How Story took over our human Self, and how we can break free.
Story is the superpower of our species—but also our greatest vulnerability.
Through the ages, we’ve used stories to entertain, to teach, and to persuade each other—but somewhere along the way, Story became more than a tool; it became who we are. Our Self is a cluster of stories: an explanation of where we came from, a definition of who we are, and an anticipation of where we are going. As the Gautama Buddha observed 25 centuries ago, this Self is an illusion and a source of suffering and dissatisfaction.
In ARROW, William Gadea weaves together insights from neuroscience, evolutionary studies, the Buddhist tradition, history, imagination, and memoir—to tell the story of Story. How many different faculties, each with their own independent adaptive utility—consciousness, self, emotions, episodic memory, mental modeling, theory of mind, language—converged to create the majestic power of storytelling. This new ability became not just a tool of communication and organization, but a mechanism of self-regulation and social connection: we became Story Animals. Our minds turned into hives where the narrative often seemed more real than our actual experience. This mode was powerful, but it also left us discontent and vulnerable.
ARROW points the way to a different way of being that can make us steadier, stronger, more connected and more content.
