Cortisol Chaos

The effect that story has on us is driven, like so many things, by a set of neurochemical responses.  And one of the key neurochemicals involved in our response to storytelling is cortisol. 

When the world changes around us, bringing with it the potential of threat, we get a hit of cortisol and start to pay attention quickly.  That’s a great thing to initiate in your audience quickly because it holds them captive, receptive to what you have to say next.

Some examples from film:  Top Gun, when Maverick is informed that he’ll be sent to the elite fighter school in the Nevada desert.  Aliens, when Ripley receives an unexpected knock on the door and an invitation to join the Marines on an expedition to find out what happened to the missing colonists. Apocalypse Now, when MPs arrive at Captain Willard’s hotel room to drag him from a drunken sleep to be offered a mission upriver to find Colonel Kurtz.

Your personal stories are no different.  You have to elicit a cortisol response from your audience early in order to grab their attention.  You have to recount moments of the incident when you were hit with an unexpected ball of chaos. 

These will sometimes be big moments, sometimes small but always something that brings the prospect of change, challenge and threat, whether physical, emotional or spiritual.