’m a fan and student of children. (In fact, some would say that I’m still one myself!) As a lapsed teacher and a less lapsed uncle I’ve learned plenty from the most naturally persuasive storytellers in our midst. I suspect few would argue the fact that children, even infants, master the art of storytelling the moment they first lock eyes with an audience. Mom. Dad. Siblings.

The art of storytelling is initially almost the only weapon in our persuasion arsenal, so we polish it to perfection and maintain it meticulously without even realizing we are doing so. And we use it. Again and again. As son as we realize how effectively we can persuade (read “manipulate”) circumstances, we instinctively begin experimenting and honing our nascent art of storytelling.

The Art of Listening

While one mark of childish persuasion is the inability to listen, the stubborn insistence on shoving forward no matter how resolved and resistant the audience, savvy youngsters discover the art of listening early on.

People who know how to persuade… are actively listening when in persuasion mode. First, they are listening to assess how receptive you are to their point of view. Second, they are listening for your specific objections, which they know they’ll have to resolve. Last, they are listening for moments of agreement so they can capitalize on consensus. ~ Kevin Daum (7 Things Really Persuasive People Do)

I’ve argued elsewhere that the art of listening may be the most fundamental skill in effective storytelling. Children are the original A/B split testers, running different versions of their story past both parents (and any other relevant influencers) based upon their day-to-day assessment of their audience’s receptivity. Horse trading their way through a forest of objections and emphasizing the moments of agreement (no matter how few or stretched) are also early learned skills.

Create a Connection

Parents are impenetrable fortresses when the child is pushing a categorically unacceptable agenda. But parents will lower the drawbridge to negotiate when they detect overlapping objectives.

Really persuasive people… look for common ground to help establish emotional bonds and shared objectives. They show empathy for your position and make it known that they are on your side. ~ Kevin Daum (7 Things Really Persuasive People Do)

Whether you’re an ankle-biter or a seasoned film producer, the art of storytelling involves sidestepping antagonistic issues (at least initially) to forge a sympathetic dynamic between storyteller and audience. Once the drawbridge is down and you’re swapping pipe dreams and war stories on the grassy bank of the moat, watching ducks bobbing for snacks under bluebird skies, persuasive storytellers know that they stand a better chance of finding a receptive audience even to the “problem” issues.

Acknowledge Audience Credibility

Kids struggle with this. Heck, most adults struggle with this. Struggling to win over your audience by arguing the superiority of your experience, knowledge, facts, etc. mostly pisses people off. We all think we’re right. But this doesn’t stand in the way of persuasive storytellers.

When you are persuading people, reinforce their credibility on facts and opinions rather than dismissing them outright. Then they’ll be more likely to pay you equal respect in the exchange and be more open to the merits of your opposing view. ~ Kevin Daum (7 Things Really Persuasive People Do)

And if not, then you’re wasting your time. Move on!

Offer Satisfaction by Yielding

Video Marketing For Dummies, by Kevin Daum

Kids struggle even more with this, perhaps because it’s tied to the previous issue. It’s about thinking big picture instead of getting tangled up in each element of your story. What’s the goal? Do you have to triumph at every turn to reach your goal? Usually not.

Smart persuaders know that they don’t have to win every little battle to win the war. They are more than willing to sacrifice when it helps the overall cause. They are ready to find the easiest path to yes. ~ Kevin Daum (7 Things Really Persuasive People Do)

Compromise along the journey, and you’ll earn the respect and trust of your audience, even though they may not share your views or goals. You are not trying to prove that you’re a genius. You just want to keep them hooked, curious, and sympathetic. By demonstrating that you may not be right about everything, you satisfy their need to object and resist. You demonstrate respect for their beliefs and needs. And you earn their confidence that you’re not trying to dupe them, just guide them toward a mutually meaningful conclusion.

Tell Your Story and then Shut Up

It goes without saying that one of the most pleasing rights of passage from youth to adulthood is learning this lesson. And one of the most aggravating forms of birth control is arguing with a kid who won’t shut up.

