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Tell Me a Story: The Life-Shaping Power of Our Stories
Tell Me a Story (previously published as The Healing Power of Stories. New York: Doubleday, 1996) explores the story-shaped nature of our lives. We are born, live, and die within stories. These stories shape how we see ourselves, the world, and our place in it. The first great storytellers in our lives are home, church, school, and popular culture. Knowing and embracing healthy stories are crucial to living rightly and well. This book investigates the relationship between stories and meaning in life, the difference between character and personality, the ability of story to make connections between things, the power of story to bring about a desired future, how stories create community and a sense of belonging, and how broken stories can be healed.
Drawing on a wide range of stories-literary, popular, and personal, Tell Me a Story offers profound insight, encouragement, and inspiration. It includes a series of questions designed to help readers identify the important stories in their own lives.
Drawing on a wide range of stories-literary, popular, and personal, Tell Me a Story offers profound insight, encouragement, and inspiration. It includes a series of questions designed to help readers identify the important stories in their own lives.
182 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1996
7 people are currently reading
344 people want to read
About the author
Daniel Taylor
154 books62 followersDaniel Taylor (Ph.D., Emory University) is the author of eighteen books, including The Myth of Certainty, Letters to My Children, Tell Me A Story: The Life-Shaping Power of Our Stories, Creating a Spiritual Legacy, The Skeptical Believer: Telling Stories to Your Inner Atheist, Believing Again: Stories of Leaving and Returning to Faith, and a four novel mystery series, beginning with Death Comes for the Decontructionist and ending with The Mystery of Iniquity. His most recent novel, The Prodigal of Leningrad, is set in that city during the Nazi siege of World War II. He has also worked on a number of Bible translations. He speaks frequently at conferences, colleges, retreats, and churches on a variety of topics. Dr. Taylor is also co-founder of The Legacy Center, an organization devoted to helping individuals and organizations identify and preserve the values and stories that have shaped their lives. He was a contributing editor for Books and Culture. Dr. Taylor is married and the father of four adult children. Website: www.WordTaylor.com
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Displaying 1 - 26 of 26 reviews
September 19, 2018
"Stories are more important than facts" - this is painfully true, in politics, individuals, families, communities... I've heard this before but to hear it in the language of theology was a need I didn't realize I had until I came across this book. Taylor is an engaging, entertaining, and deeply thoughtful writer. The community of ideas is broad and deep here: Twain, Wiesel, Hurston, Momaday, Augustine, Dostoevsky, Welty, King, Flannery O'Connor, Tolkien... and of course, scripture. The author leans conservative but this only barely comes through the text; he was an editor at Books and Culture before it folded. A book I want to read again. A book important for our times, for ethics, for self-knowledge, for preaching... not sure why this one isn't getting more press.
January 12, 2024
This was for a class, I would have needed to be paid a lump sum to finish it in my own free will.
While I appreciated the concept of a book dedicated to the powerful nature and many forms stories take on; the writing style was dense and tough to follow with a lot of repetition.
While I appreciated the concept of a book dedicated to the powerful nature and many forms stories take on; the writing style was dense and tough to follow with a lot of repetition.
April 9, 2016
This is a very powerful book. I have highlighted and made notes all through the book. So much truth, wisdom and inspiration in this one. I'll return to it again and again.
September 21, 2020
I cannot now remember what encouraged me to buy this book. It was probably recommended in one of the many blogs that I read. I am really glad that I followed the recommendation because it is a volume that has made me slow down with my reading and really think about the concept of story, and the stories that have surrounded me all through my life. The auther's thesis is fully summarised in his opening sentence "You are your stories". I did not understand this at first, but now I do. My journey to that understanding was not always easy - there were many times, especially early in the volume, when I had to stop and reread sentences to take them in. There is powerful insight here into what we take from the things people tell us and our engagement with those things. Hard work at times, but well worth the effort.
