The Need to See the World as a Story

I am no psychologist— this should be made clear. And yet, even I have picked up on the notion that, at least in some avenues of modern psychology, there is a notion that human beings understand the world not as it literally is, but through the lens of a story. It seems to be a means of comprehending ourselves, our relationship with the world around us, and a greater meaning that all things may perhaps point to.

It should also be stressed that I mean in no way to insinuate that this is a religious phenomenon. Indeed, I suspect that the religious narratives may just be a symptom (however profound and affecting) of this deeper requirement for story.

We all feel this need for narrative. When one considers how their day has gone, they do so as a sequence of chronological, interconnected events, which possesses a certain overarching significance; whether the day has been ‘satisfying’, ‘disappointing’, ‘relaxing’ or ‘productive’. Similarly, considering the future, we play out a series of hypothetical scenarios involving ourselves as a protagonist, making actions that cause resulting reactions; both of these examples can be understand as stories.

(This divide between the hypothetical narrative and the recounted narrative is, of course, the line between the author and the historian— both very similar in their processes, but dealing with different subject matters.)

The nature of these stories can have a profound effect on our mentality, and how we position ourselves as an acting agent within the rest of the world. A large point in this is the details of the story that we view to be significant. For example, imagine that somebody is late to an important work meeting, because their bus didn’t turn up on time. One person may feel that this is a personal failing regardless of the inefficiency of public transport, and cast themselves as the antagonist of the narrative, or at least the antihero. Another, more confident person in the exact same situation might depict themselves as the brave, embattled protagonist, who persevered despite the machinations of an incompetent state/corporation/driver. Perhaps they may even feel that it was an achievement to make it at all, given the circumstances. One completely identical situation, but due to a slight tweak in which details were considered important, two wholly different narratives have been derived from this.

Again, there appears to me to be an overlap with psychology here. Those individuals with less of a tendency towards neuroticism, or more of a proclivity for disagreeableness, will naturally choose a narrative that favours them, moreso than a personality that tends towards self-doubt. However, once more I am neither a psychologist nor a guru, and so will not attempt to give any iota of ‘self-help’, except to humbly point out that the second bus narrative above will make its main character feel far more positive about themselves than the first.

What we seem to be doing with this process of the ‘storyfication’ of our lives is deriving meaning where there otherwise would be none. In this secular world, devoid of grand narratives or divine structures, it appears that the cold embrace of rationality only offers us an empty truth— that of nihilism, existentialism, of absurdism, that the only meaning in a random and uncaring universe can be a shallow and pointless lie. And yet, when we construct narratives out of individual occurrences, stringing them together into sequences that lead to yet more sequences, we attach a snowballing significance to each one that suggests they are not just random events in a never-ending void, but a series of building blocks that must lead to a better future, if we just keep moving forward.

For an example of how a specific choice of narrative can create meaning from none, consider a man who has done something wrong in the past, and has been plagued by guilt (consciously or not) for it ever since. Now, say that same man is currently going through some kind of trial; a health problem, a family issue, a hated job, etc. He may choose to characterise this present suffering as a kind of necessary ‘atonement’ for his past sins. Atonement implies that the suffering is leading towards a redemption, and thus all present woes are directed towards a meaningful end.

Whether or not anyone really believes this— and indeed, it is obviously not a conclusion grounded in material reality— he has created a narrative that results in a great importance, his own redemption from the taint of previous transgressions, where otherwise would just exist a mere set of unrelated, random and miserable events.

This is why grand narratives can be so intoxicating, and yet so dangerous. Religions are an obvious example, whatever you may think of them. Science offers another, or at least did— as pessimism grew, the idea of perpetual and uncapped human progress fell out of favour. Apocalyptic narratives are perversely popular, and often become wrapped up in the other categories, for I suppose a fittingly, poetically cataclysmic end is better than fading out into meaningless obscurity. And politics provides a wealth of overarching narrative to understand and interact with the world through, from the steady, cynical, individually-motivated hand of Conservatism to the diverse, accepting, regulated embrace of Socialism, or from the radical, vengeful uprising of the Jacobin to the racial purity of the Fascist.

Here is an example of applying the previous notion of choosing a narrative, in the context of these existential grand narratives. In the face of a mounting and seemingly inevitable climate catastrophe, do we subscribe to the narrative that human beings are a cancerous scourge whose greed and bigotry can only lead to the demise of Mother Nature herself? Or do we choose instead to believe that we are noble (if misguided) creatures, who amidst all other animals possess the ability to imagine and implement the technologies and methodologies that can save our Earth from destruction?

Which of these is more true? Simultaneously, which is more useful?

It is when people are at their most lost, most devoid of meaning and direction, that they are most in need of a narrative larger than themselves. And when they lack the means of finding one that is positive, they will allow the machinations of another to overwhelm and embody them, sometimes with disastrous consequences.

There is a famous Nietzsche quote that reads ‘He who has a why to live for can bear almost any how’. It is why an enthralling novel or beloved TV series that fluffs its ending can suddenly be turned upon in an instant– nothing about the quality of the preceding pages or episodes has been diminished, and yet without the triumph of a sufficient ending, the ‘why’, they all suddenly seem far less appealing. There is danger in the intoxication of grand narratives— especially when they are designed from the start to advance a pernicious purpose. And yet, it is natural in human beings to not only tell stories, but to conceptualise themselves as within a story, that contains both the places that they have been, and that where they are still yet to go.

Perhaps in reading the stories of others, fictional or otherwise, we may learn something vital to the narratives that we ourselves are spinning.  

Thank you for reading,