Successful persuaders get that you don’t win the battle by constantly berating people with an unending verbal barrage… They carefully support their arguments and check in with questions… [and then] they step back. ~ Kevin Daum (7 Things Really Persuasive People Do)

Frankly, this is my biggest shortcoming as a storyteller. I’m prone to blather on ad nauseum. Not good. Neither in written storytelling, nor in oral storytelling. I continue to work at this, but I’ve a long way to go. Which reminds me, it’s time to wrap up… I still have some growing up to do before I perfect the art of storytelling!

Postscript

You see, I’m not good at shutting up. But I’m working on it. I promise. I close with a hat tip and deep bow to Kevin Daum (@awesomeroar) whose article I’ve read and run through the food processor to suit my present needs. Sorry if I’ve distorted your opinions and processed your article into the digital equivalent of potted meat. And thanks for the inspiring road map and cogent argument. You, sir, are a persuasive storyteller!

Related articles

• 7 things really persuasive people do (inc.com)
• Storytelling and Social Engagement (virtualdavis.com)
• Persuade vs. convince (sethgodin.typepad.com)
• Persuasion (vizziblog.com)
• CPS STUDIOS: The Art of Storytelling (rondapalazzari.typepad.com)

Talk to Me! Storytelling and Social Engagement…

Prepare for a reactive post, no, an interactive conversation, about social engagement.

But first, what about that photo? Bam! A powerful graphic. Except for the middle word…

I’d prefer “Talk with me.” Because social media is all about with. Old school, top-down, one-way, pump-it-out, force fed broadcast media was all about to. Do you follow me?

Engaging Storytelling

Media has evolved. Most of it. Not all. There are still a few knuckle-draggers lurking in the shadows!

Which is why storytelling – in it’s simplest, purest and most engaging form – trumps old school broadcast media. Storytelling in its oldest form. Pre-books. Pre-TV. Pre-movies.

Storytelling is about social engagement, author-audience engagement. Storytelling is about relationships. It’s about with. Not to.

Social Media

Which brings me to Randy Thio (@ideabloke), the founder of ideabloke, “a personal digital media agency committed to 100% organic social media practices.” His post, The Endgame Of Social Engagement provoked my curiosity because I don’t consider social media to have an endgame. Not in the conventional sense. At best there’s no final stage. No end of the process.

Social media is about building relationships, about engaging and maintaining communication, about interacting, about author and audience evolving together.

Social Engagement

But Thio is focusing on the initial social engagement, not social media in general. The objective of engaging an individual through social media, he proposes, is to provoke (and then hopefully extend) a response.

In it’s purest sense, engagement is the ability to cause another person to respond… using any (or a combination of) the following methods:

• Comments – In response to a status update, tweet, or blog post.
• Shares – Includes linking/mentioning on a blog post they wrote.
• Likes – Includes +K’s, Kred, etc.
• Retweets – Whether native or via a tweet button
• Mentions – Includes Follow Fridays, etc.
• Favorites – Anytime your tweet/update/post is faved on any platform
• Pins/Repins – Pinterest specific of course.
• Tags – Whenever a user is tagged on pics on any platform.
• Hashtags – When ppl begin to adopt & share a hashtag you created.
• Pokes – Yes, I did just put that on there.

Whichever method the audience chooses to respond, it’s critical to acknowledge and capitalize on the opportunity to have a conversation… geared to get to know that particular person… which hopefully leads to a relationship. ~ Randy Thio (ideabloke.com)

Social Media as Storytelling

Short of wandering village to village like Mario Vargas Llosa’s storyteller, social media offers raconteurs of all stripes ideal audience interaction. Ideal global audience interaction. With no end game. Except building a rich and enduring relationship. Social engagement is the first step, the wink, the handshake of social media. Social engagement is the open door behind the well worn welcome mat.

Unlike broadcasters, live storytellers understand this intuitively. Initial social engagement is the spark of interest, the pause long enough to listen, a provocation, an invitation. But storytelling itself, live storytelling, is the original social media. Live storytelling is an interactive relationship, and the story evolves accordingly, being shaped collaboratively by author and audience. The storyteller listens and watches and feels, tailoring the narrative to the appetites and needs of the audience. Sometimes abbreviating; other times inventing extemporaneously.