June 27, 2023
I received this book from my college career advisor during covid, and he had annotated it beforehand which was so sweet! It was a great, simple, easily digested reflection on story, why it matters, the power it has to heal, develop, change things, etc. I really enjoyed it. There are many religious and literary examples used and the appendix has a guide to walking through your story that I hope to use someday! Very fun. The 6th and 7th chapter I thought were particularly insightful. The author discouraged the ever-popular social trend of being an objective spectator in life and being passively willing to blame circumstances/outcomes on a system or situation in which you have no agency. It was a good word.
May 22, 2017
Fantastic and articulate, Taylor breaks down in this book the importance of story on a personal and universal level. His thoughts about story ring with highly specified accuracy to the role that stories have played in my own life and helped give me words to explain just why I think they're not only wonderful but vital to a fully flourishing human existence. I'd highly recommend this book to anyone who enjoys the power of stories. It'll deepen your appreciation of them on every level.
January 21, 2019
This has been on my TBR shelf since it came out in hardcover. Dan was one of my college professors, so reading this took me back 30 years to sitting in his classes and especially the many conversations with Dan and my classmates during our senior seminar sessions. During a long drive, in which we listened to a few history podcasts, my husband and I got to talking about story and the role that story plays. Thanks, Dan, for the food for thought.
August 10, 2019
This was one of those books where I agreed with almost everything the author was saying, I thought what was being said was important, but I felt that the message was lost in the writing style. The book felt repetitive and like many of the points were hammered home, then hammered home again, and again, and again, without bringing additional meaning or perspective each time.
I'd still say its worth reading for its unique message about story and the individual.
I'd still say its worth reading for its unique message about story and the individual.
May 12, 2020
This is not a self-help book. The author is determined to make that point. It is philosophical discussion of why and how stories affect and change our lives. As a grandfather who is into storytelling with his grandchildren I really appreciated this. For self-help book lovers there are guidelines in the back to help them get started. But it's not a self-help book.
June 16, 2023
A very philosophical but real take on our lives as stories and the value of community storytelling in a broken society. It’s a bit repetitive at times but has a lot of very valuable takeaways. (The only reason I took five months to read this is because I read six chapters of it for class and then forgot about it and read the last chapter today. Whoops. I promise it’s not a drag.)
May 23, 2018
Nicely paced. Read for studies on audiences and participation but loved for his comments on Twain, Wiesel, and MLKJr.
May 4, 2021
Interesting perspective on how stories shape who we are and how we relate to the world.
March 5, 2023
Did not enjoy the writing style but I appreciated the fact that there is an entire book on the power and importance of stories.
December 28, 2009
I will let the author speak for me:
"Stories tell me not only who I am but also who you are, and what we are together. In fact, without you and your story I cannot know myself and my story. no one's story exists alone. Each is tangled up in countless others. Pull a thread in my story and feel the tremor half a world and two millennia away."
"It is crucial . . . that we surround children, and ourselves, with healthy stories. These stories should be filled with mentors, models, and heroes who do the kinds of things, physically and spiritually, that we ourselves wish to do. If I cannot imagine myself doing something, I am unlikely even to attempt. Stories multiply our possibilities."
"Stories can . . . literally give us courage. The child who hears of another child outwitting a giant in a fairy tale is better equipped to conquer the equally fearsome giants in his or her own life. . . this is one of many reasons to reject the flippant response "It's just a story" . . . Stories are more real and more determinative in our lives than the vast majority of things that go on in the merely physical world. Stories form our minds and spirits, the way we perceive ourselves and others, and how we act in the world. Strip the world of story and it becomes more a simple mechanism--and therefore less real."
"Storytellers should be aware that they are dealing with dangerous materials. Life and death flow to us through stories. Words have almost unlimited power to destroy and to heal. Nothing is more false than the implication of the phrase 'words, words, words--nothing but words.' More lives have been destroyed by words than by bullets, and more lives redeemed and made whole."
