The singer Frank Sinatra used to say that a song is like a three minute play. He meant that songs are really short stories. When he sang he told the story with as much passion as he could to impress upon the audience the song’s message. In fact reality presents itself to us in the form of a story. Every detail big and small is part of a larger narrative up to and including our personal human stories. We naturally gravitate towards story as a mechanism for making sense of the world and even unconsciously frame the world in a narrative form when describing what we see to others.
Every story has a beginning, middle and an end. This formula is coded into our individual and collective psyche. We all know what it’s like to pull for a character and have a preferred ending for how we want their story to end. Maybe a love struck couple finally ends up in each other’s arms or perhaps the villain receives their just deserts. We know however that life’s narrative doesn’t always work out like that. For every happy ending there’s at least one unhappy ending. Whether it’s a marriage persevering, a business succeeding, or a patient recovering, the odds are probably going to be around fifty fifty that everything ultimately works out the way we want. So in some sense there’s a constant in terms of outcomes. Half the time things turn out favorably and the other half they don’t.
When we are counted among the winners it’s considerably easier to accept this reality than when we find ourselves among the losers. It’s understandable that we would want to be on the winning side as much of the time as possible and are disappointed when we are not. It might be a mistake though to imagine that the ordinary flow of outcomes we all experience, is arbitrary.
Science begins with observation, and observation draws our attention to the patterns that exist throughout reality and are built into the narrative. Patterns resonate within the natural and human order, from the seasons, to spring cleaning, to intricate fractal patterns found in the plant ecosystem, to a widow who always does her shopping on Thursday mornings, our reality can actually be defined using patterns. By recognizing patterns we gain an insight into understanding a key predictor of outcomes. A woman married to a man who cheats and is yet unwilling to leave him… A hard working young man whose parents can’t afford to pay for college gets a full scholarship to his favorite school… An excited couple out on their first date inadvertently left the keys in the car ignition after parking on a night time city street…
We have a good idea of how these stories might end because we already know the story.
Our attentiveness to patterns will have a major impact in defining our own life story. By simply leaving a few minutes earlier we can avoid having to speed on our way to work risking a traffic ticket or maybe worse. We can increase the odds that we will be more likely to succeed, by not only avoiding the negative patterns that invariably lead to failure like speeding but also by embracing healthy patterns of behavior like leaving early to arrive ahead of time and stress free.
Our life stories intersect and are intertwined with the life stories of others. Starting with our families and working outwards we have virtually unlimited potential to impact the lives of people we know and love by simply taking control of the patterns that define us. Learned behavior has to do with how people acquire skills and behavior from watching others. Negative patterns transmit negative examples that those watching are apt to follow. Many of the unhealthy patterns; overeating, procrastinating, exaggerating, excetera, that we struggle with were at least in part the result of a proximity to the bad habits of others. By understanding the role that story plays in human lives and the significance that patterns have in determining the individual’s life story we are able to show people their way out of often hopeless cycles of negative outcomes.
A greater awareness and appreciation of narrative and the role that story plays at both the micro and macro level of reality, is invaluable in helping unravel the mysteries that appear to surround us. The historical narrative can often be painful in review and yet informative beyond measure. When we can establish links between the events of our own time and those of the past by spotting patterns, we then have the availability of the historical record to assist in predicting possible outcomes for our future. Such is wisdom and insight and maybe even something approaching the superpower of a prophet!
