Hawkins Scale of Consiousness can be a great storytelling tool.

Allow me to explain...

This is David Hawkins Scale of Consciousness.

It shows the emotional expression of people as they increase their vibration and get closer to enlightenment.

Whether it is true or valid is irrelevant to out discussion here.

We’re looking at it as a tool for creating stories

With great stories

EMOTION DICTATES PLOT

The emotion comes first which then tells you what events to write about.

Beginners get this backwards.

They come up with a bunch of mere events without the emotional journey.

Using the Scale of Consciousness fixes this.

A HEROIC TALE

A happy story involves the story of a character moving Up the scale.

So the protagonist might start off as a timid person (Fear)
Suffer a tragedy (grief)
Tackle their demons (anger)
And stumble bc of ego (pride)
Before overcoming & being ready for life (hope)

See how it works?

And this was linear for the sake of simplicity.

You can move a character up &down the scale, snakes and ladders-like to build tension.

If you reflect this is how real life journeys transpire. Two steps forward one step back.

Boring stories are too smooth

The emphasis on emotional movement naturally gives your story propulsion.

In fact, if you just think up a sequence of different movements up and down the scale, your mind will easily form a plausible plot within these to manifest.

This system is great for idea generation.

TRAGEDY

A tragic tale involves a character ultimately ending up at a lower place on the scale

For contrast they will usually start at a place of neutrality or higher and then descend

Romeo starts at neutrality &moves as high as Love & joy before descending all the way down

Hamlet sinks from neutrality all the way down to the very depth of despair and apathy

Othello too

Any character who murders or kills themselves is at the very bottom of the scale

And this is the value of tragedy, to make us reflect on the bottom without having to go there

STORIES ARE SURVIVAL INFORMATION FOR FUTURE GENERATIONS ENCODED EMOTIONALLY

They don’t resonate and stick without this element

So we need to learn to shape stories in terms of waves of emotion

Hawkins Scale is an invaluable reference for this

Emotion dictates plot. Always.

More from Life

1/ Here’s a list of conversational frameworks I’ve picked up that have been helpful.

Please add your own.

2/ The Magic Question: "What would need to be true for you


3/ On evaluating where someone’s head is at regarding a topic they are being wishy-washy about or delaying.

“Gun to the head—what would you decide now?”

“Fast forward 6 months after your sabbatical--how would you decide: what criteria is most important to you?”

4/ Other Q’s re: decisions:

“Putting aside a list of pros/cons, what’s the *one* reason you’re doing this?” “Why is that the most important reason?”

“What’s end-game here?”

“What does success look like in a world where you pick that path?”

5/ When listening, after empathizing, and wanting to help them make their own decisions without imposing your world view:

“What would the best version of yourself do”?

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1/“What would need to be true for you to….X”

Why is this the most powerful question you can ask when attempting to reach an agreement with another human being or organization?

A thread, co-written by @deanmbrody:


2/ First, “X” could be lots of things. Examples: What would need to be true for you to

- “Feel it's in our best interest for me to be CMO"
- “Feel that we’re in a good place as a company”
- “Feel that we’re on the same page”
- “Feel that we both got what we wanted from this deal

3/ Normally, we aren’t that direct. Example from startup/VC land:

Founders leave VC meetings thinking that every VC will invest, but they rarely do.

Worse over, the founders don’t know what they need to do in order to be fundable.

4/ So why should you ask the magic Q?

To get clarity.

You want to know where you stand, and what it takes to get what you want in a way that also gets them what they want.

It also holds them (mentally) accountable once the thing they need becomes true.

5/ Staying in the context of soliciting investors, the question is “what would need to be true for you to want to invest (or partner with us on this journey, etc)?”

Multiple responses to this question are likely to deliver a positive result.