No Odyssey without Homer

Global Cosmopolitans should know their stories, and know the stories told of them. These insights can help guide them through lives made of changes and developments, both personal and professional. (3/3)

	Title:	Global Cosmopolitans
	Author:	Linda Brimm
	Pages:	256pages
	Publisher:	Palgrave Macmillan
	Price:	$40

For the first part of the series, click here.
For the second part of the series, click here.

In her years of teaching and counseling, Prof. Linda Brimm has accumulated piles of stories from students and clients. These stories are the journeys that have taken her flock of Global Cosmopolitans from country to country, from assignment to assignment, along the meandering paths of far-flung careers.

For the author, story-telling should be an integral part of the journey, even if the Global Cosmopolitan is not from a culture that spins yarns that easily. A Chinese may have more difficulty than an Irish, but no matter – telling your story is the best way of explaining who you are, and that can be of use both to yourself and to others, such as your work colleagues.

Learn from stories
For the author, storytelling is not of the ‘Once upon a time…’ variety. It is a powerful learning opportunity that is a key for the Global Cosmopolitan to understand her identity. It is a powerful method to develop self-awareness. Understanding what one is about can only be helpful both on personal and professional levels.

For the Global Cosmopolitan, learning to tell their story requires some time, and some assistance – perhaps not in the composition phase, but in the analysis. The author provides a fifty-page workbook in this book, which helps readers prepare and understand their journeys and themselves (see box on Seven Cs).

How others perceive me
Knowing yourself is also knowing what others think of you. What stories are being told about you? The well-balanced Global Cosmopolitan will gather both perspectives: what she understands of herself AND what others understand of her. This third-party perception is important; it may be that certain ‘erroneous’ or distorted perceptions can be modified.

Storytelling therefore has a second important role for the Global Cosmopolitan. It is a way to connect with colleagues or friends, and establish stronger bonds. This storytelling is a way for outsiders to understand what phases the Global Cosmopolitan has gone through, and what mettle she is made of.

Putting pen to paper
Although the author uses the term storytelling, she actually refers to story writing, for it is in the sometimes painful laying of words on paper that the Global Cosmopolitan will come to know himself.

For the author, this is not to say that every Global Cosmopolitan should become a stark raving mad introspector, with notepad and pencil ready at moment’s notice. The introspection of the storytelling is something that can assist periodically, when change occurs.

As the author writes (page 170): “Through their stories, Global Cosmopolitans can ultimately understand how they learn and how change affects them… to experience this power [of knowing] must begin with a decision to devote the time to know themselves.”

By Chris Fodor, published May 2011.