This is a storytelling manifesto.
Its purpose is to lay a philosophical foundation of what stories and storytelling are. It’s meant to give you, and myself as well, clarity on what we are actually doing and what our role as storytellers in this world even is.
I have read countless advice on story and storytelling and, although it improved my craft to a certain extent, I still couldn’t find the connective tissue which would put all the disparate advice together and create a meaningful framework of why some advice speaks to me and some doesn’t.
Without a firm philosophical foundation, it is difficult to remember writing advice in the first place and it is impossible to reconcile opposing views on story which many successful writers have.
The goal of all storytelling teachers needs to be in developing a method of thinking about story and storytelling so that you yourself can think and learn about it on your own. They shouldn’t give you premade answers, but to prompt you to find them on your own.
We need to learn how to think about story, not what to think of it.
The most important questions I wanted answered as someone who, probably like you, was haunted by stories, obsessed with the worlds I created and the characters that inhabited them, concerned themselves with the nature of me as a storyteller.
Why did it feel like these ideas chose me? Why couldn’t they leave me alone? The ideas came out of nowhere and they gripped me hard and wouldn’t let go.
Why did it feel like I had to write, even as a kid, before I even knew I could make a living out of it? The stories wanted to be released into the world, as if it would be selfish for me to keep them just for myself.
And why, despite this urge to tell my stories, was it so goddamn hard to actually write them down? Why were all these stories so clear in my mind, but so chaotic and confused on the page? Surely, if I was meant to be a writer, it wouldn’t be so hard to sit down and write. And write something good.
It took me almost a decade and 9 screenplays to understand why that is the case and to finally be able to translate a story from my mind to the page in the way it truly deserved.
The insight that helped me the most with this was when I grasped the difference between story, storytelling and writing (i.e., the craft).
In this article I want to lay out my philosophy of what stories and storytelling are. They are not the same and how they differ, I believe, is the key to understanding your story and your role as a storyteller. They are a key to understanding stories as such.
If you face the same problems I did, then I believe having a clear philosophical foundation of what story and storytelling are, is key to understanding and overcoming these difficulties.
These ideas helped me on my writing journey and I hope they will help you finally write your story with complete clarity, meaning and impact it deserves.
Story vs storytelling vs craft
The story pyramid:
Story > Storytelling > Craft
A story is an eternal idea. It is a universal truth about the human condition. It is an archetype of a human life. A story is a journey through which a character understands themselves, their own life and existence as such.
I apologize for this philosophical description. There are many definitions of story and I don’t find any of them convincing – not even my own. But I don’t want to get bogged down in a be-all-end-all definition, because I do believe it embodies a truth about how one should live their life and I do believe there are common properties to every Story.
I also firmly believe a story is like a platonic idea, a form. Story is eternal. Universal. An archetype. We have immediate and direct access to it, but only through revelation.
A story is like a mathematical object. Like a triangle, a story is fixed and never changes. Its properties have always already existed and always will. Once you understand the idea of a triangle, you can recognize it in any particular instantiation in this world.
But to prove the properties of a triangle, you have to come up with a proof – a series of steps with assumptions and a conclusion which are independent of you and your mind, and which everyone can follow on their own.
A proof from a mathematician or a syllogism from a philosopher leads everyone else to accept that a triangle or reality itself has properties which are unchangeable and will always remain the same. The proof is how mathematicians and philosophers share the truth they found by themselves in the platonic realm with everyone else who inhabits this physical, temporal reality with them.
So it is with story. Just like a mathematical object or a philosophical truth, a story exists in the realm of ideas as well. That’s why it is so clear in you mind. Just as you can’t imagine a triangle with four angles, so too the story comes to you complete and with all its unchangeable properties.
The story is clear in you mind because you are in direct contact with it, with the platonic realm of ideas. But to get everyone else to accept your Idea, you have to develop a series of steps which people can take without you to arrive at the Idea themselves.
This is the core issue. The proof. The story revealed itself to you, but not to others. To everyone else, you have to tell the story step wise. You have to prove it.
Enter storytelling. It is the way the story is translated into our reality. Storytelling seizes the story from the realm of platonic forms and inscribes it into our physical world.
Storytelling is an art. It is an art to grasp an idea and communicate it to other people. It is an art because it necessitates creativity and inspiration.
