Dropping the Story?

There's a photograph on facebook with the caption "Who would you be without your story?". And I have all these thoughts.

What if one was to shed all the "what happened" and "which led to what" and "because of whom" and so on? What if one did that thing in which one "dropped the story"? Who would I be? ... it's almost liberating, as a thought, isn't it? What do you guys think?

In some ways then all stories are a form of madness, or an expression of madness; partly because they're an expression of a particular reality and limited, but also because they're speaking of all those hidden impulses that do not necessarily emerge in the everyday expression and experiences of things.

Someone once told me that there is only so much one can experience in one's own life, and reading is a way of experiencing more, seeing more, knowing more, learning about experiences otherwise denied to us. So is reading like a journey through someone else's neurosis? Is that why it's so intimate, almost, sometimes, to read a book?

Someone else told me, very recently, that the neurotic cycle really lies in the state where we relive the stories we tell ourselves. And in that there is the hope that when one "drops the story", one becomes more tangibly aware of the now, and can revel in the experience of the now. Can one really experience without stories?

Then there's the thing about how we learn through stories. It is not through experiences alone that children grow; it is also through imagination, stories, imaginary friends and pretend games. And those are crucial too. So could we exist without stories at all?