The Healing Art of Storytelling

Book excerpt: Over the years, television and other cultural forces have robbed us of storytelling as a tool of communicating, learning, and healing. In The Healing Art of Storytelling, professional storyteller Richard Stone describes this crisis and its devastating effects, and then offers a step-by-step guide for creating a storytelling tradition that we can use to transform our families, our friendships, and ourselves. This ancient art offers us a fresh approach to issues such as coping with death and grieving, building esteem in ourselves and our children, finding courage in the face of uncertainty, and discovering the miraculous in the everyday. With The Healing Art of Storytelling, you will gain a deeper sense of integrity, purpose, and direction and, most importantly, see the story of your life in a new light. "Richard Stone is a captivating storyteller with an important lesson in his tale-you can do this, too, and in the telling, transform yourself as well as your story." -Henriette Anne Klauser, Ph.D., author of Put Your Heart on Paperand Writing on Both Sides of the Brain "Beautifully written, insightful and practical, a book for every storyteller and the storyteller in everyone." -Allan B. Chinen, M.D., author of Waking the World and Beyond the Hero "[Richard Stone] invites us on a rich adventure: To tell the smaller stories of our lives with exquisite precision, that we, ourselves, through the telling, may become larger and spacious, full of grace." -Wayne Muller, author of How, Then, Shall We Live? and Legacy of the Heart "This is the storyteller's workshop and cookbook, but more than that it shows the deep motivator and the healer of wounded hearts and souls at work in an effective and salvational manner A most helpful book and a good read." -Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, author of The Dream Assembly and From Age-ing to Sage-ing