"Although you don't have complete control of the story of your life, you can still create that story. Although you will never fully know or successfully manipulate all of the characters who surface or disrupt your plot, you can respect the ones you can't avoid by paying them close attention and doing them justice. The plot you choose may change or even elude you, but being your own story means you can control the theme. It also means you can invent the language to say how you mean in this world.
Well, it's true. I am myself a storyteller, and therefore, an optimist--a firm believer in the ethical bend of the human heart; a believer in the mind's appetite for truth and its disgust with fraud and selfishness. From my point of view, your life is already a miracle of chance waiting for you to shape its destiny. From my point of view, your life is already artful--waiting, just waiting, for you to make it art."
***
I'm not even sure where to begin with my response; nevertheless, I had one. It's Toni Morrison speaking after all, and who can really top her ability to craft wisdom with language?
I read her address yesterday in a teaching workshop, and I haven't been able to extract it from my mind; it won't step down off the tip of my thoughts. In fact, I have this deep yearning to chew every single word and spit it out into every moment of my life.
Stories interest me beyond anything else--beyond facts, beyond formulas, beyond theory. Stories are at the crux of what makes us tick as human beings. They've entertained, inspired and persuaded us for ages. We are who we are not because of what we've discovered, but because of how we've told the story of our discoveries--how's we passed on our learnings, realizations and truths.
And in each of us rests a bank of stories we've lived, stories we are meant to experience and stories that have preceded our place in the world. I believe stories can change the world because they are what change people. They are what move us to act, and they are what teach us to be good. In a world where more and more power seems to elude us daily, all we truly have are the stories we choose to tell. The stories we make each day when we wake up, and the stories we commit to each night when we fall asleep. We may not be able to control who bounds into our path, but we can certainly control how we respond, how we fight and how we walk forward.
"The stories we make each day when we wake up, and the stories we commit to each night when we fall asleep."
ReplyDeleteThis is so important. Thank you for reminding me that I have the right, the ability to write my own story each day. All too often I find myself going to sleep each night wishing the day's story were different.
As always... thank you for the perspective :)