Welcome to Pine Point, innovative digital storytelling by The Goggles

Much of the innovation driving digital storytelling is still half-baked. Most storytellers are just beginning to fathom the riches of this new frontier, and for many of us it means learning (and inventing) new storytelling techniques to effectively leverage the cross-platform capabilities of digital storytelling.

And yet inspiration is every day more abundant. Recently I discovered a digital story so innovative and compelling that I looped it as soon as it ended. Even though the subject interested me very little (at least at first), I dove in again and again devouring the recipe and savoring the experience.

Welcome to Pine Point by Paul Shoebridge and Michael Simons (aka The Goggles) is an interactive, short format documentary about an erased industry town in Canada’s Northwest Territories. It’s incredibly clever, all the more so because it conjures a compelling, captivating narrative experience out of rather grotty 1970s and 1980s miscellanea.

I’ll pass the baton off to Dan Blank (@DanBlank) who already reviewed “Welcome to Pine Point” nimbly on his business blog, We Grow Media back in March 2011. (Yes, I’m late to the Pine Point party!)

The documentary tells the story of this town – through photos, interviews, videos. How it came to be, what it was like to live there, and how it came to its demise. Literally, the town was torn down, and left as a barren wasteland with no signs of its previous existence except for some crumbling pavement. Wiped from the planet.

This film came about when it was discovered that a former town resident, Richard Cloutier, had created a website where he was cataloging the world that was Pine Point. He was collecting and sharing photos, stories and other updates. It is called Pine Point Revisited. (We Grow Media)

Welcome to Pine Point is an illuminating example of digital storytelling’s potential. I take notes each time I wander through its nostalgic messiness. A truly enticing messiness, I should add.

It’s part film, part photo album, and completely fascinating. (Deirdre Foley-Mendelssohn)

They’ve made an homage to memory, at once linear and exploratory, unraveling through a poetic collage of writing, image, video, sound, voice and music, all in service of a story. (transom.org)

Despite the rough, hand-animated photo-collages and humble lettering, Welcome to Pine Point achieves sophisticated and haunting effects as it chronicles a small Canadian town that was literally wiped off the map… (Scott McCloud)

Mike Dormuth and Richard Cloutier

But no matter how much Webby-winning awesomeness is packed into Welcome to Pine Point, it would not (and could not) exist but for Richard Cloutier’s Pine Point Revisited. While Cloutier’s Pine Point memorial/tribute is basic — its vintage turn-of-the-century navigation and style emphasize content, not aesthetics — it is a deep, dusty archive. It’s a museum. Or a warehouse. It’s a digital reunion for neighbors, friends and colleagues torn apart by time and chance. It’s a surrogate or a facsimile for a place that no longer exists.

But Pine Point Revisited also offers the inspiration, the skeleton and much of the source material for Welcome to Pine Point. In a sense, the documentary is a remix of Cloutier’s website permitting him to play one of the starring leads, though you don’t fully appreciate this until the end of the video.

While accolades aplenty have rightfully rained upon Shoebridge and Simons for their groundbreaking digital storytelling, Cloutier’s digital storytelling is the underlying source and inspiration for The Goggles’ mashup. While recognizing and celebrating this does not diminish Shoebridge’s and Simons’ accomplishments, it does award Cloutier for his less flashy, but hard earned accomplishment. I tip my hat to all three!

Related articles

• The Wonder of Storytelling (virtualdavis.com)
• Storytelling: From Ira Glass to Benedictine Monks (virtualdavis.com)
• Storytelling, Stillness & Deep Listening (virtualdavis.com)
• Transmedia Storytelling and Documentary Filmmaking (meanderingmargaux.com)

Life can become so very hectic and full of movement that we can forget what it is to be still and have nothing to do except to be still. (Abbot’s Notebook)

Before joining Mary Beth Coudal, Joanna Parson and Kathryn Cramer for a thoroughly rejuvenating Adirondack Memoir Retreat at Skenewood I posted a wandering rumination on storytelling. It connected dots. Loosely.

