Telling a story with #storyseeds

I post a lot here about #storyseeds, but it's a nice chance for me to think them through. As you know, many #storyseeds are single-shot prompts, with no connection to other #storyseeds or larger narrative framework, but I sometimes post sets that are intended to suggest another narrative. Tax day inspired just such a run.

I'm thinking about turning #storyseeds into a card deck, with some rules for play or just as a creative tool. What do you think? Would something like that interest you?

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Planting, cultivating, and harvesting #storyseeds

Many of you know I've been sending out near-daily #storyseeds for several years. They are short images or questions, crafted to spur the reader's imagination and maybe lead to new creative work. Truthfully, I started them as a way to spur my own creativity. It's a challenge coming up with something every day and it's keeping my imagination supple.

#storyseeds started as text only. Sometimes they would be interrogative:

What is that smell?

or

Name your superpower and why.

or

What would you give up to create the change you hunger for?

Other times they might be a teeny-tiny story, or a sentence with the potential to become one.

My garden is full of wild onions, tumbleweeds, and dandelions.

or

You find a note on the mirror. "Don't look behind you."

or

"I can never find shoes in my size," grumbles The Monster, "It makes me think there is an anti-monster bias in the fashion industry."

Lately I've been experimenting with #storyseeds that include images. I'm really enjoying this because it's giving me a multi-layered challenge. Not only do I have to come up with the seed itself, I need to find a way to enhance it with an image. Sometimes the image is integral to the seed as in these:

Other times not as much. While the image supports the seed it isn't the key part. This particular set of #storyseeds were part of a set released over one week, intended to suggest a longer story.

I'm also offering expanded, multi-part #storyseeds over on Patreon. To see those go over to my Patreon page.

I find planting and cultivating #storyseeds has given me a great harvest of ideas. I hope it has for others. Stories rarely emerge fully formed like Athena from Zeus' forehead; they often need to be tended and cared for as they grow. When we pay attention, the potential for a story is everywhere.

As I mentioned in the ideas, images, and story seeds entry in my book, From Audience to Zeal: The ABCs of Finding, Crafting, and Telling a Great Story, "Storyseeds are all around. Ask yourself questions about why the world is as it is. Pick one thing and wonder about it. Maybe your next-door neighbor has a secret. Maybe they are really a minotaur...or used to be a prima ballerina. Maybe they are looking at you and wondering who you really are."

Which leads me to ask: Who are you? What are your #storyseeds? What are you cultivating?

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Support me on Patreon.
laurapacker.com Performance, coaching, keynotes, and more.
thinkstory.com Organizational storytelling, communications consulting, and more.
(c)2019 Laura S. Packer

#storyseeds

As you may know, I've been posting #storyseeds on Facebook and Twitter for several years. These are little creativity sparks. I've shared longer, text based seeds here before, but I'm trying something new. I've begun making them image focused and it's really fun. Having to think through an image and seed has been sparking all kinds of ideas for me, so I wanted to share them with you here. I'd love to know what they might evoke!

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www.laurapacker.com
www.thinkstory.com
(c)2019 Laura S. Packer

#storyseeds Friday: The dark wood

If you follow me on Twitter or on Facebook, you know that I'm posting daily #storyseeds, a short prompt for creativity and imagination. I started doing them as much for myself as for anyone else. They make me stretch my mind a little bit each morning and they help me remember that I am a creative being. It's fun, a little therapeutic, and a little useful for others. I'm posting expanded #storyseeds here on Fridays, both as a chance for me to experiment with more complex prompts and as a way for you to have a playful start for the weekend. Let me know what you think, which worked for you and which didn't, and send me any prompts you'd like to see posted! I can't promise I'll use them, but I may very well.

“In the middle of the journey of our life I found myself within a dark woods where the straight way was lost.” 

― Dante Alighieri, Inferno

The dark wood is rich with story. It is the warning heart of so many fairy tales (those stories that offer guideposts to living), the place where old lives can be released and new beginnings may be found, rich with promise and peril, and the metaphor for some of the most catalyzing times in our lives. 

Let's spend a little time there, planting seeds for stories.

1. Embodied
   How does your body feel when you are in wild places? Do you breath more deeply? Is there a kernel of caution? Do you feel it in your gut, your heart, your eyes?
   Equally, what do you feel when you venture into the unknown, whether it's a new place, a new way of thinking, a new activity?
   What does fear feel like? Or excitement? How do they differ? How are they the same?
2. Described
   Imagine a wood, a place of mystery, beginnings, and endings.
   What do you see? What kinds of trees? Is there a path? Is it dirt or pine needles or something else?
   What do you smell? What are the sounds when you are moving through the woods or those when you are still?
   How did you get there? Does anyone live there, human or otherwise? Is the wood named or nameless? How big is it? Are you lost or do you have an origin and destination? Is it an urban wood or a remote place? 
3. A seed
   While wandering in the wood for a pleasant afternoon walk, you glance down and see a white pebble. You pick it up, surprised the see such a bright stone here. A dozen feet down the path you find another. Then another.
   OR
   The trees are whispering.
4. Story-story-go!
   Imagine you set out into the dark wood to find a solution or salvation. Who or what did you find? How did they help or hurt? How did you help or hurt those you encountered? Remember, this story takes place in the woods. How do you find your way out again?

