The Four Powers of Stories that Unite Us

Stories bring us together. But why?

Virgil Reading the Aeneid to Augustus, Octavia, and Livia by Jean-Baptiste Wicar, 1790-1793 (Wikipedia - public domain)

It's the Monday after the Game of Thrones finale, and you know what that means: every marketer and communicator alive is thinking about Tyrion's speech.

Yes, I'm going there, but I've got a story to share with you along the way.

In case you didn't get a chance to see it yet (or simply don't care about it), here's the lowdown: in the series finale of Game of Thrones, Tyrion Lannister gave a monologue in which he said:

“What unites people? Armies? Gold? Flags? Stories. There’s nothing in the world more powerful than a good story. Nothing can stop it. No one can defeat it.”

It was a fine speech — one that moved leaders to set a bold new direction for the realm. And I'm guessing that your inbox or timeline will be deluged with a marketing hot take on it.

The power of storytelling is certainly worth spending time on. But more than acknowledging that stories do in fact work, we …