"In his Nobel Lecture, Solzhenitsyn reflects on the role of stories, and art generally, in the modern world, and identifies four things literature can do to help heal a violent, fragmented, alienated world. First, it preserves memory, without which we forget who we are. In addition, it helps us to see ourselves accurately, diluting our human tendency to self-delusion. Further, it gives us a vehicle for overcoming our radical separateness and the relativism of values, offering something for common contemplation that shows us our potential for agreement and community. Lastly, as we have seen, art and stories can vanquish lies, including the lies that provide the needed cover for violence and oppression."
Tonia, you have it right when you say, "Fight Evil, Read Books".
I really liked this book, and when I think of my life as story, and my friends as characters in my book, I don't know, it just adds something to my life.
"Stories tell me not only who I am but also who you are, and what we are together. In fact, without you and your story I cannot know myself and my story. no one's story exists alone. Each is tangled up in countless others. Pull a thread in my story and feel the tremor half a world and two millennia away."
"It is crucial . . . that we surround children, and ourselves, with healthy stories. These stories should be filled with mentors, models, and heroes who do the kinds of things, physically and spiritually, that we ourselves wish to do. If I cannot imagine myself doing something, I am unlikely even to attempt. Stories multiply our possibilities."
"Stories can . . . literally give us courage. The child who hears of another child outwitting a giant in a fairy tale is better equipped to conquer the equally fearsome giants in his or her own life. . . this is one of many reasons to reject the flippant response "It's just a story" . . . Stories are more real and more determinative in our lives than the vast majority of things that go on in the merely physical world. Stories form our minds and spirits, the way we perceive ourselves and others, and how we act in the world. Strip the world of story and it becomes more a simple mechanism--and therefore less real."
"Storytellers should be aware that they are dealing with dangerous materials. Life and death flow to us through stories. Words have almost unlimited power to destroy and to heal. Nothing is more false than the implication of the phrase 'words, words, words--nothing but words.' More lives have been destroyed by words than by bullets, and more lives redeemed and made whole."
"In his Nobel Lecture, Solzhenitsyn reflects on the role of stories, and art generally, in the modern world, and identifies four things literature can do to help heal a violent, fragmented, alienated world. First, it preserves memory, without which we forget who we are. In addition, it helps us to see ourselves accurately, diluting our human tendency to self-delusion. Further, it gives us a vehicle for overcoming our radical separateness and the relativism of values, offering something for common contemplation that shows us our potential for agreement and community. Lastly, as we have seen, art and stories can vanquish lies, including the lies that provide the needed cover for violence and oppression."
Tonia, you have it right when you say, "Fight Evil, Read Books".
I really liked this book, and when I think of my life as story, and my friends as characters in my book, I don't know, it just adds something to my life.
September 8, 2016
Really good book that extensively argues (and maybe even labours the point) for the importance of story in our society and for ourselves. The depth of the book is enhanced by the fact that it comes from the perspective of an 'expert' in story - a professor of English Literature.
Ironically, though, the book contains nowhere near enough stories, and ends with a surprisingly negative tone. Very insightful though, and revelatory.
Some snippets (from the chapter on healing our stories): "Healthy life stories [ie the stories we live our lives by] ... should be truthful, freeing, gracious and hopeful." (p129)
"If the stories I live by are unfettered with falsehood, and if they free me from preoccupation with self so I can act in the world, then I am more likely to be a source of grace to others and, therefore, to receive grace from others." (p133)
"freedom and responsibility are self-fulfilling understandings of the self. If we live as though we are free and responsible, then those become the qualities of our life." (p137)
Ironically, though, the book contains nowhere near enough stories, and ends with a surprisingly negative tone. Very insightful though, and revelatory.