A storyteller is defined by his or her being mode, not the doing mode. The doing mode would be the craft, the act of writing. The being mode is in the openness, vulnerability, creativity and inspiration of the storytellers soul. You are a storyteller because of how you live, not because of what you do.
Coming back to our mathematical analogy, storytelling is to story what theorems are to mathematics and logic is to philosophy. They are not merely techniques used to prove a truth, but they are also means of communication and persuasion.
Ideally, as a storyteller, you want to reveal a truth about the human condition. The mathematician wants to reveal a truth about the physical world. The philosopher wants to find a necessary truth of what reality is. All of you have to prove it.
Storytelling is your proof. When you tell the story, you actually prove the truth about the human condition which was revealed to your from the Platonic realm, by making the audience experience that truth. If the audience connects to the characters and understands their beliefs and their life, in other words, if they are “touched” by the story, then you have succeeded in proving the story idea.
And because storytelling happens in this physical reality, it has some principles, just like mathematical proof and logic do.
The beauty of proof is its persuasive power. The proof, be it a theorem, a sylogism or a novel, is independent of the author. It lays out steps which anyone can take on their own. It offers an invitation to a journey. And once that journey is taken, you get an insight (in case of maths and philosophy) or an emotional response (in the case of a story), independent of the author and as if entirely on your own. The truth grips you independently of any external pressure.
If you heard of the expression „the author is dead”, this is what it actually refers to. There is nothing outside of the text, outside of the proof. No external influence, such as the success of the author or their background should be a factor in convincing you of the truth of what they claim. The proof stands on its own and all that matters is how it conveys the truth, nothing else external to it.
Furthermore, a journey is not an element of stories, but of all proofs. A proof is just that: an invitation to a journey. It says “come, follow these steps and see where it leads you”. You don’t know where your going or how you are going to change. A good philosophical argument changes your life just as much as a good story does. And it does this when it lays a solid proof.
That being said, the third level to this divide, would be the tool used to tell the story. This is writing, or painting, or sculpting, or making music. This is the craft.
The craft is inseparable from storytelling, but art is not found in the activity of the craft. It is in the mode of being in which that activity takes place. The outcome, the product of writing, is not art unless it comes from the corresponding mode of being, the storytellers being.
We have all read expertly crafted books, or watched professionally made movies which were so uninspired and mechanical that, aside from a firm grasp on craft, had no soul, no higher purpose and no contact with the divine.
Anyone can write something. ChatGPT sure can (better than me, definitely). But if the craft, the mode of doing, is not in direct contact with the eternal realm (as true storytelling is), then you don’t get art. You just get color on paper. Just a refined rock. Just words governed by probability and not anything divine.
Storytelling is an art, writing is a craft. You grasp a story through divine revelation and inspiration – but all of this energy has to pass through the craft. Storytelling manifests itself through this tool, but without the correct mode of being, the mode of doing does not lead to a story.
Back to the analogy: the craft is to the storyteller, as the different types of proof are to a mathematician. A proof by contradiction, by construction, by mathematical induction… these are all tools available to the mathematician as the different writing techniques are available to storytellers.
Same with the philosopher. Modus ponens, modus tollens, truth tables and logical connectives – just tools of logic through which the philosopher tries to prove a deeper truth (which was revealed to them) about what reality is. The crucial thing is that they need this deeper truth, this revelation, to truly do philosophy and not just follow logic, which any computer program does as well.
To summarize, a Story is an eternal idea. Storytelling is the mode of being which connects our physical reality to the eternal realm of stories. Writing is the craft through which the story is channeled and actually inscribed into the material reality.
Story = truth
Storytelling = proof
Writing = methods of proof / clarity of proof
Why you have difficulty sharing your story
The reason why it is difficult for you to write and share your story with others, is because you have immediate access to it. The story revealed itself to you fully and completely, because, as I argued, story is an eternal Idea. It is clear and it makes complete sense in your mind, just as it is completely clear that a triangle has three angles and that 2 plus 2 equals 4.
But to communicate the story to others, you have to tell it piece by piece. You need to be concrete. Specific. Follow the law of causality. One argument at a time, the final conclusion in the end.
Story is a gift of revelation. Storytelling is a product of understanding.
Revelation and understanding. This is the main difference between story and storytelling.
The story was revealed to you, but you do not necessarily understand it yet; nor do your readers.