During the retreat I presented to the group on storytelling in the digital age, emphasizing the importance of — and increasingly abundant, powerful and affordable/free tools for — good storytelling. While the tools are many and evolving daily, the keys for good storytelling are few and enduring.

• Listen Suspend noise, distraction and judgment.
• Wonder Become curious and receptive. Ask questions.
• Distill Strive to “unpack a narrative in its purest form” ~ Bob Davidson
• Plot Sequence the scenes: beginning, middle, end.
• Revise Trim the fat. Focus the narrative. Polish the delivery.
• Practice Discover the narrative’s energy, pauses and cadence.
• Share Relate interactively with your audience.

Although the last tip might vary depending on your storytelling medium (ie. print and video, for example offer minimal interactivity between storyteller and audience), I believe that “sharing stories” remains a superior goal to “telling stories”. After all, the story exists not in the words, images, etc. of the teller. The story is conjured up in the imagination of the audience. Whether oral story, book, movie, cartoon, it is the interaction of teller and audience that breathes life into a narrative.

For this reason, the best storytellers remain receptive, listening deeply to their audience even while relating their stories. Listening, revising, improving their narrative(s) for the current audience.

Mary Beth Coudal’s post-retreat reflection reminds us to listen and discover.

I’m finding benefits to being still, keeping quiet…

As we walked in the Adirondacks, the other writers and I stopped talking for a little bit. We said nothing.

When I wasn’t talking, I could listen. I could hear our footsteps, our breathing, a bird on the lake. I could hear a breeze through the leaves of grass. (To Pursue Happiness)

Abbot Philip Lawrence’s quotation at the top of this post, excerpted from “Storytelling: From Ira Glass to Benedictine Monks“, was in my mind as I spoke with the retreat attendees about storytelling in the digital age. Today storytellers are blessed with ever richer storytelling tools and platforms, but their audience is drowning in distractions. It’s a noisy, hectic world, and it is more important than ever to cultivate stillness and quiet in order to listen.

Another conference attendee, William McHone, is setting off in pursuit of stories following the retreat.

As I head off on Wandering III, the people, places and events I come upon will inevitably remind me of the many wonderful people, places and events that have shaped my life thus far. I am hopeful, over time, the recording will become both something of a travel log and memoir… (Wandering With Moe)

As a fellow wanderer, perennially swaying to the siren song of adventurer, I envy McHone’s walkabout. Such sweet seduction!

And yet he must cultivate stillness as he wanders. He must be curious and receptive in order to discover the stories lurking in the people and places and events he will encounter. He must ask questions and listen deeply to the answers. He must distill the essential scenes and weave them into intoxicating narrative adventures. And he must share them. Again. And again.

And if he does, when he does, we will be listening.

Related articles

• Storytelling: From Ira Glass to Benedictine Monks (virtualdavis.com)
• The Wonder of Storytelling (virtualdavis.com)
• Adirondack Memoir Retreat (virtualdavis.com)

Ira Glass: This American Life

A week ago Bob Davidson (@bob_davidson) asked, “What makes good story?” on my new favorite blog, rednow. Davidson is the creative producer for Rule29 and co-founder of rednow, where the art of wonder is practiced, romanced and encouraged.

Wonder makes good story. And, like Davidson, I’m happy to reward storytelling MVP status to Ira Glass and This American Life. Though I’m not certain I could have teased out the reason(s) why… Not so simply. Nor so elegantly.

Here’s Davidson:

I decided to… listen to the entire collection of This American Life… [So far I] have listened to over 250 episodes. I’ve subsequently determined the TAL team are arguably the best storytellers in the business today. Primarily, because they get this:

Great storytellers are made by great listeners. Great listeners understand how to ask and identify the right question. The right questions beckons the story.

And while this is the basic framework of all great storytelling, the real brilliance of the TAL team and what arguably sets them apart is their ability to unpack a narrative in its purest form – a focus on the sequence of actions, or the “anecdote”, as Ira Glass deems it… the audience has no other choice but to begin visualizing the narrative… a space for wonder is created. (rednow)

Over the next few days I’ll be talking to two different groups about Storytelling in the Digital Age, a familiar (and favorite) topic explored with memoir writers on Friday and artists on Saturday. I have high hopes for both workshops, especially now that I can cite Davidson’s post to help incubate reflection on what makes good storytelling.

