This Fiction Is Inspired by True Stories

You may have spotted this sentence on your screens recently. A wonderful line. It caught my eye. It made me think.

Truth is now stranger than fiction for sure. Fiction has become the truth. I believe 'we' have the responsibility and ability to put it right.

You know the ‘star thrower’ parable?

A storm leaves thousands of starfish stranded on the beach. A child begins throwing them back, one by one. An older passer-by says it’s pointless, there are too many to save. The child picks up another and replies, ‘It matters to this one.’

Small, deliberate acts really matter even against overwhelming odds.

We talk a lot about ‘agency’ these days. Quite rightly, given the shitshow rained on us from all sides. I'm defining agency as our individual power to act independently and make our own choices.

And yet we struggle to do so.

Truth has little bearing for many people. Fiction has convinced them as it supports their position. Critical thinking has reached its limits.

We can reverse this through our own agency, if we choose.

A long time ago, I created an ‘agency’. Its role was to influence individuals (audiences) on behalf of clients who paid us for this service.

I left the agency world to return to the creative industry. I had come to realise that unless clients used their own agency (as individuals working collectively), they were forever dependent on others to create the outcomes they wanted.

Human agency is autonomy and will. Collective agency is a collaboration that can reverse things. (Kimmel)

Creative agency can be our own imagination/intention applied with purpose.

We easily mistake our individual visibility for power. We confuse being seen with having agency. It isn’t enough.

It’s a fiction to believe 'we' are a homogenous thing, a single ‘we’ that moves in unison. But each of us, as individuals, holds agency and therefore the ability to act with intention, to create, to alter.

Do we need everyone to connect in person to convene, align and rediscover collective agency? No.

Can we harness our human agency to amplify the intelligence that exists between people, not just within each individual? Yes.

We have a choice. Surrender our agency to algorithms and succumb to media noise, or reclaim it through combined intention and common sense.

We don’t need another app to fix us. We need intention and the will to use it.

So, if you haven't already...

Unsubscribe from what dumbs. Question every bit of news that appears as certainty. Spend your agency wisely and not on outrage, but on action.

Stop scrolling. Stop consuming. Stop surrendering.
Start creating. Start acting. Start choosing.

Our agency hasn't gone anywhere, but it’s definitely waiting for us to use it.