The Art of Storytelling: Part IV
The Gift of a Good Surprise
I was tutoring a small group of 3rd graders at a local elementary school one morning about four months after my failed leap in left that had required significant surgery on my left hand.
We were gathered around a table, and mid-lesson I placed my still-healing left hand visibly on the table while using my right hand to write out a few math problems on a large sheet of paper.
Huh!? I heard a gasp from one of the boys.
I looked up to see the boy’s eyes fixed on my left hand’s two, 2-inch scars which began just above my knuckles and ended just below my wrist. They ran (and still run) like parallel railroad tracks alongside one another atop my hand.
Was he grossed out? Confused? Had his dad also dove for a softball, failed to catch it, and instead crushed his left hand with his own bodyweight?!
Then, his eyes gradually grew larger and larger as he drew them from my scars, followed the curve of my left arm up, and then settled directly upon my face.
And with that kind of shocked mix of fear-and-joy that overwhelms us those few times in life when we genuinely cannot believe what we are beholding, he whisper-yelled, “Wolverine!”
(Hugh Jackman as Marvel’s Wolverine)
A more honest Bobby would have smiled and said “No. I threw my entire body weight down upon my hand and crushed it almost beyond repair and so I’m actually the furthest thing from your favorite Marvel hero. Like… Think “Wolverine,” then think “Opposite of Wolverine,” and that, my child, is who is before you.”
But I didn’t.
I smiled, nodded, and went on with the lesson. With a touch more swagger, I recall.
Did he ever figure it out? Did he really think it might be true to begin with? What was the recess chatter that day? Who knows.
It’s a fun part of the story, though :)
And it includes tiny element that all truly great stories have: the element of surprise.
In this case, the surprise is nothing huge - the audience is surprised (and humored) to hear how the child saw my scars. And, if the audience knows me to be an honest-to-a-fault type of person, maybe they are surprised that I never let on one way or another about the ‘Wolverine’ interpretation.
More, perhaps this story adds an element of surprise because you find yourself a bit shocked that this particular Small Story is so short in comparison to other ones!1
Or, again, maybe it’s surprising simply that this is arriving on a Monday. Isn’t Bobby’s Substack a Friday thing?
The stories that stick with us best (and are most likely to move us) inevitably have some moment, insight, or twist that surprises us. Even when we see part of the story coming, the best ones still find a way to land with a measure of unexpectedness.
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Intuitively, I think we know this.
There is a unique delight and sense of newness and discovery that happens when a story finds a way to surprise us - however powerfully or subtly.
Increasingly, too, the business world understands this.
Jeremy Connell-Waite is a Communications Designer at IBM where he created IBM’s Communications Thinking™ framework to help leaders tell stronger purpose-driven stories on screen, on stage, and in the boardroom. His storytelling framework and expertise have fueled successful multi-million dollar pitches for some of the biggest brands in the world, and in a recent interview on the podcast Inside Influence, he explained the heart of his art.
Bottom line: “Surprise is THE magic ingredient in epic storytelling,” Connell-Waite says. It is the singular ingredient in stories that most readily…
opens people,
changes people,
shifts perspectives,
leaves a lasting impression,
and creates a sense of genuine sense of connection.
He goes on in the interview to put it this way, “There are four words that you care about as an author: And then what happened?”
If a reader or hearer has those four words unconsciously working in their mind at each moment of the story then they are ever-being surprised. They feel they don’t entirely know what is next (hence the four-word question that continues to linger).
But how to incorporate surprise in our stories, Bobby!?
Funny thing about surprise - there’s no formula for inducing it or making it happen. In fact, a formula is antithetical to it, and it’s why Connell-Waite’s next point in his interview on storytelling is about ‘guarding against the formulaic.’2 As soon as you try a formula, you lose the element of surprise.
One of the best ways I’ve found to ensure the element of surprise comes through your stories? You yourself need to be surprised by your own story at some level.
So, imagine taking a story you want to tell.
Perhaps you take the advice of the very first piece in this Art of Storytelling series and you begin the story-writing process with a break - a pain, hurt, loss, or otherwise. And instead of waiting to write it down until you are 100% clear on the beginning, middle, and end… what if you just start writing, and let yourself go where you need to go.
Stumbling unto the Sacred, as I once wrote.
Which is to say, let yourself discover the story in the process of writing it (or speaking it). Let the story tell you where it wants to go - which I know sounds a bit mystical, but it makes a lot of sense once you put pen-to-paper (or fingers-to-keyboard) and go consecutively even for ten or twenty minutes.
And a lot of the time, something about the story will surprise you. A previously muted or hidden direction, insight, or detail will rise to the surface and begin giving shape to things. This is the beginning of a surprise emerging for you, and thus one of the central and most powerful delights of storytelling for all involved.
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To be sure, storytelling is an art.
And like any art, it is a practice where you return to the canvas time and again to try out a new technique, a unique insight, or a fresh color.
Some stories, you find, work better than others. Some are beautiful, powerful, and moving the very first time you give expression to them. Others take years to truly hone in a way that feels deeply authentic, surprising, and good.
Best way to get started (or restarted)? Trust that humans have been telling stories for a very long time. It’s fundamental to who we are, how we understand ourselves, and how we navigate this world.
And then… Try.
Pick a time when something or someone broke.
Start writing about it.
Include what the story means to you at this point in life.
Share it with someone(s) and see what they ask. What they say.
Revise and continue…
Along the way, listen to, read, and enjoy the stories of others! We grow in our storytelling by listening to and receiving the stories of others.
Speaking of which… I’ll be back with a new one as early as this coming Friday :)
Or, if you have read all four parts of The Art of Storytelling series, you know that one surprise in this story is that it turns out the leap in left was not just a leap I took 15 years ago, but one I am currently taking, too.
We recently celebrated Easter, and that is a story chock full of the element of surprise! Not only, quite foundationally, the fact that Jesus is not in the tomb but alive and risen… but also that the earliest witnesses of the empty tomb are “trembling and bewildered” (Mark 16:8) and that the earliest proclaimers of the resurrection event are women (Luke 24:11) - people whose testimony in ancient society was second-class at best.
Which is to say, the writers do not do what you might expect if you want to recount a joyful, world-changing event and ensure wide acceptance. They go with honest reactions (fear) and sharing about the real people who first preached (women) - details that both surprise and, ultimately, land with far more power.
Re note 2: Never realized or thought about this. Actually lends more credibility to the Easter story. Thanks for including.