Sponsored content: Chris Leslie invites you to free Your Voice, Yoir Story information sessions
A few years ago I started doing the scariest thing I’ve ever done at work.
I’d just finished managing the first version of Scottish Book Trust’s Your Voice, Your Story project where, in partnership with seven Scottish library services, we helped people to create digital stories about their lived experiences.
Our team of freelance facilitators worked with all kinds of community groups, and the stories they made were so incredibly heartfelt and varied.
Many people wanted to publish their stories – often to raise awareness of a local service like a community garden or choir. Others wanted to share ‘offline’ in targeted ways, particularly those who shared experiences of long-term health conditions. Some wanted to keep their stories private, for friends and family or for their own private reflection.
I loved managing our team of freelancers, but I never thought I would actually run our programme of workshops to help people share their experiences, create a narrative and make a video. But to make the programme sustainable, I really did want to learn how to provide that space for people.
I’ve been doing it for five years now, and I’ve found that once I learned to listen – to really listen – I could help people feel safe, respected and able to share the things that matter most.
This is why I think stories matter more than ever. We need to listen more than ever. Several years ago, I worked in partnership with Scottish Adoption and Fostering to help birth mums share their stories in a small, safe group.
For some in the group, it was enough to simply have that space to share with a supportive group and lift a burden. Others wanted to raise awareness of their situation, and with a very carefully considered strategy and adherence to the guidelines from Story Centre about ongoing consent, they’ve been supported to do that. I think it’s important to have a space to share a story in all its complexity – something I often wonder if we’ve lost in a world driven by simplistic narratives on social media.
Some stories really do help to achieve change. In our recently completed partnership with Macmillan Cancer Support, some of the digital stories became part of internal training, to complement staff expertise with people’s individual perspectives on what mattered during their experience. Some of these stories focused on change that was needed at work, some focused on treatment pathways, but all were focused on what was most important to each storyteller.
No storyteller is expected to publish their digital story in our workshops. We think the real importance lies in the process of creating the story – the space to reflect in safety with a small group, to grow and build the confidence that comes with being able to make sense of a journey.
If you’d like to know more about the programme, you can come to one of our free information sessions online. But most of all we recommend watching the stories on our website.
Chris Leslie is digital storytelling manager at the Scottish Book Trust.
