What’s your Story ?

On Podcasts, Our Stories, and Why We Listen

This is a story I told on my Instagram today, that came out of a conversation I had with my friend Paula a couple of months ago. If you want to listen to it, you can find it HERE.

It was about why podcasts are so successful and why there seems to be something so interesting about two people talking with each other. Just two humans in conversation

Why do you listen to podcasts?

We seem to love to relate to people. To be captivated by their stories.

I love working with you on your costume concepts and all the ideas that you bring to the classes. Most of you are taking my classes to prepare for a job in the stop-motion animation industry. Your portfolios are stories. They tell the story of your creativity, your creative process, your way of handling the material. Your way of following through with your ideas and how you present them so that they can be received by a possible employer.

The question is always: how does your portfolio, your story, stand out from the 500+ other portfolios they look at?

Employers don’t want to admire your work. They want to know how you can be of value to them. You have to tell them. The way you visually put together your work tells the story of what you can offer them. How they can use your skills for their project. How you lead them through your work paves the path for them to decide which position to put you in. And that, in the ideal case, is also the position that is best for you! You want to work in a position that suits you, and you want to do the work that you enjoy, don’t you?

So, how do you do that?

You put the images of your work together in a way that tells a good story. An entertaining story. A captivating story. The story of you, your work. You want to hold their attention long enough for them to think, Huh, interesting! And then to put your résumé on the “invite for an interview” pile!

On the other hand

If you are already creating your own movies or short films, or even if you are someone who just browses by and you don’t know me and you’re a creative of some other kind, this is really for all of us. This is important for every ordinary moment where we just want to bring our point across.

Living life itself is telling a story. Our story. And there are mechanisms and patterns that make our stories powerful and more importantly, impactful. Or not…

What is a captivating story, and what is your point, Ani?

I want to explore the weight of storytelling with you. Not the best technique or the most clever way…

If you understand this, you will absolutely find that for yourself.

In my classes, I usually want to explore the realm with you where you not only find your stories, but from where you can tell your stories in a way that they have depth and impact. Through writing prompts and class reflection on the process and the experimentation, we reflect in ourselves on why we do things the way we do. That roots the narrative in our experience how we consciously feel about it, if you know what I mean.

Storytelling, in the old days, was a way to pass on experience. Useful experiential knowledge that prevented us from dying from poisonous food, for example. Or we shared how to stay warm because someone found out how to make fire. This is what we still do but these days the sharing is far more sophisticated. While making fire was the cool new thing for a few millennia before someone came up with a new cool thing to do, like writing… or math.

My point here is, things used to be very slow and developed slowly by us sharing our experience.

Today, things are far more fast-paced and confusing. Today, and really since the industrial age, there are all these new inventions at dizzying speeds, like medical technologies or quantum computing. But not only that. Because of the way we communicate these days — through books and more recently social media, there seems to be the illusion that only some contribute to this collective evolutionary development in valuable ways.

By this I mean scientific discoveries and contributions, philosophical ideas, great movies that shape the face of our culture. But how we evolve is still the same. We learn from each other by sharing our experience.

Now we are unconsciously fooled into believing that there is an “out there” that shapes us, and that we have to shape ourselves after it. In truth, the “out there” is shaped by us. Do you get it? Every single one of us.

I want you to let that sink in. Not just a few extraordinarily talented ones. All of us. We are the collective.

My whole point is to bring this to your awareness so you don’t let it unconsciously trick you into the false impression that your story does not matter.

It does.

Think about it once more

In the old days, storytelling was our means to perpetuate our wisdom, to pass it on to the next generation. And that means every single one’s wisdom. Passed on to the next one who was there. Mostly family, then the neighbors in the clan. That sharing was essential, and everyone did it. Yes, people had different functions. Some were parents, some were elders, some were medicine men and women, some were leaders—everyone had their role and experience to share from.

We live in a very different time now, but the rules still apply. We still live in a village. A global village. But hey, everyone still plays an important part. It can’t be otherwise, or you wouldn’t be here. It is just important that we find our role and play that part.