Revelation is immediate and direct and channeled to a single individual. That’s why it feels that the story idea came out of nowhere, as if the Muse struck you. That’s also why the idea is so difficult to put into words, although it is so clear in your mind.
Understanding, on the other hand, is sequential. Understanding follows the law of causality. To understand anything you need to understand its causes and effects.
We storytellers have a difficulty of telling our story because we are in direct contact with the Idea, which is complete in our mind and wants to come out on the page all at once. But that’s not how our brains and this physical reality works. Our mind might have a clear vision of the story, but our brain, our understanding, has not yet caught up with the overwhelming nature of the story.
The vision of the story means seizing the eternal nature of the story, but understanding the story means grasping the precise causes and effects of how the story unfolds in our physical reality. And this is more difficult than we think. It is not a straight path from vision to reality.
You can’t make anyone else experience the story the same way as you do, because only you have this direct access to it. Everyone else needs to experience the story through storytelling: sequentially, one step at a time, one cause and effect at a time.
I do not doubt that the story you have is so vivid and alive inside your mind. This is precisely the nature of an Idea and of revelation.
I would also claim that you yourself don’t actually understand your story yet. It usually takes me the first draft to understand my story in the first place.
I though that because the story was clear in my mind that it is the fault of other people that they don’t understand it. I blamed others for not being as brilliant as me in seeing the bigger picture of my story.
But I was wrong. I actually didn’t understand the story myself. It was clear in my mind, but it wasn’t understandable. It was complete, but it wasn’t yet connected.
The problem is that revelation and understanding are two different faculties of the human mind.
We cannot “reveal” an idea, such as a story or a mathematical truth, to other people through revelation. To successfully share a revelation with the world, the story needs to be understandable. The truth of the story needs to be proved.
The proof is the problem. It is not easy and it is not immediate. The way you prove the eternal truth of human experience to others, without them having this immediate access to it as you do, is a difficult and ardous process.
Furthermore: you have to use the different tools of what makes a proof valid, i.e., you have to write it and write it good. You have to be clear, vivid and creative. Without a firm grasp of the writing craft the proof will fall flat.
Mathematicians and philosophers take years of education and trial and error to grasp their truths. You are no different. It takes years to become a good storyteller. You might really have an amazing idea, I don’t doubt it.
The problem is the proof. Show me that your idea is as good as you claim it is.
If you are reading this, it means that you are haunted by your story ideas and that you seek to share them with others. You most likely need to share it with others.
The need to share a story comes precisely from the nature of a story and its revelation. Because a story reveals itself to you, because it chose you and no one else, you feel the urge to share it.
The discrepancy between the clarity within your mind and the chaos on the page, is that you lack the principles of how to prove to others the truth you have found. You probably don’t understand your story and don’t know how to make it understandable to others.
The clarity of a story as it is revealed is different than the clarity as it is understood. You will never make others see what you see in your mind. But you can make them understand the core of the story as well as you, because we all share the same faculty of understanding. The understanding is the faculty of human minds which we all share and connect through.
Given what I said, it is necessary to understand the principles of storytelling to make your story valid and reach people’s hearts. Just as a proof can be invalid, so too a story can fall flat.
Furthermore, you may not only lack the understanding of storytelling, you may lack the craft. Writing is one such craft. It has nothing at all to do with being creative. Like any activity, it has a set of rules and principles on how to use it appropriately.
The key is to unite the mode of being, the storytelling, with the mode of doing, the writing. The proof is only good if it is clear and concise.
To do this, you have to know the principles of storytelling and the principles of writing. You can find a better writer than me to show you the latter. But I do want to share the principles of storytelling with you, which I do not believe are properly disclosed.
The principles of story and storytelling give you an understanding of how a story is to be translated into this temporal, material reality. They describe the journey of a story from inspiration to understanding.
They are meant to give you an entry point into the storytellers mode of being.
The key principles of story and storytelling
As I already pointed out, storytelling is a mode of being. It is this mode of being which opens up the passage between the platonic realm of ideas and this physical reality.
It is not the act of writing and creating as such that make works of art, but it is the channeling of the ideas trough these activities that creates art.
This channeling has its own set of principles.
Just like logic lays out the principles of philosophical proof, so the principles of storytelling lay out the ways in which a story becomes understandable to you and your audience. Following these principles, you will successfully channel and prove your story.
