Therapy is great but have you ever told a deeply personal story to a room full of strangers

From Noreen💌

Ever since I fell into the world of storytelling, I’ve grown increasingly convinced it’s not just performance art, or live entertainment on a Friday evening. Each time I tell a story on stage, my body experiences chaos closely resembling the inside of Riley’s brain from Inside Out: nerves sizzling like I’m short-circuiting, nausea escalating to a self-diagnosis of appendicitis, a buzzing euphoria from the adrenaline, until I dissolve into my final form: a colossal exhale.

It’s catharsis, yes. And so much more.

Two months ago, I started EMDR therapy. That’s also when I happened to join an 8-week storytelling workshop. It turns out, both have a tendency to invite your past into the present. And when done at the same time, well, it’s a doozy.

Every week, my therapist and I focus on a different, difficult event from my life. I cozy up on my couch, close my eyes, put my headphones on and listen to the sound of a steady heartbeat, bouncing from one ear to the other. This is the “bilateral stimulation” part of EMDR. The point is to mimic what your brain does in REM sleep…aaand that’s about as scientific as I’ll get.

And then, the memories come like a flood, and it’s like I’m there again. My chest tightens or my heart races. I even get a tummy ache sometimes.

After a deep breath, I open my eyes, and we check in on what my mind spit out. It’s usually another memory. We then take the new memory and do the same bilateral stimulation over and over, in short bursts. From start to finish, my mind has travelled as far back as my childhood playroom, to the more unpleasant parts of myself I’ve tried to bury.

Revisiting these moments is viscerally uncomfortable. I can feel myself expanding with memories I’d forgotten, while excavating for what else is stuck in the nooks and crannies.

And even though the storytelling workshop did not require eye movement desensitization reprocessing…that would be weird, it still forced me to expand and excavate. The path there just looked a little different.

I joined the storytelling workshop as a returning member; I’d done it before and loved it. The workshop culminated in a storytelling show, and the theme of the show was Fools. I already had a story pitch cooking. At its surface, my story was about a random roommate turned best friend who scammed me. At its core was something I had to discover.

To get there, fellow storytellers shared feedback on what was missing in the initial story, and what they wanted to know more about. This led to a critical step of the workshop known as “Accordion Out” - stretching out the story to see every detail available.

As I filled in the gaps, the story grew another life. I found myself mining old memories from a time in my life I tried so hard to forget. And like my EMDR sessions, my body was the first to recognize all the familiar sensations - the pit in my stomach when I found out she lied to me for years, and the scorching heat in my chest when she downplayed her betrayal. Writing the story turned into reprocessing what happened, and worse, reliving it.

I started to wonder why I volunteered as tribute for this self-inflicted emotional torture. But EMDR isn’t just sulking in painful memories, and the workshop doesn’t stop at accordion out. In both, there’s a yin to the yang. And I had to trust the process.

On my couch, my therapist brings me back to the present. She asks me what I want to believe about the memories instead - ideally a self-belief that elicits the opposite of my chest tightening and heart racing. I’m not good enough becomes I am good enough.

My favorite part is when she tells me to close my eyes, cross my arms, and gently tap my forearms, back and forth, back and forth. The “slow tap.” As I do this, she narrates the same memory back to me, and I’m back in my childhood playroom. Except this time, my therapist asks me to picture adult me in the room, protecting younger me. I get to be a witness to the little girl that something unfair happened to.

By the end of the EMDR session, all the muck from the nooks and crannies of my mind are pulled out of me and sealed in an invisible container. And somehow, I feel physically lighter. The grip of the event feels less tight.

After my written story expanded into a novel the size of The Lord of The Rings, it was time to “Accordion In” - cutting what doesn’t move the story forward.

Here I was, with rich, new details staring at me on the page. There was so much I wanted to say about my old roommate - how unhinged she was, the signs I ignored. But I kept coming back to my story coach’s question: “why are you telling this story?” I wasn’t sharing this story to shit talk her; that did nothing for me anymore.

Tucked away in my writing, I found something that surprised me. During the Accordion Out step, I’d written an anecdote about something that happened to me when I was a kid, in my childhood playroom: all I wanted was to be included in a silly game, and when I wasn’t, I learned that people pleasing was the only way to stay in the room.

It turns out, this was the life event my first EMDR session focused on reprocessing. Reading the anecdote written out didn’t cause my chest to tighten, or my heart to race anymore. It felt neutral, like something that happened, and it was ok. It became the through line that helped me understand why I stuck around my old roommate for as long as I did, even when she mistreated me. I found the core of my story, and it was never really about her. The process was working.

At the storytelling show, the usual suspects were in attendance: nerves that short circuited, a soon-to-be ruptured appendix, a buzzing high, and sweet catharsis.

But something else showed up. As I got to the end of my story, I felt a lump in my throat and choked up. That’s when I crossed my arms, and started to gently tap my forearms, back and forth, back and forth. I remembered where I was, and I was safe.

Telling my story in front of a room full of strangers and loved ones allowed me to witness my story without getting lost in its grip. It helped me find grace for a past version of myself. I even mustered up an ounce of grace for my old roommate.

Instead of sealing what happened to me in an invisible container, I left it all on stage.

About the Author:

Noreen is an artist, storyteller, and writer based in Oakland. After discovering live storytelling at a local story slam in 2024, she began performing at events across the Bay Area and Los Angeles, including The Moth. Inspired by the experience, Noreen turned to personal essays on her Substack, where she reflects on storytelling, creativity, and the moments that shape how we understand ourselves and one another.

Substack ID: Noreen

Have something to share? Submit your own reflections or stories to be featured in The Open Letters. Send your work to hasifnewsletter@gmail.com. For more details, check out this post: Submit your Essays and get Featured.

Hasif,
Editor-in-Chief, The Open Letters