Learning to Listen
This post is part two of three in a series on armature. Check out the last post if you haven’t already. Without any further delay, let’s learn about listening.
Proposal
Jim went up to his friend Bob and said, “I’m exhausted today.” Jim then began telling Bob about his weekend: he went on and on, rambling about all these random things he had done, and he threw in a tangent about his kids’ sports, and he added another tangent about his endless yard work, and now (like this sentence) the story had gone on too long, and Bob was confused. When Jim finally finished, Bob asked, “Your point?” Jim replied with a big yawn, “Oh right, I just wished I had set time aside to kick back. I’m dead tired today.”
I think we’ve all been Jim (the rambler) or Bob (the confused) at one time or another. Even so, when we tell each other stories, we always tell them with a point — with an armature. Even though we sometimes forget our point, the listener usually reminds us to state it (“Your point?”). Above all, Jim’s long-winded story about his weekend was about sharing an armature with his friend Bob: Don’t forget to set aside time to rest.
How did Jim communicate this armature, even while rambling on in his tired haze? Jim is like any other human: He’s a storyteller [1].
Talking is the parent form of storytelling. If we follow Mark Turner’s proposal that language emerged from our mental capacity for story (as mentioned last post) [2], any observations we can make about how people talk will tell us something about storytelling. Brian McDonald and Jesse Bryan talk in-depth about, “stories in their natural habitat” in the You Are A Storyteller podcast episode Stories In The Wild [3]. Much of this post comes from what they have to say about learning storytelling by listening to people talk.
For now, though, let’s focus on armature. You can understand how to communicate an armature by learning to listen to other people’s stories.
Argument
Specifically, you want to listen to the structure of someone’s story. Remember, the armature is the representation of the story’s structure.
I’ve been actively observing stories in the wild for about a year (per recommendation from Brian), and each one has followed the same structure practically every time:
- First, there is a Proposal: This usually states the armature or a version of it.
- Second, there is an Argument: This is the story and the examples that prove the armature.
- Finally, there is a Conclusion: This is the point or reaffirmation of the armature. Sometimes the Conclusion will be nearly identical to the Proposal.
You may have noticed the above structure has three parts, and you may have heard this type of structure called different things:
- Three Act Structure
- Proposal, Argument, Conclusion
- Tell them what you’re going to tell them, tell them, tell them what you told them
They’re all the same thing. The three-part structure is fundamental to how humans communicate a point. Just like with the concept of armature, this is an observation about how we tell stories. It is descriptive, not prescriptive. We already do this when we talk (and many are good at it), but we rarely notice unless someone points it out. I certainly hadn’t noticed until I heard Brian talk about it!
Now that we know what to listen for, we can apply this fundamental structure to Jim’s story. Let’s take a closer look:
Proposal:
Jim went up to his friend Bob and said, “I’m exhausted today.”Argument:
Jim then began telling Bob about his weekend: Jim went on and on, rambling about all these random things he had done, and he threw in a tangent about his kids’ sports, and he added another tangent about his endless yard work, and now (like this sentence) the story had gone on too long, and Bob was confused. When Jim finally finished, Bob asked, “Your point?”Conclusion:
Jim replied with a big yawn, “Oh right, I just wished I had set time aside to kick back. I’m dead tired today.”
Can you see how Jim’s point was clear from the beginning? He said the central idea of his armature at the start, “I’m exhausted today.” Then, Jim’s Argument told us why he was exhausted. If we listen carefully to a speaker’s Proposal and follow along with the structure, the armature the speaker intends to share becomes clearer.
Next, notice how the Argument contained specific examples of how Jim spent his time exhausting himself. He said everything in this part to demonstrate how tired he was as a consequence of not resting.
Finally, since Jim ended without a firm conclusion, Bob quickly reminded Jim to say his point. Even Bob had an automatic feeling that the story was missing something (he’s a human too). So, Jim gave Bob his complete armature and ended his story. Take note of how Jim’s Proposal and Conclusion are nearly identical.
Conclusion
As humans, we love to share and exchange armatures through stories. This survival information exchange happens naturally in a three-part structure: Proposal, Argument, Conclusion. The Proposal is a statement of the armature, the Argument proves the armature, and Conclusion restates the armature. You can understand how to communicate an armature by learning to listen for this structure when others tell you stories.
From personal experience, I can say with certainty that focusing on listening has helped me become a better writer, communicator, and conversationalist. It’s gotten me through some really long and incredibly valuable ramblings that I otherwise would have been confused about. It’s helped me organize my own ramblings and notice when I go off course from my point. Learning to listen has become invaluable in connecting with others and learning from their stories.
To accomplish the above, I try to keep my or the speaker’s Proposal in the back of my mind. I’ll refer back to it if we go on a tangent and need to remember the main thread, or I’ll combine it with the Conclusion to check my understanding. I’ve also had some conversations where the speaker didn’t know how to conclude. They would trail off with something like, “I don’t know if that made any sense…” In some of those situations, I’ve been able to help the speaker reach a Conclusion by briefly summarizing their Proposal and Argument in my own words. That connection with the speaker and the shared clarity in meaning is a fulfilling experience. And it all starts with keeping the Proposal in mind and listening for the structure.
As an exercise, I highly recommend listening closely to the next (or all) stories you hear. Try to observe the three-part structure, and collect the armatures others give you. I promise the structure will be there, and you may even start to see how each armature is like a little gift from the speaker. It takes some practice, but it becomes almost automatic over time. Better yet, you may start to notice this structure in your own stories, and with this knowledge, you can tell even better stories and give others armatures that you’ve learned.
Have you observed this pattern before? Can you spot the three-part structure in this post? Let me know in the comments!
And of course, don’t be like Jim: Set aside some time to rest. :)
Bonus: Constructed Stories
Since humans communicate in the wild using a three-part structure, shouldn’t constructed stories (the ones we sit down to write) do the same? Ideally, yes! A great example is James Taylor’s song Secret O’ Life (but essentially every one of his songs would do). The song begins and ends with the armature, just as we do in the wild: “The secret o’ life is enjoying the passage of time.” And between those first and last lines, he makes a beautiful Argument! In the future, I’ll do some posts about structure in constructed stories.
Sources and Notes
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Note: Including you reading this! Unless you’re a bot… ↩
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You Are A Storyteller, Stories In The Wild ↩
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