​Many Sides to Every Story by Pennie Hunt

This column is my platform to share stories. My stories. Stories of my experiences, events, family, beliefs, personal trials, and successes. Within the story I share, I include a life lesson. A learning from the experience I have lived.

If it is a story from my childhood, my brother (at times) is quick to point out the errors in my writing. He will claim my memory of the event is inaccurate. But, here is the deal, my telling of the story is my story. It includes my feelings, my memories, and my lessons. He may tell the same story colored with his feelings, his memories, and his lessons. These two versions may hold the same theme, the same characters, and the same event, but the telling of the story will be in the context of the teller. The story reflects how the story touched them.

If the story includes more family members or a group of people, the story each person tells will be delivered differently depending on how the event affected them. The story of a family event told by a parent, may be a very different story than the version told by a child. If there are six siblings experiencing the same event each one may share their own colorful story of how they experienced it.

This happens in every area of life. If you describe the story of your marriage, your spouse’s story of the same marriage may be different. The story of divorce has two versions. Friendships hold two descriptions of the relationship. The story of a 7th grade classroom may hold 30 narratives from the students and one from the teacher. The same story, but all different.

So, which story is correct? They all are. Sure, there may be small details that don’t match, and someone probably does remember the detail correctly, but the overall painting of a picture, the feelings, the place, the outcome, and lesson learned is accurate according to the teller’s life and meaning to them. The small differences in details don’t really matter.

If it is a breaking of a relationship story the differences may be bigger. The more emotion involved the larger the space between the stories. A divorce filled with anger creates two stories filled with opposing views of what occurred. Again, each is their story to tell and shaped by their feelings and emotions. The true story may be a combination of both views.

When a tragedy takes place, emotions are at the highest level. The characters involved in the story hold very specific memories of what happened. Their story will be filled with the deep emotions of the sadness, hurt, and pain they felt and witnessed. If one person was at the event, they hold a deeper visceral reaction than the person who received the news from a shocking phone call. Each story is specific to them. All of them can be correct.

The next time someone tells a story and remembers it in a different way, take a step back. Look at the overall picture of the story being told. Do the details you remember differently change the big view of the story? Do the details you remember differently show personal feelings you experienced that are very specific to your viewpoint?

Everyone remembers an event differently. Everyone tells the story differently. Everyone learns lessons differently.  And every story can be correct when told from different sides.
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                                                     Pennie’s Life Lesson:
                  Stories can be told differently. And they may all be true.
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​YOUR TURN...        
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                                                                 Thank you!  ​
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