August 19 2015. Sometimes it is good to be reminded of a truth—even if you have never doubted it. It is all too easy to take the familiar for granted.

WHAT IS THE MOST POWERFUL, WONDERFUL, WORD IN THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE?

MANY WOULD SAY ‘LOVE.’ THEY HAVE A POINT—BUT I THINK IT MAY JUST BE ‘STORY.’

I ran across the following extract by Tyagarajan Sundaresan in www.medium.com –a favorite website for exposing one to the quite astonishing talent that exists in this amazing world of hours.

The man has a way with words.

It is just a pity that we don’t know how to put it—our talent—to better use—and are busy destroying the actual world itself. Our capacity for self-destruction is downright impressive.

Damnably confusing! I’d feel depressed if I didn’t feel so cheerful. Writing itself always cheers me up—and good writing enhances that feeling.

But, here’s my point. Whatever about our adventures, vicissitudes and distractions, ultimately we live in a story-driven world.

Content isn’t king in itself. The story is.

Photography is story telling. We are either telling the story literally (a rare species of bird) or metaphorically (a morose urban decay shot). Without conveying a good story, photography is just light capture. Story telling elevates it into an art.

Often, I see stories emerging from my photographs after I have shot them. It’s not that I create them for the sake of creating. Usually, stories are latent. When I look back at me and my wife’s first Europe trip we have captured a lot more of the life there (cafes, squares, public performances, avenues with restaurants, etc) than in later trips abroad. This tells a story of what we were most impacted by and enjoyed in our first exposure.

Life is story telling. But more tangibly, story telling is the single most awesome weapon at our disposal to influence, motivate and achieve goals. Innovations are stories with a purpose. Great businesses are stories that make a difference. We live and breathe stories. We like to think of our lives as stories and package it in small parcels across the internet. Photography helps hone the skill of story telling and helps create great narratives. Combined with logic, it is an incredibly powerful tool.

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