The proof of any truth needs to be laid out in steps, independent of the author. That’s why scientific and mathematical proofs are so strong. Anyone can follow the steps on their own, without the persuasion of the author, and reach the exact same conclusion – always.
The principles of story and storytelling are meant to give you a foundation for just as convincing of a proof. They describe the differences between the eternal Idea and your work of art and how to make that leap from the eternal realm of revelation, to this temporal realm of causality and understanding.
A story is proved if the reader identifies with the characters and experiences their journey. In other words, if the story makes the audience become another person and gives them an insight into the human condition, then the story was successfully proved.
The mathematician succeeds if their ideas are accepted and cannot be disproved. A philosopher if they change people’s view on reality. A storyteller succeeds if they make a reader feel. If they make them think. If they expand their view of human experience.
These are the 7 key principles of story and storytelling:
- Story is eternal, storytelling is causal
- Story is archetypal, storytelling is particular
- Story is universal, storytelling structured
- Story is about truth, storytelling about belief
- Story is about the author, storytelling is about the characters
- The core of story is revelation, the core of storytelling is choice
- Story manipulates the characters, storytelling manipulates the audience
These principles follow directly from the nature of the world of Ideas and the interaction between the incorporeal and corporeal realms.
And they are just that – principles. They don’t impose anything on you. They are not a formula to tell a “great” story. These principles just tell you what makes a story understandable. Not good. Not bad. Simply understandable to you and to your audience.
If you remember these principles you will just tell a story. Your story. Nothing more, nothing less.
The 7 principles of storytelling
1. Story is eternal, storytelling causal
The story unfolds all at once. It is not temporal nor is it governed by causality. It is as it is. Eternal and unchanging. You get immediate access to your story and that’s why it’s so clear in your mind.
Storytelling, however, is temporal and spatial. It unravels in time and space. It takes place in our physical world which is subject to these dimensions. Most importantly, it is subject to causality.
Story is a process of revelation; storytelling is a process of understanding.
Therefore, storytelling is the journey of truth from inspiration to understanding.
Storytelling is an art because it translates divine inspiration (revelation), which is irrational and primal, into understanding, i.e., a causal structure, something rational and objective.
The human mind only understands cause and effect. And as storytelling is temporal and takes place in this physical reality, the story needs to be told following this law.
Just as Pythagoras theorem was always already complete, the art of extracting it from the Platonic realm by a proof is messy and step-wise. So too is storytelling.
The truth of the theorem is eternal. The proof is not. It needs to be causally coherent and connected.
2. Story is archetypal, storytelling is particular
Story deals with archetypes of human experience. These are the patterns of the human condition. Every single human life moves in harmony with these archetypes, because there is a ground to being human – a foundation which defines human life as human.
A story does not depend on the time and space in which it takes place. Because it is archetypal, it is about those experiences which remain even when the outer world changes.
Storytelling then translates these archetypal patterns of human experience into particular experiences. Only through individual lives can we understand the deeper patterns of human existence.
Storytelling instantiates the archetypal patters of what makes humans humans (just as the triangle grounds every instantiation of triangles in the world) in particular lives, in particular persons or personifications of humans.
3. Story is universal, storytelling structured
The universal nature of stories means it applies to all human beings. We all have access to them whether we are conscious of it or not. All humans can understand stories, because, in a way, their own life is a particular instantiation of a story, i.e., an idea of a human life.
If we all have access to stories, just like we do for mathematical truths, then we all have the ability to understand stories, just like we all have the ability to understand mathematical or philosophical proofs.
However, the process of translating stories into the physical reality needs to be structured, because structure unifies the relations and connection between different elements of the story (such as, characters, beliefs, plot, themes…).
The story is universal, complete and unified. But storytelling is sequential and incomplete. To gain the completion and unity of the story, you need to structure it because a structure is how unity and completeness arises in the physical world.
Structure is the best representation of the universal dimension of stories.
Everything in the physical world is connected to everything else. Structure is the connective tissue which puts all the relevant elements of a story into a relevant relation and connection. It ensure your story is universally understood and embraced.
Just as a philosophical argument follows the structure of induction or deduction (or simply, of a syllogism), so too your story needs to follow a structure. Just as an argument has at least two premises and a conclusion, so too the story structure has a certain amount of acts (mirroring the two premises and a conclusion).
4. Story is about truth, storytelling about belief
If a story is a Platonic idea and it is eternal, then it is also the Truth. Stories are truths about the human condition. They show how a human life should be lived.
