Telling Your Story Well
The Surprising Link Between Narrative and Emotional Health
“All great literature can be reduced to two stories: a man goes on a journey, and a stranger comes to town.”
This axiom, most often attributed to Leo Tolstoy, speaks to the power of the stories we encounter in books.
But the stories we tell about our lives—both to ourselves, in the quiet corners of the evening, and to others, as we traverse the world—are compelling too, and far more consequential. The stories that other people tell about us are also formidable, at times exerting undue influence over our lives.
Therefore, we must learn to tell our stories well.
We Use Stories to Make Sense of Our World
Stories are narrative devices used to convey information; they are infused with emotions and often threaded with metaphors—strategies that help hook the listener (Auvinen et al., 2013). In a world where so much is unknown, stories help us fill in the gaps as we attempt to make sense of life’s ambiguities.
For example, let’s say you pass a colleague in the hall, and instead of reciprocating your friendly hello, she averts her eyes and hurries by. In that moment, you make up a story. You may attribute your colleague’s aloofness to external circumstances, figuring she has something else on her mind and didn’t hear your greeting. Conversely, you may take the rebuff personally, deciding she thinks your recent promotion was unearned and is purposefully giving you the cold shoulder.
As Harter and Buchner (2009) put it, “through narrative activity, we structure perceptions of events, identify protagonists and victims, accentuate details, redress dilemmas, and legitimate and discount social orders” (p. 115).
The stories we tell about our lives matter—and they correlate with mental health outcomes (Adler, 2012). Think of it this way: visualize the last five years of your life as a square piece of paper covered with 100 dots, each marking an event. How you conceptualize your previous few years is not a summary of all the occurrences, but a map of how you connect specific dots across the page—selecting those you assign importance to and skipping over those you consider insignificant (Morgan, 2000).
How We Tell Our Life Stories Matters
When considering our life’s narratives, research highlights two categories of tellings that correlate with emotional health: redemptive vs. contamination stories and agency vs. passivity stories.
Struggles are an inherent part of being human; however, it is the ending valence—or the story’s conclusion—where the meaning resides. When recounting an experience of hardship, if the story spirals and ends in despair, we say the narrative is contaminated. In contrast, when the story ends with elements of hope, we describe it as redemptive.
This hope is not reliant on a tidy bow of toxic positivity. Instead, it is embedded within our viewing lens. For example, a redemptive ending to a story about terminal illness is not predicated on a full recovery but perhaps on the deepened relationships and clarification of values that followed the diagnosis (McAdams et al., 1996). Sometimes, a story can be transformed from contaminated to redemptive simply by moving the chapter break. If the ending is tragic, perhaps the chapter isn’t over yet.
How we position ourselves in a story also matters. When we adopt the role of a passive observer in our life’s narrative—believing we are unable to effect change—we feel disempowered and downtrodden, which leads to poorer mental health outcomes. In contrast, if we flip the script and become agentive, wrestling even a modicum of control over our circumstances, we find hope and resiliency. In fact, research shows that therapy clients often infuse elements of agency into their self-talk before seeing positive mental health changes, illustrating the profound impact of language on emotion (Adler, 2012; Adler et al., 2016).
The Impact of the Stories Others Tell About Us
Blades are not the only tool that cuts. Stories can be weaponized, leaving holes in our identity. When someone launches a character assassination—hijacking our narrative in an attempt to sully our reputation—the falsehood feels like a knife. Interestingly, our brains do not differentiate between physical and emotional pain; both activate the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex and the anterior insula. Therefore, we are not speaking metaphorically when we say the betrayal hurts; wounds to the heart are indeed painful (Brooks et al., 2025; Eisenberger et al., 2003).
Bullies often concoct “sticky stories,” defined by Dzurec (2020) as “convincing but morally disengaged narratives,” to damage the target’s status and credibility in a social group (p. 647). These salacious tales grab listeners and make them feel part of an exclusive club they want to gossip about, compelling them to share what they’ve heard. The sticky stories grow with each retelling, suffocating the truth as it travels across the community.
Such stories often reference the “invisible army” or an unnamed group of people used to add gravitas to the narrative. It sounds something like this: “Everyone at the party was saying…” or “Nobody believes she is qualified for the job,” leaving the listener to ponder exactly who “everybody” and “nobody” actually are (Brown, 2018).
Targets of sticky stories are often ostracized from the community, leaving them feeling isolated and afraid. Humans are pack animals, meant to travel together; thus, exclusion can induce serious health consequences such as anxiety, insomnia, depression, and suicidal ideation (Lever et al., 2019; Suskind, 2023).
However, the stories others tell about us can also elevate—lifting us up and drawing out our most evolved version of self. These stories are told with respect, consent, and humility, building a bridge of connection between the subject and the teller. As Yaconelli (2022) shares,
“This is how stories can save us. We step into the reality of another person’s existence and, instead of judgment, feel kinship. When we say, ‘Tell me your story,’ we’re really asking, ‘Can I relive your experience with you?’” (p. 9).
