#106: The stories we tell ourselves

When I meet someone new, one of the first questions I typically ask is, “What’s your story?”

Undefined and open-ended, it invites them to share what they consider most important about themselves. It offers insight into what they value, and, equally, how they tell it. A person's ability to frame their life as a story gives me an immediate read on how they make sense of the world.

One of the most important skills that anyone can possess is the ability to tell a good story.

Storytelling is one of the most powerful tools we have. It brings people together. It drives sales, learning, change, leadership, relationships, almost everything. Stories are how we understand each other, and how we understand ourselves. Quite literally, stories run the world.

The most important stories are the ones we tell ourselves.

The person we will speak to the most over the course of our lifetimes is ourself. We may be extremely open with others. We may be extroverted, but no one will hear our stories more than us. We are in constant communication with ourselves. That inner narration in our minds never has a day off.

The stories we tell ourselves shape who we are.

There’s a concept in psychology called narrative identity, which suggests that we construct our sense of self by weaving together the events of our lives into a coherent story. These personal narratives aren't merely records of what happened, they’re how we make sense of it all. We choose which memories to highlight, which to downplay, and how to connect them, often subconsciously. This storytelling process gives our lives continuity and meaning, and it profoundly shapes how we see ourselves and the paths we choose to take.

But here’s the critical question: are the stories we tell ourselves true?

Are the stories accurate?

It’s not always easy to tell. Humans are association machines; we like patterns, and we seek coherence, even when it’s flawed. We’re also prone to confirmation bias. If you’ve grown up believing you’re “bad at maths” — as seems to be incredibly common in many societies— you’ll likely accumulate a lifetime of examples that support that belief. The narrative solidifies. Over time, that story becomes part of your identity.

Changing narratives like these, especially ones formed in childhood, is no small feat. Stories left unexamined can create self-fulfilling loops.

So, how do we begin to challenge an old story?

First, it requires actually articulating the stories clearly, whether that’s sharing them with others or writing them down. I believe that it's only when you attempt to articulate something that you realise whether you truly understand it.

From there, the process becomes one of forensic reflection: looking back through our lives to find where that story began, what events shaped it, and what triggers may have reinforced it over the years. Next, examine how it plays out in our life today. Finally, and most powerfully, comes the process of rewriting the story.

Because, we are the authors of our lives.

Writing the story of my life

For the last few months I have done exactly that. In #100 back in January I changed the frequency of Plane Thoughts, stating I was working on other projects. One of them has been this deeply personal project: writing a book on the story of my life.

I never set out to do so. What started as a single journal entry of self-reflection as I sought to understand something about my life, has evolved into something far more ambitious. An undertaking of considerable scale and complexity, it has resulted in a 30,000 word book.

It hasn't been easy, far from it. Quite honestly, it has overwhelmed me completely.

The best way I can describe the feeling is this: imagine trying to find a cable behind your PC in a messy office, wires crisscrossed and tangled in every direction. You don’t know where to start, and you’re not sure what connects to what. That’s how this process has felt. A tangled knot of memories, emotions, and unresolved stories.

Until now, I’ve not told a single person what I’ve been up to. I didn’t plan to speak about it, and don’t plan to share or publish the story. They say the best books are written with one specific person in mind. In this case it couldn't have been easier. It was me. The aim was to fully understand the person that I am, the stories that have shaped me, and find clarity on the story I want to write going forward.

I've never found a task as difficult as this one. I've never truly understood procrastination until now. I've lost track of the number of times that I've slammed the laptop shut before typing a single word, because I knew the chapter waiting for me was emotionally difficult.

I write first drafts on paper with a black rollerball pen. At times, the ink has run gold with triumph. Other times, it has run red with pain.

The difficulties of such an exercise

I’m not suggesting that everyone needs to write a book. It’s not feasible. It's a huge time commitment and is emotionally draining.

You may even question the point of it. After all, we can never fully know ourselves. We have many biases and blind spots that will evidently feed into an exercise of introspection.

But fundamentally, the more we know about ourselves, the better. The more we try, the better. How can we hope to achieve self-mastery if we don’t know ourselves? If we’re unwilling to look beneath the surface?

There’s also another significant issue. We’re actually quite bad at recounting our own stories.

Our memories aren’t as fixed as we might like to believe. Each time we recall an experience, we reconstruct it, and in doing so, we subtly reshape it. This means our stories about the past aren’t static records; they’re living, breathing narratives that evolve with us. Neuroscience has shown that memory is reconstructive, not reproductive; we don’t play back the past like a video, we recreate it like a story.

This is why two people can remember the same event so differently, and why how you feel today about someone or something materially colours how you remember the past.

This is precisely where Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) comes in; it helps people identify and reframe distorted narratives.

Leveraging AI to understand myself better

So how did I work through this without a CBT-trained therapist? I used AI.

It might sound counter-intuitive, but in many ways, AI has advantages over even the most well-meaning friend or confidant. Friends carry their own perspectives, biases, and emotional investments and filter due to their relationship to you. AI doesn’t. (I’m simplifying…)

When I fed my 30,000-word manuscript into ChatGPT and asked thoughtful, structured prompts (and asked it to create follow-up prompts for itself), the feedback I got was remarkably insightful. It helped me see patterns, blind spots, and inconsistencies. It wasn’t just one mind giving feedback — it was like having every therapist, psychologist, and behavioural expert who’s ever published anything reviewing my story, all at once.

I’ve increasingly turned to AI for self-reflection tasks, and I’m frequently astounded by the clarity it offers, and highly recommend it exploring it.

Implementation idea: An invitation to reflect

So, what are the stories you tell yourself?

Where did they come from? Which ones are serving you? Which ones might need editing?

We often talk about identity as something we have; fixed, singular, and neatly defined. But in reality, identity is more like a verb than a noun. It’s something we continually create and recreate through the stories we tell ourselves and others. When we say “I’m the kind of person who…” we’re not just describing reality. We’re shaping it.

Recognising identity as a narrative process opens up space for change. You don’t need to throw out your whole story. But small, intentional changes in the way you explain your life can unlock big behavioural shifts.

You’re not locked into the old story.

You’re always mid-sentence,

and you can choose a different ending.

— AJ

On my bedside table:

🎙Podcast: Dr Gabor Maté ON: Understanding your trauma & how to heal emotional wounds to start moving on from the past today - On Purpose with Jay Shetty

💬 Quote: “Those who tell the stories rule society” - Plato

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