Books are great, because they do not only introduce you to ideas, but they also make you form your own. And then those ideas transform to a set of weapons in your possession to pull up whenever the need presents itself.
But those ideas aren’t the only important thing about the book (the what), the how of the book (how the ideas are transmitted) is as important as the ideas. That’s why great ideas conveyed through stories make a book a bestseller.
One of my very favorite books and still remains is Dale Carnegie’s How to win friends and influence people. The whole book is a compilation of stories, and after each story you end up with an idea.
Robert Greene as well. He is a master at compiling stories that goes with the initial theme of the book.
So the best books in my opinion are those who present their ideas in the form of stories. They have a magic way of transmitting the concepts in the book.
They first put you as the protagonist of a story: someone who’s dealing with a problem. Then they make you discover the solution on your own and as a reward you end up with an idea to fix whatever problem you’re currently dealing with.
There are many examples of this kind of books, including:
- How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie
- Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion by Robert Cialdini
- The Five Love Languages by Gary Chapman
- The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen R. Covey
- The 48 Laws of Power by Robert Green
On the other hand, one really effective skill authors should keep in mind when writing a book, is storytelling. They should invest more time in mastering the art of storytelling. And it’s a pretty good skill for whoever willing to convey an idea or a concept using the Art of Indirection Method (you can refer to Law 24: Play the Perfect Courtier from the book The 48 Laws of Power to know more about it).
It can be used by people who make videos, animations at Happy Dust, or it can be just used when persuading someone in real life conversation. You don’t wanna be direct. Besides have you ever seen a leader explaining a concept with: Computer programming is a process that leads from an original formulation of a computing problem to executable computer programs.
NO! You wanna be subtle and indirect. You wanna make it effortless for the person to get the concept. Nobody wanna hear the raw facts, everyone wanna be taken on a journey and realize the fact by himself.
I believe that anyone can develop his own storytelling techniques, it doesn’t take much and it’s a very handy skill to possess, eventually resulting in a more pleasant experience for both the listener and the storyteller.
Pixar has made 22 rules of storytelling, you can check them out to get some inspiration.
Thank youuu!