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(c)2018 Laura S. Packer

#storyseeds Friday: A world without

If you follow me on Twitter or on Facebook, you know that I'm posting daily #storyseeds, a short prompt for creativity and imagination. I started doing them as much for myself as for anyone else. They make me stretch my mind a little bit each morning and they help me remember that I am a creative being. It's fun, a little therapeutic, and a little useful for others. I'm posting expanded #storyseeds here on Fridays, both as a chance for me to experiment with more complex prompts and as a way for you to have a playful start for the weekend. Let me know what you think, which worked for you and which didn't, and send me any prompts you'd like to see posted! I can't promise I'll use them, but I may very well.

What would you give up for a week? For a month? For a year? For the rest of your life? The Lenten season started last week, which brings giving things up to mind. 
Things.
Behaviors.
A way of life.

Last week we saw another horrendous act of violence that leaves many families without their loved ones while others argue about what they are or are not willing to give up. 
Memories.
Objects.
A future.

What would you give up to change yourself? What would you love to remove from your life? What would you give up to change the world? What would you sacrifice? What would you see excised from the world entirely? How would things change?
Species. 
Environments.
A known path.

1. Embodied
   When you think about giving something up, where do you feel it in your body? Does something tighten or relax? What if you think about giving something else up? Does it change?
2. Described
   Describe a day without the given up thing.
   Describe the world without it.
3. A seed...
   You wake up tomorrow and find that you no longer remember the thing that you thought shaped you.
   Or
   You wake up tomorrow and have the power to remove one and only one person from the world. They would be removed from this point forward, not any point in the past. What happens?
   Or
   You wake up tomorrow to find the one thing holding you back has been removed.
4. Story-story-go! Tell the story of a world without. Start with the day-to-day changes then move to the larger implications. Do you miss the way the world was? Does it impact you at all?

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(c)2018 Laura S. Packer

#storyseeds Friday: What is that smell? Is that love?

If you follow me on Twitter or on Facebook, you know that I'm posting daily #storyseeds, a short prompt for creativity and imagination. I started doing them as much for myself as for anyone else. They make me stretch my mind a little bit each morning and they help me remember that I am a creative being. It's fun, a little therapeutic, and a little useful for others. I'm posting expanded #storyseeds here on Fridays, both as a chance for me to experiment with more complex prompts and as a way for you to have a playful start for the weekend. Let me know what you think, which worked for you and which didn't, and send me any prompts you'd like to see posted! I can't promise I'll use them, but I may very well.

It is the week when romantic love is in the air, whether or not you want it to be. This week's #storyseeds are here to help you think about love in all of its many forms and possibilities.

1. Embodied
   How do you feel when you love? Do you feel different with different kinds of love? How does romantic love feel compared with loving a pet compared with the love you may have for a really great sandwich?
2. Described
   Describe the first thing or being you knew you loved, other than a parent. What did it look or feel like? Why did you love it? Do you love it still? 
3. A seed...
   You fall in love with someone you used to despise. What changed? You? Them? Are the very things you found revolting before now appealing and endearing?
4. Story-story-go! Tell a love story from the point of view of a physical object or non-human being. A table in a cafe watching a couple fall in love. Juliet's knife. Your dog, meeting the dog of your new sweetheart.

Please post any answers you'd like to share, I'd LOVE to know what these prompted for you!

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(c)2018 Laura S. Packer

#storyseeds Friday: Unknown objects

If you follow me on Twitter or on Facebook, you know that I'm posting daily #storyseeds, a short prompt for creativity and imagination. I started doing them as much for myself as for anyone else. They make me stretch my mind a little bit each morning and they help me remember that I am a creative being. It's fun, a little therapeutic, and a little useful for others. I'm posting expanded #storyseeds here on Fridays, both as a chance for me to experiment with more complex prompts and as a way for you to have a playful start for the weekend. Let me know what you think, which worked for you and which didn't, and send me any prompts you'd like to see posted! I can't promise I'll use them, but I may very well.

In the 1980 film The Gods Must Be Crazy, Xi (a Kalahari Bushman) and his people find a glass soda bottle. They don't know what it's for, so they use it in as many ways as they can; as a musical instrument, a pestle, a firestarter and more. Eventually this object brings strife to their village and Xi must dispose of it at the end of the world.