Ira Glass (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I couldn’t agree more with his first assertion that great storytellers are first and foremost great listeners, but I think it’s even more fundamental than identifying the right question. Before you can identify the right question, you have to quiet your own voices enough to hear the singing underneath. Instead of imposing your story/ies, you need to open up, to become receptive and unjudging. To listen, I mean really listen, you have to be curious. To listen deeply, you have to suspend your own assumptions and convictions.

Questions help, and I agree that they’ll help beckon the stories, but even before you start to identify and ask questions you need to listen with patience and curiosity.

Above all, I tip my hat to Davidson for this: unpack a narrative in its purest form. Period. If only it were as easily executed as repeated!

Related articles

• Through the Ira Glass: Advice on Storytelling From the Host of This American Life (enotes.com)
• Ira Glass on Storytelling (Part 1/4) (whimsicallyours.com)
• The Fundamentals of Social Listening and Storytelling (spiral16.com)
• Ira Glass on Storytelling (Part 3/4) (whimsicallyours.com)

Sony WM-FX421 Walkman. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Technology creates our needs faster than it satisfies them. (Kevin Kelly)

My Monday morning muse for your ruminating pleasure is actually not mine at all. It’s a quotation from Kevin Kelly’s 1998  New Rules for the New Economy. No longer new, of course, but if you missed out before you’ll find that it’s still relevant and eerily prescient. And did I mention that the blog version lives on his website? And that it’s free?

According to Kelly, we’re hurtling forward, inventing technologies to satisfy our desires and — in the process —  discovering new desires.

Our wants are compounding exponentially… technology creates ever new opportunities for those desires to find outlets and form. (Kevin Kelly

Although the illustrative example, a $50 Sony Walkman (remember cassette tapes?), seems practically ancient, I can’t help but transpose an iPad or even a Kindle Fire.

When a merchant sells a consumer a new Sony Walkman for $50, he is in fact creating far more demand than he is satisfying–in this case a continuing and potentially unlimited need for tape cassettes and batteries. (Paul Pilzer)

Transposed for the digital age:

When a merchant sells a consumer an iPad, he is in fact creating far more demand than he is satisfying–in this case a continuing and potentially unlimited need for digital products (ebooks, videos, games, apps, etc.), physical accessories (from practical screen protectors and card readers to fashion carrying cases), non-physical accessories (warranty extensions, maintenance contracts, customer support, etc.), software updates/upgrades, and–let’s be totally honest–hardware upgrades because sexy new models with more memory, faster processors, longer lasting batteries and retina displays are the MSG that keeps consumers coming back for more!

With writers, publishers, editors, agents and booksellers wandering the Wild West known as the Post-Gutenberg Paradigm, it’s more evident than ever that technology creates more demand than it satisfies. Increasingly tech-centric publishing and storytelling is catalyzing an avalanche of new non-book formats to satisfy consumer demands. New options are invented daily, and yet we’re only beginning to glimpse the world of storytelling possibilities around the corner. Technology is simultaneously sating and creating new demand, seeding storytelling innovation and inventing new consumer desires… Suppose I’m bullish on storytelling in the digital age?!?!

Related articles

• SONY and Apple Instructive Example for Publishing Industry (digitalbookworld.com)
• Kindle Owners’ Lending Library (virtualdavis.com)

I mutter on and on about storytelling in the digital age, but storyteller Joe Sabia (tumblr/facebook) whips out his iPad and geeky glasses for a waltz with Lothar Meggendorfer. Sabia’s quirky narrative quickly, deftly demonstrates how storytellers have always leveraged innovative technologies to improve their craft.

No doubt Meggendorfer shook up the book world when he launched his storytelling technology, the pop-up book. Bibliophiles, teachers and book printers/publishers/retailers must have ranted and raved. “Three dimensional images? Are you crazy. That’ll be the death of imagination! That’ll be the end of reading…”

But his history-altering technology was a hit. It still is today. And yet we’re still imagining, still reading. Bravo, Lothar!

