by Tina Cherpes, Featured Contributor
Group Therapy: Lessons From The Couch – #16
LOIS SAID softly, “Sit down, I want to tell you a story…”
Back in the day when it was a generally accepted form of discipline to send a swift backhand or two toward the head or behind of a disobedient child, my sisters, brothers, and I quickly learned the boundaries of what is and is not acceptable behavior; at least while within arm’s reach of our parents.
One rainy summer afternoon when our cooped-up energy must have created some form of temporary insanity, we decided it would be a great idea to play freeze tag – in the house.
Having allegedly ignored several of our parents’ prior cease and desist orders, our game inevitably escalated into a shouting match of who was lying, and who was cheating, and who was quitting and the next thing we remembered was hearing our father’s voice, “You’ve got 5 seconds to get outside (it was still raining) and pick out a stick from the yard and get back here with it”. What? Was he really asking us to choose the instrument of our own punishment? Immobile until the sound of his voice released us “1…. 2” we sprinted outside and fearing the worst, frantically searched the yard for the smallest stick we could find and raced back with it.
Reminiscent of something from a Von Trapp family album, we stood in a row before him each of us extending our sticks toward him and each of us secretly hoping the others would be chosen first. As our father collected the sticks from our outstretched hands he paused for a moment to make prolonged eye contact with each of us before moving on to the next.
Having gathered all of our sticks, he stood quietly for what seemed like an eternity before he chose to speak, “Each of these sticks on their own is fragile” (he snapped one of the sticks) “and can easily be broken, but together, these sticks are nearly impossible to break” (he tried to break the remaining bundle and couldn’t) “I’m angry because I heard you call each other names like liar and cheater. You are a family, and just like these sticks, when families stick together they’re nearly impossible to break” (another long pause) “Now go find something to do quietly until it stops raining or your mother and I will find something for you to do”. We scattered; we knew that usually meant cleaning our rooms.
Lesson? Whether our audience is our sales team, our patients, potential investors, or our children we can often influence future behavior in an effective way by incorporating the principles of storytelling. Yes, we could choose to tell our sales team the facts: “You’re responsible for 50 calls per day, 3 field calls per week, and 25% of your monthly quota each week” or, we could choose to communicate the same information in a different way – via storytelling; “This morning I’ve invited Sarah from our Springfield office to share a few success stories with you about what she’s doing that’s working really well”.
