Why should we care?
It’s Sunday afternoon and I’m mopping the sitting room floor. I had started my mopping journey from upstairs listening to songs on YouTube (you know, man don’t have space on his phone, so man streams) using my Bluetooth headset.
By the time I got downstairs, the song paused. “Ah, the network is out 😒”, I reckon. The network in my house is better upstairs but unavailable downstairs.
So, I had to make a decision between two alternatives.
One, leave my phone upstairs where the network is good and continue jamming up. Two, listen to something offline.
But alternatives had their drawbacks. For the first, if I left my phone upstairs, I actually will not be able to jam-up, because of the distance between my phone and the headset.
For the second, I don’t do offline songs (which is my go-to while carrying out routine tasks like mopping).
So, I would have to listen to something else that’s not online music.
But what would that be?
A few months ago, after I completed my first book this year (and in a long time, to be honest), I started r̶e̶a̶d̶i̶n̶g listening to another book.
I would listen to it everyday on my way to work. But the journey was short — ~30 minutes, so, before I could finish replying messages I’ll find myself at work. For the first week, I was diligently listening to the book after a while, I stopped unwillingly. And would use any available time to listen to it.
Plot twist: there is no “available time”.
So, here am I with a mopstick and a bucket half-filled with water in front of me, thinking of what to listen to next.
Bingo! my book!
It satisfies all the offline condition above. Therefore, I could keep my phone in close proximity and listen to it wirelessly while mopping away.
But why should you care?
The title of the new book I’m listening to is Made to Stick, which basically talks about how you can communicate ideas that people remember for a while — sticky ideas.
As chapter 6 was ending it concludes by saying “giving people a reason to care about your idea makes them act on it more” (paraphrased, cause I don’t remember it verbatim).
That why should people care question kept lingering on my mind. So much so that I went to share it in my Slack group of writers.
Turned it into a criteria by which we publish articles on the blog henceforth.
We want people to read our articles on benjamindada.com, so, we must be able to answer the question:
Why should people care?
To answer this for the blog, the author has to have thought about it in that manner and be prepared to tell the team why an audience (including us) should care about his story.
So, I’m saying to all the storytellers out there, ask yourself why should people care?, before putting together your story. It helps inform the direction in which you present the information. For instance, whether or not you start your story with a real-life story or a meaning statistic or a recommendation.
I’m learning a lot from Made to Stick and I’m happy to share it with as many people that would want it.
Pop your email here on the blog and I’ll be sure to send it to send it along with next week’s newsletter.
P.S — I imagine someone would ask “Why you should care about my story”. Well, I don’t have an answer because it is easier said than done 😜.
BTW, I think the central idea of this story stuck, do you also think so?