Sabia’s TEDTalk, “The technology of storytelling” reminds us that technology — from the walls of caves to projected iPads — have long served creative storytellers. Bravo, Joe!

I’m curious what you think of this video. Several commenters on the YouTube video have suggested that Sabia’s performance wasn’t TED caliber. I disagree, but I’m a storytelling pushover obsessed with digital storytelling. What’s your opinion?

Related articles

• The technology of storytelling: Joe Sabia on TED.com (ted.com)
• Storytelling from Cave Fire to Kindle Fire (virtualdavis.com)
• Technology and Storytelling….An evolving partnership (resourcelinkbce.wordpress.com)
• A Brief History of Storytelling (virtualdavis.com)
• Papercut has designs on a new storytelling genre (radar.oreilly.com)

Resolutions (Image via Wikipedia)

Cheers to a razzle-dazzle 2012! I’m saluting the new year with a confession: I failed my top resolution for 2011.

There it is. I tried. I failed. Period. But last year is history, and the new year is my story!

That’s right, I’m totally undaunted. Humbled but not discouraged. Perhaps I was overly ambitious. Perhaps my resolve faltered. Perhaps I needed humility, checked ambition, faltering resolve. Perhaps I needed to unlearn and relearn and regroup and refocus…

One year ago today — with all the hubris and fanfare of a precocious adolescent — I threw caution to the wind and sang out across the interwebs.

I do hereby firmly resolve to publish Rosslyn Redux in multiple formats and to share my experiences over the next year while moving toward this goal.

My most important 2011 new year’s resolution was to deliver Rosslyn Redux to its audience. And I failed. Mostly…

But rather than sulking and groveling and begging absolution, I’m going to double down. My timing was off, but my goals were spot on. Last year whistled past like a downtown express which sucked my clutch of papers and carefully coiffed do down the tube in its wake. After standing on the platform for a while I learned to read an iPad and wear a hat. Now when the train bullets past I don’t blink.

My 2011 resolution numero uno eluded me, but I made strides and learned plenty over the last twelve months. Now I’m ready to deliver on my promise. I’m gambling that new year’s resolutions (like wine and cheese) tend to improve with proper maturation!

But good cellaring alone won’t be enough to deliver the goods. Dreams are dandy, but it takes good fundamentals and process to mature goals into accomplishments. Here are a few pointers I’ve collected to help guide me.

• pick very small resolutions, measurable actions that you can fulfill… You want small goals you can meet in a short time. (abc7.com)
• make your resolution specific, with a tangible, achievable outcome. (forbes.com)
• create a timeline… that gives you enough time to make the right choice. (How to keep your New Year’s Resolutions)
• Get back to scrappy… and do fewer things, better. (inc.com)
• outline the small, manageable steps you’ll need to take in order to achieve [your resolutions]… [Create a] a step-by-step plan…  (forbes.com)
• [When you encounter] setbacks, don’t throw in the towel. Pick yourself up and start again. Setbacks are not a sign of failure; they are opportunities to learn and start again. (huffingtonpost.com)
• Counterbalance all of these resolutions with a resolution that inspires you. Something you just want to do… Something that just makes you happy to be alive for another year. (psychologytoday.com)

Not bad coaching, right? So far I’ve got goal and guidance. What’s missing? Inspiration. For the rocket fuel of success, no better place to turn than Seth Godin.

The thing is, we still live in a world that’s filled with opportunity. In fact, we have more than an opportunity — we have an obligation. An obligation to spend our time doing great things. To find ideas that matter and to share them. To push ourselves and the people around us to demonstrate gratitude, insight, and inspiration. To take risks and to make the world better by being amazing.

You get to make a choice. You can remake that choice every day… you have the power to change everything that’s to come. And you can do that by asking yourself (and your colleagues) the one question that every organization and every individual needs to ask today: Why not be great? (fastcompany.com)

I always and forever agree: we live in a world filled with opportunity. And we have an obligation to find, create, inspire and share greatness. In order to do so, we have an obligation to take risks.

