by Jean-Yves Le Moine, published on 31.07.2009

We are touched by good stories. Our bodies and our senses can be touched. A good story touches us physically by revealing to us a different side of ourselves, a side that cannot be reduced to this body, which we often put to the fore or in the background as the case may be. So we recognize ourselves as being entirely ourselves and entirely different.

Our senses are touched by a good story when it moves us, makes us move, sets us in motion, inwardly and/or outwardly. To be at one with a story, we should put ourselves in the right position, one that commits us physically and emotionally. In our armchair, in the underground, or in the street with our friends.

Inner movement is only possible if we are ready for it, if we have no fear of our own fears. A good story should reassure us, give us confidence. Outward movement is always movement towards others. When the story is good I feel like living it, sharing it with others. A good story resonates socially in us, individually and collectively.

But how and why are we touched by a story?

We relate to a story. The story should resonate in us. Something about the story activates the deepest recesses of memory, semantic memory. This activation helps us “recognize” the story. It is told to us, but it is already there inside us, and has been in our lives for a long time. It echoes something inside me, something at once similar and different. Something that I recognize and that escapes me at one and the same time.

I make it my own, I want to tell it in turn to others. But the story I’m going to tell is no longer the one I was told, it’s my story. And as it succeeded in touching The Other within me, I know it is going to be able to touch The Others within others. So this appropriation of the story isn’t solely personal, but collective, too, for good stories always convey an archetypal meaning that touches us collectively.