Improving Your Storytelling

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ISBN: 9780874835304 | 0874835305
Cover: Paperback
Copyright: 12/15/2005

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The first steps in storytelling are often easy, because we tell stories informally every day. Once you take storytelling into the more formal contexts of performance or occupational uses, however, you may be faced with challenges you hadn't anticipated. You need information that goes beyond the basics. And you need it in a form that does not just tell you what to do but helps you make your own informed decisions.

Acknowledgments	p. 9
Introduction: Storytelling Basics and Beyond	p. 11
Thinking in the Present	p. 12
Helping You Make Your Own Decisions
The Case of the (Possibly) Bad Second Performance
Not Advice but Understanding
No Right Way to Tell Stories	p. 15
Locally Preferred Styles
Style versus Effectiveness
The Storytelling Triangle	p. 17
Loving the Mystery
Exploring Each Component
The Transfer of Imagery	p. 19
Oral Language	p. 21
The Variety of Expression	p. 22
Tone of Voice
Facial Expression, Gestures, and Posture
Eye Behavior
Orientation in Space
Multidimensionality	p. 29
Characterization through Clusters
Humor through Contrasts
Transitions
Time-Based Language	p. 32
Nonreversible Time
Pauses
Rhythm and Tempo
Repetition
The Uncrowded Stage
Forms of Imagery	p. 41
The Nature of Images	p. 41
The Ways Experiences Are Stored
Preferred Modes of Imagery	p. 43
Learning to Transform Images
Imagining Fully	p. 47
See the Sights	p. 47
What If I Can't See the Colors?
Hear the Sounds	p. 50
Developing Your Aural Sensitivity
Feel the Muscle-Tension and Movement	p. 52
Tuning In to Kinesthetic Images
Using Sensory Details When Telling a Story
Kinesthetic Imagery and Characterization	p. 57
Open Versus Closed Postures	p. 57
Using Open/Closed Postures in a Story
Habitual Muscular Tensions	p. 59
Why We Develop Habitual Tensions
Tensions Begin Creatively, and Can Be Slow to Release
Male and Female Abdominal Tensions
Using Habitual Muscular Tensions in a Story
Transformation Is Fascinating to Watch
Body Centers	p. 66
Using Body Center in a Story
In Support of the Key Concepts	p. 68
Using Multiple Body Centers
Using Multiple Muscular Tensions
Other Forms of Kinesthetic Imagery	p. 71
Your Relationship to the Story	p. 73
Learning to Learn Stories
What Is a Story?	p. 75
The Esthetic Expectations Behind the Fairy Tale	p. 76
Expectations About Story Attributes	p. 76
Responding to Divergent Expectations	p. 78
Learning the Story	p. 81
Beginning a Natural Process	p. 81
How We Learned to Tell It
How We Changed It
Tell It Informally, Many Times
The Dangers of Practicing	p. 84
What if the Story Didn't Happen to Me?	p. 86
Discovering the Meaning	p. 87
MIT: the Most Important Thing	p. 87
What Does This Story Mean to Me?
The Most Important Thing is Boss
The Next Most Important Things
To State or Not to State	p. 92
Conscious or Unconscious Connections
A Continuum of Ways to State Meaning
Discovering the Structure	p. 95
Outlining	p. 95
Time-Lines	p. 98
Other Tools for Understanding Structure	p. 99
Memorizing	p. 101
Why Not to Begin by Memorizing	p. 102
Using My MIT To Create a Structure	p. 103
Working toward the Details
At Last, the Words
The Central Role of Deciding the MIT
Memorizing Someone Else's Words	p. 109
Your Relationship to Your Listeners	p. 111
Helper and Beneficiary	p. 113
The Beneficiary's Needs Come First
Being Clear and Agreeing	p. 114
Fuzzy Situations
After the Performance
Stating the Expectations
Moving from Beneficiary to Helper	p. 120
Telling a New Story As Beneficiary
Deciding to Tell As Helper
Special Problems with Personal Stories
When the Feelings Surprise Me
The Four Tasks	p. 125
Uniting	p. 125
Ways to Unite
Inviting	p. 128
Relaxed Confidence
Rejected Invitations
Offering	p. 132
Too Much Invitation
Acknowledging	p. 134
Your Effect on Your Listeners	p. 137
Leaning Forward	p. 137
Leaning Back	p. 138
Special Problems with "Leaning Back" Stories
Some Genre-Related Effects on Your Audience	p. 141
A Response to Personal Experience Stories	p. 142
Program Planning	p. 143
The MIT for a Program	p. 144
Planning by the Slots	p. 145
Unbidden Images	p. 146
Developing Audiences for Your Needs	p. 149
The Rehearsal Buddy	p. 149
The Home Audience	p. 150
Other Practice Audiences	p. 151
A Balanced Diet of Audiences
Your Relationship to Your Self	p. 155
Your Voice	p. 157
Reducing Tension	p. 157
The Healing Yawn
The Sources of Tension
What Are You Trying to Do?
Changing the Decision
Special Problems in Teaching Voice	p. 162
Vocal Warm-Up	p. 164
Performance Anxiety	p. 167
Excitement and Fear
Readiness	p. 168
Readiness Skills Increase over Time
One Uncertainty at a Time
Fear	p. 171
What Is Fear?
How to Process Fear
Noticing the Actual Situation
Speaking Back to Common Worries
When Fear Can Be Useful
Your Support Team	p. 181
Planning Buddies	p. 181
Many Helpings	p. 182
Three Kinds of Helpers	p. 183
The Care and Feeding of Helpers	p. 184
Intangible Help	p. 184
Putting it All Together	p. 187
The Flexible Shifting of Attention	p. 189
Four Layers of Attention	p. 189
Warming Up a Preschool Audience
Act Two with Attentive Adults
Keeping My Attention Flexible	p. 192
Obstructions That Misdirect My Attention
Meeting My Own Needs--for the Good of Others
Balancing the Details with the Goals	p. 197
What Matters Most in this Event?	p. 198
Learning the Most Important Component
Intermediate Concepts
Connecting to the Moment	p. 201
Which Answer Do I Keep Closest?
Creating the Strands of Connection
Conclusion: Transformation	p. 207
How to Find Storytelling Organizations and Publications	p. 211
Notes	p. 213
Bibliography	p. 217
Table of Contents provided by Syndetics. All Rights Reserved.

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Improving Your Storytelling

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