What’s Your Story?

Prepared for print by Rabbi Eran Feintuch

Afather recently consulted with me about choosing the best yeshivah for his eighth-grade son to attend next year. The boy is a strong learner and an incredible masmid. He learns before Shacharis, in the evening, Shabbos night, and Motzaei Shabbos. Naturally, his rebbi recommended a very prestigious yeshivah. But the father wasn’t sure that would be the best thing for his son.

At first glance, the father’s uncertainty is surprising. Why shouldn’t this remarkable bochur attend the best yeshivah out there?

To understand the question, we have to dispel the widespread myth that good facts make a good story. Let me explain. In a good story, the characters aren’t static. They don’t just go here, go there, do this, do that. They change, reveal hidden depth, and rise to new heights. That’s the crux of the story. What they say or do, those are just the facts. The story is how they develop.

The same is true in real life. A person’s story is more than a collection of facts — his actions, strengths, and weaknesses. In other words, the bullet points on his biographical profile. A person’s story is the tale of his development — how his character traits come into play with the events in his life. It includes a person’s motives, aspects of his personality and spiritual kochos that lie beneath his actions, and shows how those elements interact in the person’s development.