The Turning Point: A Journey into Personal Transformation - Stage 1
Stage 1: Precontemplation
The first stage of personal transformation is precontemplation. People in this stage may be unaware or under-aware of their issues. They start to recognise that there may be a problem, but are not yet ready to acknowledge it, or think that they can manage it. They are not thinking seriously about changing and are not interested in any kind of help. They may become defensive towards people who try to pressure them to change, or try to justify their current behaviours.
This is my experience of Stage 1: Precontemplation, as I set off on my six-week trip to the US and Canada.
Destination 1: New York, New York
I flew out of Brisbane, and landed in New York, where I spent a couple of days catching up with a dear friend who I worked with in Paris, dancing at the Lido, when I was in my early twenties. We had not seen each other for over 30 years so we had a lot to catch up on! We did not stop talking! We shared our stories about our relationships, kids, careers, where we had lived and things we had done, and we reminisced about our time in Paris dancing together.
Reflecting, summarising and sharing experiences in this way gave me a birds-eye view of my life. As I retraced my life experiences and recalled things that happened along the timeline, I recognised patterns of behaviour that were keeping me on a particular trajectory. Also, for the first time, I heard my own narrative; I told my friend how much I loved the projects I was working on, and I wanted to continue to grow and expand professionally, but I was stressed and unhappy, and there were no opportunities for growth in my current role. I felt frustrated and held back, but couldn’t see any way out. I justified my decision to continue in my job, saying that I needed the income, and I wouldn’t be able to continue my projects if I worked anywhere else. I also confided in her about how lonely I felt, because my husband was often working away, and both our children had grown up and moved overseas.
I also listened deeply to my friend’s stories, as she told me about the challenges that she had faced and overcome in her life. She was truly inspirational and so many of her stories resonated with me, which made me realise that I needed to take more control of my life, and do things that made me feel fulfilled, rather than doing everything to please everyone else.
This moment of deep reflection and deep listening, combined with the hustle bustle craziness of New York city gave me a newfound sense of freedom and empowerment. I started thinking that actually, maybe I didn’t have to continue to conform to traditional ways of doing things, and being constrained by self-imposed expectations and societal norms. Maybe I could create a life for myself that was more enjoyable and that I had more control over. But these thoughts were overwhelmed by self-doubt and a strong sense of duty and responsibility, making them feel like a dream—an impossible reality.
Destination 2: Washington DC
Union Station, Washington DC
The second destination of my trip was Washington DC, to attend a digital storytelling workshop, run by StoryCentre, and the International Digital Storytelling (DST) Conference 2023. I was first introduced to digital storytelling by a work colleague in 2020. He was a social worker, but also had a passion for filmmaking, and had and been running an intergenerational digital storytelling project with high school students in Melbourne for about 15 years. I was blown away by the power of digital storytelling and how just a simple short video could have so much impact on the storyteller as well as people who watched it. At that time, I was working on a life stories project which involved University and high school students working with older adults to create a life story book or poster. So I saw digital storytelling as a great way to expand this project.
My colleague introduced me to a whole network of people and organisations across the world who were working in digital storytelling including StoryCentre, who, in my opinion, are world leaders in this field. They offer a range of courses, workshops and resources and have an impressive catalogue of digital stories from a range of disciplines and fields including health, ageing, education, and social justice. I completed an online workshop in 2021 that was run over four weeks for one hour per week. I had to wake up at 3am because of the time difference being in Australia, but it was worth it. So when the opportunity came up to attend a workshop in person, there was no way I was going to miss out!
The workshop I attended was titled, From Word to Image and went for two full days. We had to a bring a piece of writing, that we were to transform into images and sound and create a two to three minute digital story. The only thing I had written, apart from academic papers, was the eulogy for my Aunty. So that is what I used. I was going to use images of theatres and dance studios to reflect our shared passion for the performing arts, but when I started looking at photos on my computer, I found lots of images of the property where she lived in Brisbane, which gave me the idea to use these images as metaphors to tell my story about my connection with my Aunty. The whole workshop was an incredibly emotional experience, but also very healing. You can view my digital story here.
Tribute to my Aunty by Xanthe Golenko
Digital Story made during StoryCentre workshop, From Word to Image, June 2023.
My colleague had also introduced me to the annual International Digital Storytelling (DST) Conference. In 2022, the conference was held in Loughborough in the UK, and my colleague invited me to co-present with him. We were unable to attend in person, so we gave a virtual presentation on intergenerational digital storytelling. This was a great experience, but I was desperate to attend in person so that I would have the opportunity to meet with an learn from others working in this field. The DST Conference in 2023, titled “Radical Listening”, was held in Washington DC and started the day after the workshop finished. So I came straight out of this emotional roller coaster into three days of intense listening, learning, networking and creativity. The conference was incredible and opened my mind to the wide range of applications where digital storytelling can be used to empower individuals and communities, advocate for change, and enhance impact. On the first day of the conference, I met two incredible women and we became closer over the following few days. They were both smart, adventurous, and inspirational women; one from Santa Fe and the other from Toronto. They had both travelled the world and lived and worked in the most incredible places including the Middle East, China and Africa. They were also very curious, and asked me about my work and my life. When I told them how I was feeling and what I was experiencing, they were very supportive, but also challenged some of my assumptions and beliefs. These conversations shifted my thinking; I started to question everything and seeing things from a new perspective. At this point I started to think that I needed to make some radical changes, starting with leaving my job.