If you have ever watched a child listen breathlessly to the ending of a fairy tale, you know that stories are amazingly powerful. Stories have the ability to transport us, teach us, entertain and inspire us. Humans have been telling stories for thousands of years, and every culture has its own stories that are distinctly important to its people. As such stories are told and retold, it is as if we as listeners are being gathered around a fire—we are welcomed into an intimate circle united with a common history. When we tell the stories of our culture, we learn something about ourselves: where we have come from, where we fit in a larger sense, what we stand for and who we are.
