The Power of One Story

According to Joseph Campbell, author of “The Power of Myth,” and “Hero With A Thousand Faces” there is only one story.

The story where the hero is thrown out of his home. Then he undergoes the transformation, the struggling in the wilderness, and finally, the triumphant return.

Let’s look at the first part of the story.
I: Departure
1. The Call to Adventure
2. Refusal of the Call
3. Supernatural Aid
4. The Crossing of the First Threshold
5. The Belly of the Whale

II:The Journey
1. The Road of Trials
2. The Meeting with the Goddess
3. Woman as the Temptress
4. Atonement with the Father
5. Apotheosis
6. The Ultimate Boon

III: Return
1. Refusal of the Return
2. The Magic Flight
3. Rescue from Without
4. The Crossing of the Return Threshold
5. Master of the Two Worlds
6. Freedom to Live

Can you recognize this story in your own life?

Are you telling some elements of this story with your appeals, your acknowledgments, or on your website?

If not, why not? Don’t you think your donors would like to read a story too?

For example, say you are working with the Royal Winnipeg Ballet.
You’re talking about your principal ballerina in appeal letter. How can you make her story more compelling to your audience? Can you talk about her humble beginnings? How some people in her family didn’t want her to become a dancer? How she had to leave home and go through the trials of becoming a professional ballerina? The hours she had to dance on pointe until her feet were bleeding? And her eventual triumph and return to her family? And can you weave that story into the story of your nonprofit, to show how you are there to help dancers triumph over incredible odds to dance for a living? And how it’s so important to keep having heroines in ballerina form in Winnipeg?

Or say you’re working with Knox Parks Foundation.
You want to recruit more people to your Green Crew, which helps people without job skills get horticulture and landscaping skills. How can you make this more compelling to your donors and potential program participants? Can you tell the story of one young man, who came from the projects? Can you tell people that he didn’t have any garden in his neighborhood growing up? Can you tell them how he was so far from nature that perhaps he lived on corn chips and had never eaten an eggplant? Can you tell how he heard about your program, at first didn’t want to go? Can you tell how he eventually left his apartment, and started to come to your program site, to learn to grow his own vegetables, how to get closer to the land, and how he triumphed against the odds to become a master gardener? Can you even tell the story of how he has his own garden now, and his own landscaping business? Can you see elements of Joseph Campbell’s story in his story?

Or what if you’re working with the Amputee Coalition of America?
Can you tell the story of one young girl who had gangrene in both legs, and so had to have her feet amputated? Can you tell how she was teased in school, the sad namecalling, the tears that she shed, how outcast she felt, until she turned 18 and left her small home town, and went out in the world? How she met more amputees thanks to your nonprofit, and how they encouraged her to succeed despite the odds? And how she got prosthetic legs and started to run in marathons? How now she has a partner and a happy life and has learned to survive and thrive in her status as an amputee?

Can you weave stories into your communications so that people know it’s not just a big concrete building that’s getting their money, but a real person, who has triumphed against the odds to make the world brighter thanks to your nonprofit?

How can you start to tell a better story, today?