On storytelling, reinvention and the foundation beneath the pivot
Many of us are pivoting or reinventing in some way right now. Learning something new, changing jobs, adapting workflows. But are we doing it sustainably?
The organisations and individuals navigating reinvention most successfully aren’t necessarily the ones moving fastest or with the clearest plan. They’re the ones who know their own story well enough to build from it.
When we can share honestly: this is where I’ve been, this is what I’ve learned, and this is what I’m building from.
That’s the foundation.
Each experience we have shapes the story. Each chapter adding something essential to the one that followed.
That is what authentic storytelling does, not just for writers or speakers, but for all of us navigating change. It makes sense of the non-linear.
Humans have been telling stories as a means of making sense of the world for thousands of years. Anthropologists describe storytelling as woven into the very fabric of human culture – transcending time, geography and social structures, serving as a survival instinct that facilitates learning, emotional regulation and social cohesion.
Our stories are the thread that connects what we were to what we are becoming, and the solid ground to build from when everything else shifts.
When we pivot from pressure alone – reacting to what the market demands, what AI is changing, what other people are doing – we tend to rebuild on unstable ground. We move quickly but we are often disconnected from our values, from what we’ve learned, and from the accumulated wisdom of everything we’ve already navigated.
Oliver Burkeman captures this in Four Thousand Weeks – the idea that the most powerful approach to life and work is not implementing our predetermined plans for success, but responding to the needs of our place and our moment in history.
Our story is how we know what those needs are. It’s the map we’ve been drawing all along, not a map to follow rigidly, but one to consult honestly. To ask: what does everything I’ve lived through tell me about what matters most right now?
Self-awareness and connection to our own story is the foundation from which we pivot and reinvent – sustainably and authentically.
“No need to hurry. No need to sparkle. No need to be anybody but oneself.” ~ Virginia Woolf, A Room of One’s Own
This bank holiday weekend – I invite you to reflect on your story. With all its pivots, contradictions and hard-won lessons.
What grounds you in all you have learned, and what excites you about who you are becoming?