Where can we find the truths of human life? It is not found in philosophical arguments. It is also not found in scientific proofs. It is found in beliefs.
A belief is always necessarily held as truth. Beliefs don’t have to be true (you can of course, believe in a lie), but they are still considered as such. Believing is like a mechanism which transforms every input into a truth. Every fact which enters this black box, be it true or false, is then taken as true, no matter what its “objective” truth value is.
Beliefs are our attitudes to ideas, not our alignment with their true nature. And this connection of believing to truth, is why beliefs lie at the heart of storytelling.
A story shows the discrepancy between true and false beliefs based on of what a character takes to be true and what is actually true, i.e, how they want to live their life and how a human life should be lived (how they need to live it).
Beliefs connect thoughts and actions, as well as emotions and actions. Beliefs determine how we act and what we choose, because they determine what we hold as true. Beliefs determine a human life.
What we follow through a story is a belief. A belief which determines a characters life.
The character either changes this belief and through it, changes their life. This is the character arc. A character transforms by shedding a lie and embracing a truth.
Or, in stories with a flat arc, the character sticks to their belief, but changes the world around them to embrace their own belief.
5. Story is about the author, storytelling is about the characters
Story is necessarily about the author. It is about you. The story revealed itself to you because it is about you. It comes from the depths of their being.
You gained access due to your mode of being, due to how you live your life. Hence, the story is connected to your life and the being you are now. It reveals something about you.
Storytelling, on the other hand, is about the characters. You within a different cloth. A character can be of a different gender, different race, class or status than you – but they still contain a part of you, one dimension of your beliefs.
If a story is about a truth of human experience, then that human experience needs to be lived. A character is that person whose existence shows a life lived against or with this truth.
Without a character there is no story. Character/s are the primary tool through which the story takes place. They are the core of how you tell your story, because a person, a human life and how it should be lived, is at the core of the story idea.
A story is not about plot, nor the events nor the social millueau it takes place it. It is about a human life and a human life only.
6. The core of story is revelation, the core of storytelling is choice
Any change that happens within a human being is instantaneous. It is like flipping a switch.
All information within the physical universe follow a binary code: yes or no, on or off. So does human understanding: it is either turned on or off. You either understand something or you don’t. There is no middle ground.
All change is, therefore, like a revelation. It may take years of suffering before a person is willing to change, but the change itself is instantaneous. It happens in just a moment.
Years of loneliness, pain and suffering brings us closer to changing our lives, but the precise change happens within a fraction of a second. The years we suffered were necessary to bring about the change, but change itself happens purely out of a single decision of the free will.
Storytelling then translates the revelation of human change into choices. Choice is inevitable in a human life as even an avoidance of choice is itself a choice. Therefore, choice needs to be used to explain a human life and the truth about the human condition.
Choice is the clearest representation of change and transformation and that’s why it is a core principle of how to tell a story. It is the best way to visualize and show change and a shift in the understanding of a character.
Thinking how we changed or how we understand something in a different light, is neither compelling nor true. Action and choices show a true shift in perception in the most visceral way.
If a character chooses something in the beginning and then its opposite in the end, only then can we truly say they have changed their perception and also their life.
7. Story manipulates the characters, storytelling manipulates the audience
If Story is eternal, then, when it is translated into this temporal reality, it is already fully determined. The characters are set in stone because they represent an eternal Truth of the human condition.
The characters have no free will as their life follows the patterns of their archetype.
(Note: because Ideas are eternal they themselves are free. It is the idea that is free, not its representation in this physical reality. But that is a topic for another article.)
Therefore, the story already determined the behavior of the character – and it manipulates them like puppets to reveal the truth about human life through them. That’s why stories are only concerned with the essential elements of the character’s lives and not their everyday experiences.
Storytelling, on the other hand, is about the audience. The goal is to manipulate the audience so that they become more open to the truth of the human condition.
Because storytelling is a process of understanding, you have to make sure the audience understands the story. The manipulation of the audience simply means that you make them understand what the story is about. Both logically and emotionally.
Your goal is to open up the audience’s imagination (through different techniques) and make them identify with the characters (through various tools) so they can feel something (also through various writing methods) and go through the same journey and transformation the character goes through.
People don’t want to change in the real world, so why would they want to identify with another person, suffer with them, learn a difficult lesson and experience the same change as them? If you “manipulate” them correctly, that is, if you apply the various tools and techniques of master storytellers, then you will make them do just that without them even knowing it.
