The Stories that Matter
I watched the season 2 finale of The Mandalorian with my two young sons today. I had tried to prepare them, emotionally, for what was to come. I watched them carefully, as the Dark Troopers returned, held their hands when the banging on the door started. When they saw the X-Wing approach, they cheered. They’ve not seen A New Hope. They have no idea who Luke Skywalker is.
It didn’t matter to them.
They screamed, then cried. With joy, and with bliss, and with unfathomable sadness that Grogu was leaving his Dad behind.
And it made me realize, that this… this is it. This is the reason I am working so hard to be a storyteller. Because that is what stories do to us.
That is what these characters, who are so clearly not real people, do to our psyche. They change us, imprint themselves onto our brain, make us all the more human.
My boys didn’t care who the man was, that came to save the day, that Mark Hamill’s de-aging was done with ground-breaking technology. It didn’t matter. What mattered was the feeling.
They will never forget that feeling. They will never not remember the day when they saw Mando and his crew saved from the bad droids. They will never un-cry those tears, un-cheer those cheers.
Stories have sustained us since the earliest dawn of humanity. Stories have shaped cultures, tribes, communities, nations, humanity as a whole. It’s what we’ve always done.
And now, this new generation grows up with stories of hope and of perseverance as much as my generation, and all the generations before did.
The importance of storytelling can never be underestimated. Even in the smallest ways, we always communicate. And especially now, as the world falls into a new order, a new way of life, we must remember where we can best find a common ground: In the history that brought us here — and not just the factual history. The history of culture that permeates the very fabric of humanity. The history of that intricate fabric of storytelling that first took us from being apes on the savannah towards a future of enlightenment.
It was a big step we took, by the fireside, millennia ago. It is a big step we’re taking now.
Stories can help guide the way. In fact, stories are the only thing that will guide us on this uncharted path towards a brighter future.