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Annette Simmons

Stories with a Moral Blueprint – part 8 of 8

We need a Magic School for Storytellers Thirty years before J. K. Rowling created Harry Potter, Ursula Le Guin’s Earthsea series imagined a magic school that taught apprentice sorcerers how to avoid abusing the power of magic. Le Guin points out early in the series that “even to light a candle is to cast a

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Annette Simmons

Storytelling Moral Survival System: Part six

Defining Story as a Significant Emotional Experience My current teaching definition of story is: “the narration of a significant emotional experience that feels meaningful to both teller and listener.” Teaching non-professional storytellers helped me realize that it is much easier for them to find a great story if I ask them to think about a

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Annette Simmons

The Story Factor 3rd ed. OCT2019 (new material)

“Ships at a distance have every man’s wish on board.”                          Zora Neale Hurston From a distance, storytelling also seems to have every man’s wish on board. There is an initial euphoria when you consider that once you learn how to tell stories that

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Annette Simmons

Ten Games #10: Powerful Alliances

Powerful Alliances “Powerful alliances” is a territorial game humans have played from the beginning of time. But when people start treating friends and natural allies like bargaining chips to win a territorial game in ways that silence others – they cross a line.  It is human nature to cultivate connections with people who seek the

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Annette Simmons

Ten Games People Play to Control Truth (5)

  Information Manipulation Game Tweak the numbers and you tweak the decision.  Edit video and you edit context. Control the narrative and you control what information seems relevant. Truth is the first casualty whenever we assume that everyone manipulates information so we have to as well….since “that’s how the game is played.” “Their response [when tweaking

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Annette Simmons

Ten Games People Play to Control Truth (4 of 10)

Camouflage Game (Wild Goose Chase) The new forms of this game have the potential to twist truth in ways that kill ideas that matter far more than just killing the research project described in the quote below: “Hal was there only as a sophisticated untracker in groups.  Untrackers get you going down the primrose path…you feel comfortable

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Popular Posts

Paradox: Root Cause of Polarization

According to Pew research, disdain between opposing political parties in America has doubled in the last 30 years, coincidentally the span of my own consulting business, Group Process Consulting. My efforts to document true stories about these escalating conflicts inadvertently produced a set of oral histories across the years: Territorial Games (1997), A Safe Place

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Contrasts, Not Conflicts

 “Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong remedies.”  Groucho Marx Troublemakers erode trust faster than we can build it back right now. Yet, many of these “troubles” are invented conflicts that distort predictably contrasting values. It helps to know what to look for. And once

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Storyteller’s Confession: My Secret Mission

I’ve been trying to infiltrate the halls of power for decades. My secret mission is to increase the diversity of thought by teaching those without a voice how to tell their stories and by teaching leaders how to find and retell stories that broaden everyone’s understanding.

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Stories with a Moral Blueprint – part 8 of 8

We need a Magic School for Storytellers Thirty years before J. K. Rowling created Harry Potter, Ursula Le Guin’s Earthsea series imagined a magic school that taught apprentice sorcerers how to avoid abusing the power of magic. Le Guin points out early in the series that “even to light a candle is to cast a

Read More »

Stories with a Moral Blueprint – part 7 of 8

Truth in Storytelling When I wrote the first edition of The Story Factor twenty years ago, I began with the idea that people don’t want more information. They want faith in you and your positive intentions. I never suspected that two decades later we’d be discussing an explosion of stories that intentionally undermine this faith. Without

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