How to better translate your story into reality
The 7 key principles outlined above, establish the way storytelling channels a story. They allow us to draw lessons on how to properly tell our story to, not only be recognizable as a story, but to be as understandable and impactful as possible.
1. Use causality
“He who has a why to live for can bear almost any how” – Nietzche
As I already point out several times, we, as humans, only understand the law of causality. What we can share between ourselves has to have a causal structure. Thus, if you want other people to understand your story (and for you to understand it fully yourself) you need to infuse it with causes and effects.
Each event in the story has to follow a cause and have an effect on the next event. This happened, therefore this happens, but then this leads to something else. This follows, because of this.
If the audience understands WHY something happened, then they will follow what happens next. However the story unfolds and whatever you put in the character’s way, the audience will follow it and infuse it with meaning, because the WHY gives it meaning.
Without a clear causal connection, the audience will be confused. That isn’t to say, a clear sequence of causal events leads to a good story. Not necessarily. It just leads to a story people can follow and understand. It leads to story which can be shared with others and clearly communicated.
2. Be particular
“Thoughts without content are empty, intuitions without concepts are blind” – Kant
The universal is found in the particular, as the Platonists said. The more details you add, the more your story comes to life and the more of the universal truth is revealed.
A story cannot be broad and generic, because the concepts to tell such a story lack anything concrete our understanding and imagination can attach to.
You can philosophize about the general elements of the human condition, but for a story, you need to apply these elements to a particular human life. Otherwise, why write a story and not a philosophical article?
Even though a story’s theme is broad and universal, the best way to understand it is through a particular manifestation of it. That is the strength of the story. How much more magnificent are the pyramids of Giza than the mathematical object of a pyramid on paper?
Likewise, details without a connection to overarching concepts (these are often labeled as a theme) are chaotic, unnecessary and distracting. You cannot just include anything you find interesting if it isn’t connected to the broader concepts you are exploring.
The specific world of your story, the uniqueness of your characters and the peculiarity of your plot all need to be particular, but this particularity needs to be in line with the universal themes your story is actually about.
3. Follow a structure
A structure is the emergent property of the building blocks within your story.
Because a story is a single Idea, it is complete. However, when you tell a story, it is not necessarily complete, nor unified. You only understand the story as it is told, one piece at a time. One act at a time, one scene and one line of dialogue at a time.
What are the building blocks that connect all the scenes, characters, plot points and every other element of a story? It is the interaction between the beliefs of characters and the world which gives structure to the story.
As I explained above, beliefs create the life of a character, because they are held as true. The most prevalent beliefs in the world, held as true, also create the world the character lives in.
If beliefs create the life of a character and the world, then they also create the structure of the story. They are a force which structures the experiences of the characters, builds their world and life, and also, lays the foundation for the story as a whole.
A story structure has a beginning, middle and end. You don’t need more than that. The 1st act is the premise (the belief), the 2nd act is the counter-argument (the opposing belief) and the 3rd act is the conclusion (which beliefs is accepted).
Here is the proof. Every life begins. Every life ends. Living is that which connects the beginning and end. It is the middle. Just as when we know two angles of a triangle, we can calculate the third, so too, if we know life has a beginning and an end (which are undeniable aspects of life), we know that it has a third component: the middle.
You don’t need anything else than a three act structure. The beats, midpoints and plot points are not elements of story structure, but structural elements of a change of beliefs. You do not necessarily need them because they do not constitute the true story structure.
A structure does not limit your creativity, but it allows it to be channeled. It is a channel through which you turn the chaos of creation into something understandable. Just as the mathematical structure of a pyramid is unchangeable and unavoidable, if correctly applied, it can make wonders.
Everything in this world is connected and in relation to each other. So too everything in your story needs to be connected and related. That is what a structure is. It is the matrix of relations and connections between the beliefs of your story.
4. Find the core belief of the character
The most important part of your character is their belief. The belief is what determines their actions, their words and their emotions. It determines their “want” and “need”.
A belief is a truth or lie which is taken as a truth and which constructs a persons life. There are many truths and lies about this world, but not all of them determine how you live your life. There are many philosophical truths we might agree with, but in reality, they don’t impact the way we live our life. The core aspect of a belief is that it determines the actions of a character, their view of the world and their life as a whole.
