‘I’m a storyteller’, there I’ve said it! Don’t judge me, I know I’ve kept it quiet for a long time and squirrelled away behind the scenes but somehow life has allowed me to admit it now. I may even update LinkedIn, that’s how serious I am about coming out!
I assume you’re grateful that I haven’t just come out as a serial murderer or anything quite so jaw dropping, that would certainly end my new business rapidly but it’s taken me a long time to admit that I’m a story teller.
I didn’t even admit it in 2012 when I met Billy Connolly at his debut ‘Rainy Day’ exhibition, and bought one of his original artworks called ‘The Story Teller’ and then asked him to sign it ‘From one storyteller to another’. You’d think that would be a glimpse of the obvious, but it wasn’t. It’s a bit like people that paint, who would never call themselves Artists, we hide behind the ‘professional’ label that we can’t call ourselves something, unless we are professionals at it.
Well this week I’ve decided that I don’t care anymore, ‘I’m a story teller’ and I’ll tell you why; I’ve written a few books and even a poetry book, a good start you may say, but not sure that I sold that many, even after Crowne Plaza Hotels picked one up in a huge promotion in 2010.
But it’s through my yoga practice that I’ve accepted that I’m a story teller. Why? well I help people through the therapies and Yoga that I practice, to change people’s minds and the stories they tell themselves. That’s all our beliefs are; stories we’ve told ourselves or someone else has projected on to us and we accept it. When people realise it’s a story that isn’t helping them anymore, they take the first step to break it down and change it.
I have good provenance; my father was an Irish Storyteller, not in the traditional sense, of the Irish traveller, who travelled from village to village only asking for food and shelter in return for stories. My Dad told me in the 1930’s that his Village only received one newspaper a week so from the age of 8 years old onwards, it was his job to read the newspaper out to the villagers, who had gathered on a Sunday morning, to listen.
My desire to write stories started very early, I loved writing stories in poems, but a schoolteacher started berating me for one spelling mistake, which ended my enthusiasm at school. Later in life I wrote poems when I felt stressed or under pressure, I have a few hundred of those!! I always wanted to write my wellbeing stories and in 2010, Booklocker published my book ‘Walk on the Grass’ and I began to pick up the writing again. In 2015 I rebooted myself again by setting up a Writing Group and going on a Writers Retreat in France, but 4 days later I came back from it in an ambulance and was rushed straight to A&E, thats another good story! I say honestly, that it wasn’t my writing that caused it.
It wasn’t until I started teaching yoga that my aural stories started to flood out, engaging my students in stories of the body and how we hold on to stress, even though we sometimes don’t like the story. My yoga classes have many stories in them. They take my students on a journey through each energy point (Chakras) and energise the positives and reduce the negatives that they hold there.
In our meditations, which we do at the end of our yoga practice, we travel to places in our mind , to the theatres where we act out our life, the library where we hold those unhelpful books and the control room that regulates our bodies. As a trained clinical hypnotist I find it easy to help people create new stories, new inspirations and letting their mind run wild and free.
So there you have it, I’ve admitted it finally, I’m a Storyteller and I hope we’ve created a great place to start your new story in Oldshoremore, where we’ll welcome you with open arms when you come and share it with us.
Angela x