Story
Teller: use this card to tell a memory.
Write a memory this card brings to mind.
All games
Tell me the one about...
One of you draws a memory. The other draws a way of listening. Then you tell it, and something you did not plan to say usually arrives.
One turn, two different cards
Decide who is Player one and Player two. Player one tells the first story; Player two listens. The turn labels keep track after that.
- 1 Story card · teller
Tell a real memory
Read the peach card and share a memory it brings to mind. There is no perfect story to find.
- 2 Lilac card · listener
Listen through a lens
Read your lens before the story starts. It gives you one thing to listen for, such as a feeling or a need.
- 3 Both players
Offer a guess, then swap
The listener offers one sentence back. Let the teller correct it, then press Deal the next turn to swap roles.
Playing alone? Write a memory from the story card, then use the lens to reflect on your own story. Keep this saves your writing on this device.
Before you deal
- A lens is a listening prompt
It helps the listener notice something in the story. It is not a second story to tell or a diagnosis to make.
- Choose any deck
The four colors are themes, not difficulty levels. You can switch decks during the game.
- Change a card freely
Another story card and Another lens replace just that card without advancing the turn. Passing needs no explanation.
- Keep the first game simple
Try 3 turns with Twists off. A turn includes one story and one response. Twists add an optional instruction; Close the evening now lets you stop early.
A listener might say
“I wonder if you felt relieved because being understood mattered?” The teller can say yes, no, or what fits better.
How are you playing tonight?
Pick one. You can change it at any point without losing your place.
Choose a deck
Four sets of memories. Shuffle any of them, or move between them mid game.
How long?
Choose a length so the ending arrives on purpose rather than by exhaustion.
Twists
Optional. Turn them on and every deal adds a constraint to the telling.
Deal a turn
How a turn works & game rules
Decide who is Player one and Player two. Player one tells the first story; Player two listens. The turn labels keep track after that.
- 1 Tell a real memoryStory card · teller
Read the peach card and share a memory it brings to mind. There is no perfect story to find.
- 2 Listen through a lensLilac card · listener
Read your lens before the story starts. It gives you one thing to listen for, such as a feeling or a need.
- 3 Offer a guess, then swapBoth players
The listener offers one sentence back. Let the teller correct it, then press Deal the next turn to swap roles.
Playing alone? Write a memory from the story card, then use the lens to reflect on your own story. Keep this saves your writing on this device.
- A lens is a listening prompt
It helps the listener notice something in the story. It is not a second story to tell or a diagnosis to make.
- Choose any deck
The four colors are themes, not difficulty levels. You can switch decks during the game.
- Change a card freely
Another story card and Another lens replace just that card without advancing the turn. Passing needs no explanation.
- Keep the first game simple
Try 3 turns with Twists off. A turn includes one story and one response. Twists add an optional instruction; Close the evening now lets you stop early.
Nothing on the table yet. Deal the first turn when you are both ready.
Lens
Listener: read this before the story starts.
Use this lens to reflect on your memory.
Twist
Listener: when the story ends, one sentence through the lens. A guess, not a diagnosis. "I wonder if..." is a good opening.
Swap after each turn, or stay with one teller for a whole round if that is what the evening wants.
The deck is fresh again. Every card in it has been told at least once.
On a call
This link carries the deck, the turn number and the exact pair of cards. Whoever opens it sees the same table you do.
Write it
0 characters so far This text stays in this browser on this device. It is never sent anywhere, and nobody at NVC Rising can read it.
Kept on your shelf.
Your shelf 0 on the shelf
Nothing on the shelf yet. The ones you keep will stand here.
The last card
One thing I understood about you tonight that a summary of your life would have missed.
Say it out loud to each other, or write it down and hand it over. No lens on this one, and no turn order. Just the sentence.
- The room you went to when you wanted to be left alone.
- A meal at a table where something was not being said.
- The first time an adult apologised to you.
- A rule in your house that nobody could explain.
- The sound that meant somebody was in a bad mood.
- A hiding place, and what you took there with you.
- The first thing you remember being proud of.
- A time you were punished for something you did not do.
- The person in your childhood who noticed you.
- A song, a smell or a TV theme that puts you straight back into one room.
- A time you pretended to be asleep.
- The thing you wanted badly and did not get.
- A moment you understood that grown ups were also afraid.
- The way your family said goodbye, or did not.
- A friendship from before the age of ten and how it ended.
- A door you did not walk through.
- The time you changed your mind about someone.
- A small decision that turned out to be enormous.
- A day you can point to and say: after that, I was different.
- The time you said no and it cost you something.
- A thing you quit, and what quitting freed.
- An argument that changed the shape of a relationship.
- The first time you lived somewhere on your own terms.
- A moment you found out you had been wrong about something important.
- The time you stayed when leaving was easier.
- A failure you would not give back.
- A stranger who said one sentence that stayed.
- The night you could not sleep, and what was keeping you up.
- A promise you made to yourself and kept.
- A promise you made to yourself and broke.
- A kindness you never thanked anyone for.
- The person who believed you before you did.
- Someone you were unfair to.
- A teacher, coach or boss whose voice you still hear.
- The friend you lost touch with and think about.
- A person you forgave, and how long it took.
- Someone difficult who taught you something real.
- The person you most wanted to impress at twenty.
- A goodbye you did not get to say properly.
- Someone who told you the truth when it was not comfortable.
- A person you are still a little angry with.
- The one who saw you at your worst and stayed.
- Somebody whose approval you no longer need, and when that shifted.
- A person you copied without realising it.
- The relative whose story you only half know.
- Something you want that you have never said out loud.
- A conversation you keep postponing.
- The version of your day you would like to be living in a year.
- A skill you want badly enough to be bad at in public.
- Something you are ready to stop carrying.
- A place you want to go and what you think it will give you.
- The apology you would like to make.
- The apology you would like to receive.
- A relationship you want to repair, if repair is possible.
- What you would do with a completely empty month.
- A small change that would improve most of your weeks.
- Something you want to be known for by people who love you.
- A fear you would like to be finished with.
- The thing you would start tomorrow if nobody would comment on it.
- What you hope somebody says about you at eighty.
- Anger is usually standing in front of something softer. Name what you think is standing behind it.
- Somewhere in this story something went right for them. Which need was being fed in that moment?
- Find the ache rather than the villain. What was missing that a person could not live well without?
- Every story has a sentence that was never said. Guess the one thing they wished somebody had asked for.
- When a label appears, "selfish", "cold", "dramatic", turn it over. What feeling and need are wearing that costume?
- Strip the interpretation away. What would a camera in the room have recorded, and nothing more?
- People rarely defend nothing. Name the thing they were standing in front of.
- There is one sentence, one look, one second where the story changes direction. Point at it.
- Some of this is not finished. Which need from back then is still asking for something now?
- Somebody else is in this story. Guess, generously, what they might have been needing too.
- Self connection counts. What did they do for their own sake in this story, even quietly?
- Notice a word that comes back more than once. Say it back to them and ask what it holds.
- They did a specific thing. Separate the thing from what it was trying to serve.
- Leave the past for a second. Guess how they feel having just told you this, tonight.
- Tell it in three sentences.
- Start from the end.
- Tell it from the other person’s point of view.
- Include the weather.
- Tell it in the present tense, as if it is happening now.
- Name one smell from the scene before you begin.
- Tell it without naming anybody, not even by role.
- Pause once in the middle and say nothing for five seconds.
- Begin with the sentence you were most afraid to say.
- Finish with what you would say to that person today.