We are rich with things. Our culture is largely based on acquisition and use; how much stuff do we have and who has the best stuff? It's not a very healthy way to love, thoughI freely admit I fall prey to it.

What would happen if we changed our relationship with the stuff in our lives? This week's #storyseeds may help you think about all the things we have in new ways.

1. Embodied
   Take an every day object, like a fork or a pen or your computer keyboard. Look at it carefully, examining all sides. Take in its qualities, from the color and texture, to the smell and any sounds it may make.
   Now write a list of 25 alternative uses for this object. Try to look at it as if you have never seen it before. Could it be decorative? A ritual object? A tool? A musical instrument? A magical item?
2. Described
   Describe something you own and treasure. When did you get it? Why do you love it? What does it do? How does it make you feel? Who would you give it to if you had to release it? What would make you give it up?
3. A seed...
   A woman wakes up and all of her possessions have been swapped out for similar but not identical items. 
4. Story-story-go!Ask someone you care about to tell you the story of something they love.

Please post any answers you'd like to share, I'd LOVE to know what these prompted for you!

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(c)2018 Laura S. Packer

#storyseeds Friday: Small animals, signs and portents

If you follow me on Twitter or on Facebook, you know that I'm posting daily #storyseeds, a short prompt for creativity and imagination. I started doing them as much for myself as for anyone else. They make me stretch my mind a little bit each morning and they help me remember that I am a creative being. It's fun, a little therapeutic, and a little useful for others. I'm posting expanded #storyseeds here on Fridays, both as a chance for me to experiment with more complex prompts and as a way for you to have a playful start for the weekend. Let me know what you think, which worked for you and which didn't, and send me any prompts you'd like to see posted! I can't promise I'll use them, but I may very well.

Today is Groundhog Day, that date in the United States on which a poor, hapless groundhog is pulled from its den and forced to look for its shadow. The tradition may derive from a German tradition by way of the Pennsylvania Dutch, wherein an animal, originally a badger, looks for its shadow to predict the coming of spring. In the British Isles it's a hedgehog who looks for his shadow. Alternatively, Groundhog Day may be linked to Brigitmas, which celebrates Saint Brigit, originally the goddess Brigit, whose animal was a groundhog. Her feast day was February 1. Either way, it's a reminder that spring is coming, winter won't last forever, and creative fires should be stoked regularly.

1. Embodied
   Rough hands grab you and pull you out of your comfy bed. They make you face the light and demand that you tell them if the world will end or continue. What do you say? Whose hands are they? Why do they think you know?
2. Described
   Would you rather be a groundhog, a badger, or a hedgehog? What would it feel like to live on four legs and close to the ground? Tell me how delicious worms and grasses are, and what it's like living in the earth.
3. A seed...
   You wake up tomorrow morning and have no shadow. 
4. Story-story-go!
   Go for it, shadows and all!

Please post any answers you'd like to share, I'd LOVE to know what these prompted for you!
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www.thinkstory.com
(c)2018 Laura S. Packer

#storyseeds Friday: Love, life, and hair problems

If you follow me on Twitter or on Facebook, you know that I'm posting daily #storyseeds, a short prompt for creativity and imagination. I started doing them as much for myself as for anyone else. They make me stretch my mind a little bit each morning and they help me remember that I am a creative being. It's fun, a little therapeutic, and a little useful for others.

I'm going to start posting slightly expanded #storyseeds here on Fridays, both as a chance for me to experiment with more complex prompts and as a way for you to have a playful start for the weekend. Let me know what you think, which worked for you and which didn't, and send me any prompts you'd like to see posted! I can't promise I'll use them, but I may very well.

Since today is National Spouse's Day AND National Big Wig Day, here are some prompts about relationships, cover-ups, and things that shouldn't be that obvious. Please post any answers you'd like to share, I'd LOVE to know what these prompted for you!

1. Embodied
   You wake up and realize your hair has changed color and texture. Overnight you've gone from one extreme to the other. What does it look like? How does it feel? Do you relish it or immediately buy a hat or wig? How do you explain it to others?
   What if you woke up and found your spouse's hair had changed overnight?
2. Described
   Think of someone you love. If you have a partner or spouse, think of them, but anyone you have been close to will do. Describe them using all of your senses. Not only what they look like, but their scent, how they feel, the sounds they make, their taste (if appropriate). How would they describe you?
3. A seed...
   What would you do if you were King of the World for a day, a real big wig? What would you do if you were President and had to work with a deeply divided congress? What is the scandal that would bring you down?
4. Story-story-go!
   Show me what you've got!

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www.thinkstory.com
(c)2018 Laura S. Packer