Autoethnography: Harnessing the Power of Our Stories
Story is a verb—an active endeavor to create meaningful plotlines that help us make sense of our existence in the context of a community (Bruner, 1996). As Didion (2009) explains, “We tell ourselves stories in order to live” (p. 11). Committing to authoring our story well can be therapeutic, especially in light of challenging circumstances (White, 2011).
Autoethnography is a critical endeavor of self-study: auto meaning self, and ethnography referring to the study of culture and community. Since storytelling is our preferred mode of meaning-making and communication, we must be mindful of how we tell our own story—committing to iteration, or the constant evaluation of our plotlines, actively rewriting narratives that are holding us back and bringing us down (Ellis, 2020).
As Yaconelli (2022) reminds us,
“Storytelling is being human together. We tell stories to savor the pleasures of living. We share stories to help one another remember who we are and what matters. We tell stories to weave our lives together. We tell stories to keep our souls intact when suffering overtakes us. This is story as medicine. This is how story can save us” (pp. 66–67).
References
Adler, J. M. (2012). Living into the story: Agency and coherence in a longitudinal study of narrative identity development and mental health over the course of psychotherapy. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 102(2), 367–389. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0025289
Adler, J. M., Lodi-Smith, J., Philippe, F. L., & Houle, I. (2016). The incremental validity of narrative identity in predicting well-being: A review of the field and recommendations for the future. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 20, 142–175. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1088868315585068
Auvinen, T. P., Lämsä, A.-M., Sintonen, T., & Takala, T. (2013). Leadership manipulation and ethics in storytelling. Journal of Business Ethics, 116(2), 415–431. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-012-1454-8
Brooks, B. M., Cordero, F. J., Alchermes, S. L., & Brooks, B. M. (2025). Social pain: A systematic review on interventions. F1000Research, 14, 58. https://doi.org/10.12688/f1000research.159561.1
Brown, B. (2018). Dare to lead: Brave work. Tough conversations. Whole hearts. Random House.
Bruner, J. (1991). The narrative construction of reality. Critical Inquiry, 18(Autumn), 1–21.
Didion, J. (2009). The white album. Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
Dzurec, L. C. (2020). Examining 'sticky' storytelling and moral claims as the essence of workplace bullying. Nursing Outlook, 68(5), 647–656. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.outlook.2020.05.007
Eisenberger, N. I., Lieberman, M. D., & Williams, K. D. (2003). Does rejection hurt? An fMRI study of social exclusion. Science, 302(5643), 290–292.
Ellis, C. (2020). Revision: Autoethnographic reflections on life and work (2nd ed.). Routledge.
Harter L.M., & Bochner A.P. (2009). Healing through stories: A special issue on narrative medicine. Journal of Applied Communication Research, 37(2), 113–117. https://doi.org/10.1080/00909880902792271
Lever, I., Dyball, D., Greenberg, N., & Stevelink, S. A. M. (2019). Health consequences of bullying in the healthcare workplace: A systematic review. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 75(12), 3195–3209. https://doi.org/10.1111/jan.13986.
McAdams, D. P., Hoffman, B. J., Mansfield, E. D., & Day, R. (1996). Themes of agency and communion in significant autobiographical scenes. Journal of Personality, 64, 339–377.
Morgan, A. (2000). What is narrative therapy? An easy-to-read introduction. Dulwich Centre Publications.
Suskind, D. (2023). Workplace bullying: Finding your way to big tent belonging. Rowman and Littlefield.
White, M. (2011). Narrative practice: Continuing the conversation (D. Denborough, Ed.). New York, NY: Norton.
Yaconelli, M. (2022). Between the listening and the telling: How stories can save us. Broadleaf Books.
Two Read
This week, I am reading:
How We Learn to Be Brave: Decisive Moments in Life and Faith by Mariann Edgar Budde
The Measure by Nikki Erlick
Favorite Quote
“My prayer is that, by grace, we all will be emboldened to lean into the wisdom, strength, power, and grace that come to us, whenever we find ourselves at a decisive moment. May you and I dare to believe that we are where we are meant to be when that moment comes, doing the work that is ours to do, fully present to our lives. For it is in this work that we learn to be brave.” ~ Mariann Edgar Budde
Workplace Bullying: Finding Your Way to Big Tent Belonging
From the Publisher: Workplace Bullying: Finding Your Way to Big Tent Belonging is a lifeline for people who have been targets of workplace abuse and are desperately trying to make sense of the trauma. It is a resource for partners trying to help their loved ones heal. And, it is a toolkit for managers and industry leaders inspiring to create inclusive cultures by proactively addressing toxic behaviors that stagnate innovation, fracture work communities, and drive out top employees. To simplify a complex topic and make the book readable and engaging for a wide audience, the author uses the elements of story to tell the tale of workplace bullying, zooming in on the characters, settings, and plotlines of cultures that allow and/or encourage workplace abuse.
Reach Out With Questions and Ideas
I love hearing from readers, so please don’t hesitate to reach out to say hello or suggest topics for me to write about next ~ dorothysuskind@gmail.com.