I listened to a thought provoking interview with author, Claire Mussud this morning. She talks about the stories we tell about others in our minds to make sense of what has happened and also the stories we tell about ourselves. This got me thinking about how our minds want to wrap up events into a nice little package so we can let them go and move on.

For example, there are several “stories” I tell myself about why my second marriage ended. Who knows which is true. It’s probably a composite of all of them and more.

The world tells stories about why a teen would go into a school and shoot dozens of people. Some tell the gun control story, some tell the mental illness story, others the poor parenting story. The fact is life is way more complex than the stories we concoct. Sometimes the perfect storm swirls together to create the perfect nightmare.

Dave and I had a great conversation this morning about the stories we tell ourselves and he asked, “But is that a bad thing?” Sometimes you just have to let things go and if a story helps you put it behind you, is that such a bad thing?

Claire Mussud makes no judgement on the fact that we tell ourselves stories. She simply observes that we do so, and that sometimes stories just refuse to wrap up in a nice little package.

I mean, what do you do with the man who embezzled from his employer, but is a fantastic father? Or the woman who cheated on her husband but is a great philanthropist? No one is purely evil or purely perfect.

We may try to box someone up and shove them away in a cell in our minds. Claire compares this to how society once sealed away people they didn’t understand in insane asylums. Think about it… how many of us label someone in our minds and mentally shelve them? When we do that, we can just dismiss them completely. Nothing they say from then on matters because this person is an “ist” or a “phobe.”

I think it’s important to realize our propensity to make up stories when it comes to other people and how we relate to them. But what about when we make up stories to move past the disturbing events of our lives? Maybe the answer isn’t that story-telling is right or wrong. Maybe it’s just important to understand the fact that we are doing it. Maybe it’s important to admit to ourselves that our stories may not be the complete truth. There could be a lot more facets to what is happening than we are willing or able to see.

Just a little midweek musings. Thanks, Angela Ledgerwood of Lit Up and Claire Mussud for a thought-provoking interview.

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