And that seems to be so challenging for us because we tend to look to the outside and try to be someone else.

Someone with a cooler story of course.

Now look at our world — we very much live in chaos because we all try to be someone we are not. But especially these days, it is so important to get in touch with who we are and our story.

Here’s why

My friend Paula is also an astrologer. She said that astrology is the oldest human tradition.

It is the art of archetypal storytelling of all the diverse aspects of our psyche, the very fabric that makes us and which describes us as individuals within the greater pattern of the collective. You don’t need to be into astrology or believe in it to think about that. This is not about astrology, but about what we are, storytellers!

We still share words, symbols and artifacts. Now, they just looks different.

Everything we do is a narrative that we weave into the collective tapestry. Our stories, our lives, our experience on Earth, are so deeply linked to that archetypal web of our existence, where each one of us plays a part.

Carl Jung found a more scientifically acknowledged way of describing the very same thing. For those of us in film, Joseph Campbell most likely comes to mind.

They contemplate and claim that there is an interconnectedness to the human experience that is the very foundation of our existence, and out of which we create the new moments that shape our reality. One story at a time.

The human story. The human way!

So now, why do we love podcasts, and why do we listen?

Because it is in our nature. Our default, our ingrained, all-and-everything mechanism—to share with, and learn from each other, to keep crafting our human story. We want to relate to each other. Yes, we want to hear outstanding experiences—but also the simple, the ordinary, everyday story. The fun parts. The parts where things didn’t work out. We want to find ourselves in the other, or the other in ourselves. We want to feel someone else’s joy and pain. We want to be touched. This is why we turn to podcasts, art exhibitions, poetry, or music…

We want to find something to reflect and relate to, something to feel, to evolve our inner world. Don’t you?

So now—what the hell does all of that have to do with being a creative, or becoming a successful miniature costume fabricator?

Like most of you who are gravitating toward this message? A lot.

Now you’re thinking, Oh my God, that’s a whole lot of weight and responsibility to give an HR person an experience of enrichment of their inner life… Ehem… I just want to make pretty costumes… Me too, haha!

And it’s easier than you think.

You know, my expertise is pattern design and construction. I know this inside out. It’s my second nature. I drape around the form without even having to think about it. I have learned it so deeply that I do the work in my head before I even start. Because it is a pattern that lies at the foundation of every task. We call that talent.

Think about it. Do you still think about how to put words together to make a sentence?

No.

We do things automatically. And that is the same for the creative process, in terms of strengthening the inner structures of how we work and how we express that. And you can become aware of this inner mechanism. Your inner creative mechanism.

Being a successful storyteller is about how successfully you bring your story across, and that depends on how well you understand your story yourself.

How well you can tell that story to yourself first. It’s like you can’t make someone laugh by telling a joke that you yourself don’t think is funny. I mean, that’s a no-brainer, right? That’s the only thing you need to understand. From there, you can just do the work.

Work sounds hard, but it’s really just following your curiosity and your willingness to put in time and experiment. Making miles…. messing around with the materials, trying out things and see how YOU like it. It’s about playfulness. About not taking ourselves so goddamn seriously. About not having to meet any expectations. About being willing to write down something that might be utterly pointless in the bigger picture, but absolutely important as a stepping stone to the final goal. Make it effortless and fun.

The process of telling your story is effortless and fun.

That is the creative flow they talk about. That is the divine muse—whatever. You can get in on the juicy stuff.

So why am I hauling out so far?

If you have followed me this far, it is all about having weight to your message. Your message is a transmission. A message that can be creative and constructive, or destructive. Your choice. Your responsibility.

The more rooted you are in yourself, the clearer your message. The clearer your transmission, the stronger your impact.

I want this for you.

Your work shows your depth. Your personality. Your character.

This gives you agency. This gives you a tool to invite people to relate to you in a whole other way. This is why this year, in this program, it is all about that. Prompting that inner world to reveal itself.

If you want, get on my newsletter to receive more inspiration on this.

Let’s tell some good stories.

your story