I mentioned earlier that I mostly failed to deliver Rosslyn Redux to its audience. There are two exceptions. Last April the Rosslyn Redux blog was born. Nine months and four dozen posts later readership is growing and the chronicle/adventure is evolving. While working through the book manuscript the blog offers an open workshop to learn from my readers what is working and what is compelling and what is not. Reader comments and feedback have become an invaluable measure of my storytelling and focus, and I’m excited to ramp up the posts in the new years.

The second exception was Redacting Rosslyn, a solo performance at The Depot Theatre of readings, storytelling and vignettes ranging from a wader-wearing Amazon named Rosslyn to a perennially pickled bathtub yachtsman. Turning my book inside out for a capacity audience was scary and thrilling and addictive. I wanted to stay in that collaborative space, that creative tension between storyteller and audience forever. It was the first time that I’ve invite the public into the story, the first time I’ve shared the characters and scenarios with which I’ve been obsessed for years. The performance explored the uncanny parallel between renovating Rosslyn and redacting the Rosslyn Redux manuscript.

Renovating Rosslyn was an adventure. Writing and editing Rosslyn Redux is an adventure. Redacting Rosslyn is an interstitial adventure tucked into the folds of both, a wander into the unfamiliar. And it demands new methods and rhythms, new risks, new exploration. (rosslynredux.com)

In this world filled with opportunity, this world in which we have an obligation to take risks, the blog and the live performance were my first two forays into the fulfillment of my 2011 new year’s resolution. In 2012, they will serve as the foundation upon which I find, create, inspire and share greatness.

I do hereby firmly resolve to publish Rosslyn Redux in multiple formats in 2012. In the weeks ahead I resolve to define small, measurable actions and to arrange them into a viable timeline in order to produce specific, achievable outcomes. I’ll organize a step-by-step plan and reduce it to the fewest, most necessary elements in order to succeed. I’ll get scrappy when necessary, and I’ll turn setbacks into lessons that will propel me toward my goal. One year from today I will celebrate success.

Thank you for your confidence!

Related articles

• Konrath’s Resolutions for Writers 2012 (jakonrath.blogspot.com)
• New Year’s Resolutions (Inforgraphic) (funtasticus.com)
• Making And Keeping Your 2012 New Year’s Resolutions… With Social Media! (socialtimes.com)
• My New Years Resolution (elleswim.net)

Storytelling from Cave Fire to Kindle Fire (image by virtualDavis)

Isn’t digital storytelling just enhanced storytelling? It’s just the newest chapter in humanity’s quest to improve the way we tell stories. We instinctively yearn for better communication, for storytelling innovation. And yet digital books, audio books, multimedia books tend to meet resistance despite their obvious appeal.

New scares old. Old doesn’t quite understand new. Or doesn’t want to…

In “Is It A Book, Is It A Movie…No, It’s Movie-Book!” we get a glimpse at the book world’s awkward response to digitally enhanced storytelling.

Many eBook writers shy away from multimedia publishing, preferring instead to stay with straight text… An eBook that features multimedia is not an eBook, they say. It’s… an app… What IS an eBook with multimedia? Can we continue to call an eBook an eBook knowing that now it may feature multimedia? … What about audio books? … [Or] movie-books… (Technorati Entertainment)

Let’s call it digital storytelling. Or storytelling in the digital age. Maybe we should just call it storytelling, because — no matter how resistant the publishing industry and book critics and schools and libraries may be — the public is embracing (and will continue to embrace) storytelling in all of its innovative new forms.

Let us imagine the first time a storyteller added innovative new technologies to their bag of tricks. Picture the proverbial caveman standing by the bonfire with his family, talking about the hunt from which he’s returned with a week’s food. In telling the story of creeping up on his prey, he describes his cautious steps, following the fierce Bigmacosaurus, slowly, quietly all afternoon. Until afternoon turned into evening. As daddy caveman describes the fall of night he slowly extinguishes the campfire leaving his wife and children sitting in the dark around the glowing embers. They pull closer together, absorbed in the story. Now dad begins to pace around them in the dark as he speaks, so that they are never quite sure where he is, and he begins to breath deeply, hoarsely, imitating the sounds of the Bigmacosaurus. And suddenly he leaps across the embers and pretends to drive his spear into the Bigmacosaurus, just barely illuminated as he writhes on the ground, bathed in the dull red glow of the embers.

