What are the chances that a story you shared would have such an impact that it would inspire someone to get a tattoo?

Every day I sing the praises of the power of storytelling. But if someone asked me this question, my response would probably be,

“Stories can have a lasting and permanent impact but inspire a tattoo? I don’t think so.”

Stories and Tattoos

Last month I did some storytelling training in New York. One of the women that attended, Pia Silva from Brooklyn, was running a retreat for the small agency owners she coaches the following week.

She sent me an email thanking me for the workshop and said she incorporated stories into her retreat. She wrote:

“Your story workshop really ended up being a godsend! Just finished our retreat on Friday, which was a wild success, and even though I didn’t have time to prep my stories nearly as much as I will in the future, just having the principles you taught us in the back of my mind made a big difference and they were a HUGE hit.”

The first story Pia told at the retreat was about running Airbnb apartments. While some guests had no problem getting in, others would jiggle the lock and if it didn’t open right away, would call Pia and say the lock is broken. Which of course it wasn’t they just needed to jiggle the keys in the lock a bit. She used this as a metaphor for the work that they needed to do. That they needed to commit to all jiggle the keys until the metaphorical lock opened.

Pia said that throughout the entire retreat people were talking about jiggling their keys, and then at the end of the retreat two people got a tattoo that was an image of a key.

OMG! Can you believe that?

I couldn’t. I had to go back and clarify with Pia that she was talking about a real tattoo.

Long-Lasting Impact

So, if you ever doubted that stories can have a permanent and long-lasting impact, doubt no more. Because there are very few things that are more permanent and long lasting than a tattoo!