The core belief is the most crucial part of your story. Once you find it, you will understand your character, you will understand the structure of your story and you will show the truth about the human condition your story is about.
Also, the character arc lies in between the beliefs. Find the lie a character believes, then the truth which defeats the lie. Then you will find the arc in between.
5. Focus on the characters
The characters are the backbone of your story. Everything rests on them.
A story is an idea about the human condition. The human condition can only be explored through a life of a human being (or a personified entity).
Philosophy uses syloggisms. Mathematics uses proof. Storytelling uses characters. They are the element through which you prove the truth of the human condition.
The more you bring your characters to life, the more truth will emerge from that life.
This is also why characters come before plot. The truth of a human life is independent of the world it takes place in, but it is dependent on the characters which inhabit it. That is why we can have love stories in any period of human history, why we can have stories about power and success set in any part of the world, and why non-human animals or object can still carry the deep truths about the nature of the human condition.
However, characters are also determined by the time period they are in and by the spatial location where they reside. Even though characters come before the plot, they don’t come before the world. They come together with it.
Defining a good character is the interplay between figuring out their inner world and the outer world, i.e., their environment.
6. Let your characters make choices
If beliefs determine our life, then choices build the outer appearance of our life. The external life is built by choices. Not thinking. Not emotions. But actions and choices.
Choice is the most visual and dramatic element which shows a characters beliefs. Thinking about something is neither dramatic nor interesting – nor is it true. Being sad or happy or angry is more dramatic and more interesting – but it is also not true.
Thoughts and emotions which don’t lead to action are not true.
Only if thinking leads to action is it true: only action confirms what a character truly believes. The same is true for emotions: if anger leads to a rageful action than it is true. Otherwise, it is just a passing emotions, a whim of the situation, and not a core part of the character.
There is more to say about this, of course. But to keep it brief, a character has psychological traits. Social traits as well. But the former is subject of psychology, the latter of sociology.
The true subject of drama are choices and actions. A characters psychology and social background add depth to a story, but they are not its key subjects.
Our purpose as storytellers is to show a life being lived, not argue about it through psychological or sociological concepts.
7. Hijack the audience’s imagination
Ultimately, you are making a story so that other people can experience it.
Why would you write a story if not for other people? If you are only doing it for yourself, then you would just keep thinking and fantasizing it; that’s so much more fun than the painful attempts at writing and storytelling.
You feel an urge and need to write because you were blessed with a revelation. Just as prophets were blessed with insights from the divine and had the need to share it, so have you been blessed with an insight into the human condition. Just like a prophet, you have an urge to share it.
The most powerful method to share your story with others is to hijack the audience’s imagination.
The story, of course, has to satisfy our left-brain, but it truly plays out in the right-brain. A purely intellectual story might be interesting, but ultimately it is meaningless. The most impactful way to share your story is to engage the imagination and creativity of the audience, because only through this faculty, do they truly identify with the characters and experience the same journey on an emotional and meaningful level.
The human imagination does not distinguish between the identity of the person who uses imagination and the thing it imagines. Therefore, it is able to cause a real transformation in the audience. If you just engage the left-brain, you might be interesting, but you cannot access the deeper levels of the psyche, because the intellect is meant to divide and conquer, not empathize.
If you can push the right buttons of the imagination, you will make the audience forget they are watching a story and they will become the character.
This is why characters are the greatest tool of the storyteller. Through the character, the audience gains a new identity, goes through the same suffering the character does and in the end, they change with them. Herein lies the transformative power of stories.
This is the part where real craft comes to light. This is also what most advice on the internet tackles. But you only truly learn how to do this by writing.
Conclusion
As a storyteller, you have maybe the most important task of all. You prove the truths and depths of human experience and condition.
A mathematician proves the properties of space and time. A philosopher the validity of arguments. You are up there with these important thinkers. Although you don’t just think. You feel as well.
With this philosophical approach, I wanted to clarify what your role as a storyteller is.
You are not just entertaining people. You are transforming their lives.
Therefore, you are obliged to share your story with us. You are obliged to make it understandable and as impactful as possible. You do this by following the principles I laid out above.
I hope this storytelling manifesto explained to you what story and storytelling are, what the difference between revelation and understanding is, and how to prove your story idea to others.
These principles helped me synthesize all other storytelling advice I hear and read about and I hope they help you do the same.