The end.

“Time for bed, cave kiddies!” he bellows. But they don’t move. They cling to their mother, scared to death.

So dad adds kindling and blows on the embers, resuscitating the fire. Within a few minutes the interior of the cave is once again illuminated. The children are less afraid, but still too nervous for bed.

“But what if the other Bigmacosauri followed you home?”

“Yes, what if they come and get us tonight while we sleep?”

Dad takes a charred branch from the fire and proceeds to draw a picture on the cave wall. In the crude illustration a hunter with a spear crouches in tall grass beside a herd of Bigmacosauri. He explains to his children that he discovered the heard around mid-day, far away. He draws the sun directly overhead, and adds wavy water to portray the lake located half a day’s journey from the cave. Then he moves down the wall and draws himself in the mountains pursuing a single Bigmacosaurus, the sun much lower to the horizon now. He explains to his children that he successfully split the heard, forcing the biggest Bigmacosaurus to run toward the mountains which lay between their cave and the lake. He draws a herd of stampeding Bigmacosauri running off into the distance where the sun sets on the far side of the lake. His next drawing is of the the hunter right next to the Bigmacosaurus, spear high in the air about to plunge. A crescent moon is high overhead. He explains to his children that he wanted to drive the Bigmacosaurus as close as possible to home so that he could minimize the distance he would need to carry the meat. He explains how hard it was because wild Bigmacosauri are scared of cave men and don’t like to come near them. But daddy cave man succeeded, and now they have plenty of food. But the next time he wants to hunt a Bigmacosaurus, he will have to go all away around the lake to the far side where the sun sets. He draws one last picture, looking across the vast lake at tiny Bigmacosauri no larger than ants speckling the horizon beneath the setting sun.

The children have fallen asleep in their mother’s arms, so the parents carry them to their beds and tuck them in.

So far, nothing’s unusual about this, right? Just another evening at the cave.

But when the parents tuck themselves in, the cave man’s wife rolls over to her husband to whisper.

“I don’t know what you thought you were doing tonight, extinguishing the fire, making all those beastly noises, reenacting the hunt, drawing on the walls. Look how much you scared the children.”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to scare them so much. I always tell them stories…”

“I know. Stories are good. But all that other stuff, it’s just, I don’t know. Not right. Can you just stick with storytelling? Just words?”

“Yes, dear.”

“Thank you. Good night.”

“Good night.”

But the next day the cave kiddies beg for a story. “Like last night, daddy. Not the boring old way.”

“Yes, like last night. Pleeease?”

Mother grimaces.

Father looks at mother and shrugs.

Fast forward. YouTube, Audible, Vook, iPad, Storify and SoundCloud blur past. From cave fire to Kindle Fire… Onward!

Related articles

• Storytelling Is Just The Beginning (virtualdavis.com)
• Smile! I’m blogging you… (virtualdavis.com)
• A Brief History of Storytelling (virtualdavis.com)
• The technology of storytelling: Joe Sabia on TED.com (ted.com)

Mesopotamia (image by harvest breeding via Flickr)

Storytelling is often thought to have originated in Mesopotamia, where shamans would tell stories orally as a means of teaching and entertaining communities. Before we had written language, storytelling was told through a combination of drawings, which were often prompters for the storyteller to then bring the story to life through voice, dance or music. When writing was adopted in societies, various forms of media were then used to record these stories, for example etching on bark, or drawing on pottery or bones. (Simply Zesty)

A bit slapdash, perhaps, but a tidy nibble at the bigger story… Check out the post, “Social media has evolved into the art of storytelling, and we must all become masters of it.” if this nibble’s made you hungry for more. Though I should warn, the post’s thin on history and long on latter day storytelling jingoism.

Related articles

• The Age of Immersive Storytelling
• Smitten by storytelling
• Transmedia storytelling: It’s the story stupid!
• Indigenous Storytellers Festival, 2011
• Leading Through Storytelling
• 8 Steps to Leading Through Storytelling