Stories Give Us Roots and Wings

There is a popular saying, often attributed to Goethe, that “there are two lasting things we give our children. One is roots and the other wings.” Stories from our families give us roots; stories from our mentors give us wings. As Esther Choy puts it in her article on mentoring in Forbes, mentors “use storytelling to lead with authenticity, compassion, and curiosity—helping those around them become leaders in their own right.”

Yesterday, listening to the story of a distinguished Ph.D. graduate of the Emory University Psychology Department, I was reminded of the power of this statement. Brandi Kenner, founder and CEO of Choice-filled Lives Network, an organization dedicated to building bridges among research, practice, and innovative technologies to help children and families flourish, sat before a rapt audience of current graduate students to tell her story—not just the polished professional story she has honed, but the gritty story of challenge and struggle, accomplishment and success, of battles lost and battles won, and ultimately of pride and self-actualization.

Although Brandi was asked to tell the story of her professional life, she began with the story of her childhood, and the stories of her parents, her roots. Brandi’s father, born to a man who was the first Black dentist in Oklahoma, was the first Black ophthalmologist in both Oklahoma City and a smaller city in the state, Guthrie. Her mother, born to a woman who was a history-making educator and activist, was a developmental psychologist, social entrepreneur, and a fierce community activist. Her parents were great philanthropists, working hard to achieve their own family success while always giving back to the community that supported them. Brandi linked her parents’ stories to her grandparents and the lessons and values passed down across the generations, lessons and values of empathy, compassion, resilience, responsibility to one’s family and community, education, and hard honest work. For many of us, these kinds of intergenerational narratives give us roots, a sense of being anchored in the world, a place from which we can grow.

Brandi’s parents have always been a source of strength and love in her life. But her story does not stop there. Brandi’s determination in her professional life led her to achieve multiple graduate degrees, create a charter school bridging developmental science and educational practice to create innovative curricula and build teachers’ capacity, and work with multiple national organizations and foundations culminating in her founding the Choice-filled Lives Network. And as Brandi told this part of her life, she told stories of her mentors, teachers, and employers who provided encouragement, support, opportunities, and enduring optimism about the paths Brandi was choosing; they gave her wings. And these wings are transmitted through stories.

As work in the Family Narratives Lab at Emory University has demonstrated, young adults who know more of their family stories, who tell more detailed stories about their mothers’ and fathers’ wishes and dreams, their actions in moments of pride as well as regret, benefit greatly. These stories provide models of how to be a person in the world, of values, things worth fighting for, and things to cherish. These are our roots.

Mentoring stories that give us wings are equally powerful. Joshua Cruz and his colleagues have shown that teachers who share stories with their students build stronger connections and more empathic relationships, leading to higher student performance. When we connect through stories, we form a more personal bond that allows us to identify with our mentor in a more meaningful way. To facilitate storytelling as a teaching tool in the classroom, the Society for the Teaching of Psychology commissioned a book, edited by Karen Brakke and J.A. Houska, to explore the myriad ways stories were important in the classroom, from helping students tell their own stories, to linking family stories to professional goals, to teachers sharing their own personal stories in ways that help students understand possible pathways forward. Knowing the steps from point A to point B is important; understanding how someone navigated those steps, missteps along the way, corrections, and recalibrations help make that path more real.

Stories continue to be an important part of mentoring in the workplace. In an article exploring developing a new generation of leadership, Choy points to storytelling as a critical mentoring tool. Mentors who were interviewed discussed how early in their careers they did not feel comfortable sharing their personal stories, that these stories perhaps made them appear too vulnerable. But as these mentors progressed in their own careers, they began to realize how important their personal stories were for the rising generation. Sharing their personal stories helped mentors connect with and better understand their mentees, and it helped the mentees develop more articulated plans for their own career progression. Again quoting Choy, “What legacy are you building? What stories do you still need to tell?”

All of us have a story to tell, a story that might very well help someone else—a child, a student, a friend. Telling our personal stories builds connections, but it also helps the listener understand the world and its complications in more concrete ways. We all need to tell these stories, and we all need to hear these stories. We all need roots and wings.