I can’t think of anything more critical for humanity than communication. It’s at the epicenter of everything we do, everything we are, and if you think about it, we are all storytellers at various points in our day.
Although some are born natural storytellers, I wasn’t. That’s the funny thing about life experiences though it can help make-up for the things we aren’t naturally talented at. While serving my tenure as Chair of a regulatory board I quickly learned how to tell a story, in these cases taking facts and presenting it in a way people listened, could see what I saw, felt how I felt.
There are elements of storytelling but mostly it’s if you were reading it or watching it for the first time…does it transport you to another time and place, does it make you feel something, can you see the characters, can you feel what they feel? If the answer is yes, then you’re a storyteller.