Some snippets (from the chapter on healing our stories): "Healthy life stories [ie the stories we live our lives by] ... should be truthful, freeing, gracious and hopeful." (p129)
"If the stories I live by are unfettered with falsehood, and if they free me from preoccupation with self so I can act in the world, then I am more likely to be a source of grace to others and, therefore, to receive grace from others." (p133)
"freedom and responsibility are self-fulfilling understandings of the self. If we live as though we are free and responsible, then those become the qualities of our life." (p137)
August 23, 2012
This book brought further confirmation that "just" reading is so much more than that. I so love to hear that when homeschool consists of "just" reading!
The author states that reading good literature is valuable because it creates character within the person reading and/or being read to. Among the many character traits a person can develop through reading, freedom and responsibility were highlighted in the book. The author drew out the distinctions between personality and character. Personality being the modern psychology phrase that takes out responsibility within a person's choices. And character being the thing that we create within ourselves by the choices we make. Characters in literature help us to see that when we take responsibility for our choices we gain freedom in our lives.
My favorite quote: "Stories, like mother's milk, are filled with the nutrients from which lives grow."
The author states that reading good literature is valuable because it creates character within the person reading and/or being read to. Among the many character traits a person can develop through reading, freedom and responsibility were highlighted in the book. The author drew out the distinctions between personality and character. Personality being the modern psychology phrase that takes out responsibility within a person's choices. And character being the thing that we create within ourselves by the choices we make. Characters in literature help us to see that when we take responsibility for our choices we gain freedom in our lives.
My favorite quote: "Stories, like mother's milk, are filled with the nutrients from which lives grow."
May 5, 2009
It became apparent to me in reading this book that without an understanding of the Atonement of Jesus Christ, it is impossible to bring all of our beliefs and experiences into harmony. Some of the author's own disjunction is evidenced in the book. However, he gives some valuable insights into the great power that can be found in the stories that we instill in ourselves and our children. He also points our the importance of knowing that our lives have purpose. If we can find a plot in our lives, it makes our lives worth living. "The least livable life is the one without coherence-nothing connects, nothing means anything. Stories make connections." (Daniel Taylor)
January 14, 2015
It would be easier to highlight or underline the passage in the book that I did not find noteworthy as the majority of the book was spot-on.
This small volume does an excellent job of addressing the role of story in our lives and why it is vital to human meaning and flourishing. The author does this through reasoned thought, great care, and many stories along the way.
While less humorous than Don Miller's A Million Miles in a Thousand Years, this book makes a better case for why we need and should consider how we choose which stories we decide to live by.
This small volume does an excellent job of addressing the role of story in our lives and why it is vital to human meaning and flourishing. The author does this through reasoned thought, great care, and many stories along the way.
While less humorous than Don Miller's A Million Miles in a Thousand Years, this book makes a better case for why we need and should consider how we choose which stories we decide to live by.
July 19, 2012
This story full of anecdotal stories from Mr. Taylor's life, is of course about telling stories and how best to do so, but it really is about a lifestyle choice, a lifestyle devoted to being invested in other people around you. This was a very easy read,and quite settling, I would highly recommend for anyone who is or is considering a lifestyle involved with caring for and about others.
August 5, 2011
This book explains the way stories are lived out by us and how we act as characters, how our stories interact, and how they change over time and can be broken and repaired. I would have liked more examples of stories and their interaction. The book stays rather abstract.
April 22, 2008
An excellent readable account of what is at stake with narrative theology and why literature is so important and how we need story to make sense of the larger sweep of our lives.
August 29, 2010
Taylor captures the life-changing reasons why I write!
May 3, 2012
good partner book to John Niles' HomoNarrans, but in more accessible language.
September 24, 2012
Such a powerful book sharing the reasons behind stories and good books. It was hard for me to read consistently but I'm glad I finished. I learned much.
June 25, 2013
Lots of great statements about the significance of story. Well written.
October 7, 2013
Some writing books are technically helpful, others ride the self-help train, which this one did.
Displaying 1 - 26 of 26 reviews