How to Tell a Story People Can’t Stop Repeating — with Scottish Storyteller Eileen Budd

Some stories disappear almost as soon as they’re told.

Others survive for hundreds of years.

They cross villages, families, kitchens, campfires, churches, pubs and generations without ever needing an algorithm to carry them.

That is the kind of story Eileen Budd knows how to tell.

Eileen comes from a long line of Scottish storytellers, and she learned the world by listening. Nobody discovered she was legally blind until she was eight, so while other children were reading the room visually, Eileen was absorbing voices, details, rhythms and stories.

And in this conversation, she reminded me of something I think many of us are losing:

Storytelling is not the same thing as content.

A story asks something of your imagination.

It leaves space.

It lets you see something that is not physically in front of you.

And the best stories become portable. Someone hears them, carries them away, and tells them again.

That is what this episode is really about.

Eileen tells three complete folk tales on the podcast, including the story of a midwife summoned to the Queen of the Fairies, the rules she must follow to survive, and a changeling story that carries an unexpectedly compassionate understanding of postnatal depression.

But we also talk about what happens to imagination when we fill every empty moment with scrolling, why an ordinary $30 compass became worth $1,000 when it had a story attached to it, and why the stories of ordinary people — the stories of the village — may be the ones that connect us most deeply.

One of my favorite things Eileen says is that we have started to outsource our imaginations.

And I haven’t stopped thinking about that.

Because imagination requires empty space.

Daydreaming.

Wondering.

Following an image somewhere without immediately needing it to become useful.

And if you are an artist, photographer, writer, entrepreneur or simply a person trying to live a more creative life, I think this conversation will make you want some of that space back.

Inside the episode

We talk about Eileen’s grandfather, who returned from war with shrapnel in his legs and became a Scottish tour-bus driver — eventually earning more than the other drivers because he told stories while he drove.

Eileen explains the difference between stories of the castle, stories of the church and stories of the village, and why the stories of ordinary people are often the ones that bring us together.

She shares why she resisted writing oral stories down for years, what changed her mind, and what can be lost when a living story gets trapped on a page.

We talk about daydreaming, imagination and the way constant scrolling can crowd out the inner world.

You’ll hear the story of a $30 compass whose value changed completely once a story was attached to it, a 200-year-old willow rattle filled with quartz, the full tale of the midwife and the Queen of the Fairies, and Eileen’s beautifully simple way of teaching someone how to become a storyteller.

And we end with a Scottish origin story about the giants of day and night.

If you make anything for a living, I especially want you to listen to the distinction running underneath this whole conversation:

People may consume information.
But they carry stories.

Connect with Eileen

Podcast: Scottish Folk
Instagram: @eileenbudd
Books: Eileen’s seasonal folklore collections from Wide Open Sea

https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/scottish-folk/id1674005044

https://www.wideopensea.co.uk/product/seasonal-folklore-summer

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