The Single Story

Today I called my dad, and when I pulled up his contact info there is a picture of Dad in a tux from when he went on a cruise several years ago.

My dad is a pretty classy guy, but he doesn't wear a tux every day lol.

This is actually a reoccuring theme. See I have profile pictures of hundreds of people in my phone. Many are of students that I had in youth group 10 years ago.

Winter Retreat 2009 "80s Night"

Some are married, and have real jobs and adult lives now, but I still have their myspace pic of them in the akward stage wearing an August Burns Red t-shirt.

It's easy to see myself as a growing changing person.

I know what I've started, and stopped since last we hung out. I know what books I've read, experiences I've had, and character building pains I've endoured.

I don't know any of that about you unless I see you all the time. It's so easy to label a person based on our last interaction with them. This label becomes the "Single Story" that we then filter all our future interactions through.

It's hard to see others as growing changing people.

I first got this idea of a single story from Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie who gave a ted talk on this.

http://www.ted.com Our lives, our cultures, are composed of many overlapping stories. Novelist Chimamanda Adichie tells the story of how she found her authentic cultural voice -- and warns that if we hear only a single story about another person or country, we risk a critical misunderstanding.

So who have you labeled with a single story? We must acknowledge others ability to fail, grow, and change around us. Or we become a single story of judgement, criticism, and prejudice.

If you don't allow others to add chapters to their story, then you won't get to add to yours.