We are actually wired to change our stories. We embellish, we diminish, we combine memories, and sometimes we create memories that never happened. And we do this, according to the work of Frederic Bartlett and several other memory researchers after him, in an attempt to “smooth out” the memory in order to make it fit in the existing network of stories that comprise our sense of reality - our version of what is so. This is why we remember things to suit our situation: we’ve smoothed the memories out to confirm that our reality is exactly that - real. We’ve used this memory to make all the more clear that what is so IS SO. Things that don’t make sense to us, or aren’t consistent with our other stories, get edited out.

I don’t always know how to do the right thing. I can, however, quickly assess how to do the next right thing. The next right thing is what to do right now - in this moment, in this situation. And the next right thing for me is to use the privileges I enjoy to help others. This, in my opinion, is the ultimate privilege. And I enjoy that privilege as often as I can.

This story, “Clear What To Do” shows that we can know the next right thing through paying attention and reading the room.

This is a story from another podcast we created for adults called Horsemen which is about the Apocalypse or “unveiling”, which began on August 23, 2017. This was super fun to create and a very interesting series of stories that belongs on this podcast because it is about how stories can be misused to manipulate people. The narrative centers around a storyteller who becomes a researcher who then creates a clinic where stories can heal people with real diseases and terminal conditions. The reason why this person could be considered a “bad guy” is because he practices a dangerous kind of storytelling - the kind where the storyteller doesn’t listen. Really listen.