Crafting the stories that shaped us: Me & Shayne Koyczan

This repost of a February 2013 article which was originally entitled:

 Power of others’ words to shape our self-concept 

It now has new life due to this site’s story focus!

“Spotting and celebrating the different” has been a talent and sensitivity that’s been great for my business. As a writer, a public relations strategist and creator of unique marketing materials, it’s been a gift.

Original article follows:

“Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me.”  It’s a sing-songy phrase children were taught to use to “hit back” when they were made fun of or when they were being bullied.

I used it once when I was young and under verbal assault. I don’t remember what  the insult was. I do remember thinking, “Yah, the magic little ditty? It isn’t doing anything for me.”

Imagine, I grew up a lover of words. A shaper. One of the reasons is because words were very important to me. English was not my first language. I had to learn it to keep up, to belong, to be safe and to be the same. Each word added to my arsenal, my power to cope with what was around me.

At a reunion, some 15 years after high school, our class got together casually in a private dining room at Hy’s Steak Loft in Winnipeg. It was a small class and then not everyone came. So, we had the luxury of going round one long rectangular table to introduce ourselves.Not by name, of course. We knew that, unless someone needed to say they married and swapped names. Only one had hyphenated his to include his wife’s name.

We spoke of our life experiences since…And I sat in a room of doctors and lawyers. One, a dietitian became a lawyer and other professionals had a gold medal or service on an international concern like AIDS to their name. I think the “lowliest” designation  was a social worker.

Then, there was me. A writer, publicist, event producer, not yet a teacher or coach. That would come, though.

At the mingle after dinner in that room, we caught up one to one. One cute, short, ‘looking like he never aged a minute since the last sock hop’, doctor smiled with his iconic double dimples and said, ” I wish I could do what you do. To be creative and to do something different every day. Even just for a while.”

“Would you like to switch incomes too, just for that same while,” I quipped back.

Mostly, I said that to this sweet man who was the city’s top emergency room doctor at the time and beloved and respected by his grateful students, to make him feel better. I thought I saw overwhelm in his eyes. Maybe a desire for even a small swim into creativity and away from his life and death duties and all his many responsibilities including finding time for self and for family.

We both laughed.

Maybe he didn’t know or remember that in school, in our formative years all I wanted was to be average, and from an average family situation. Like him. Like the others who had been born in Canada and had reasonably aged parents. Parents who drove car pools and came to stuff and knew the culture.

“Spotting and celebrating the different” has been a talent and sensitivity that’s been great for my business. As a writer, a public relations strategist and creator of unique marketing materials, it’s been a gift.

Still, “being different” comes with a cost and its value isn’t always instantly known.

Shane Koyczan, a Canadian poet and writer, and spoken word artist, recently matched his words to a vibrant animation.

At first you might think it’s about bullying. I saw that it was the balm to being a little bit different.. in life and perhaps, in just a particular way, or one special moment in a group or in time.

See what you think:

Learn more about Shane Koyczan.

And if his name sounds familiar, you might recall his performance of his work “We Are More”, at the Opening Ceremonies of the 2010 Winter Olympics in the city I am now based on, Vancouver, Canada.