The Stories of Your Life: The Eight Masterplots That Explain Human Behaviour
About this ebook
'Life – and the quite appalling behaviour of everyone I know – finally makes sense. Read this remarkable book' – Andrew Gold, author of The Psychology of Secrets and host of Heretics
We understand the world through stories. All of our experiences, all of our insights – psychologically, we interpret them through specific lenses that have been curated, perfected and passed down throughout human history. Internationally bestselling author Professor Ben Ambridge has quantified those lenses into eight distinct masterplots that can help you to better understand – and navigate – any experience in life.
The mother who wakes up an hour early every day to prep her child's breakfast? She's playing out the Sacrifice plot. The amateur sports team who go on to win the big trophy against all the odds? They're part of the Underdog narrative.
Ambridge uses examples from fiction, real life, and popular psychology research to demonstrate how we not only naturally gravitate towards the masterplot narratives, but how we actually use those narratives to manipulate the world around us – like the addict who uses the Monster plot to paint their illness as something to overcome, or the boxer who relies on the Revenge narrative to motivate themselves to fight their way back after an embarrassing defeat.
These masterplots do more for us than to help us understand the world; they’re vehicles through which humans have survived. The Stories of Your Life shares fascinating lessons about the nature of humanity, the power of psychology and – most importantly – the way we see ourselves.
'Stories are essential for human beings - they allow us to learn, to connect, to empathize. The best stories follow structures that catalyze and amplify their power. Ambridge expertly decodes and deciphers these masterplots so we can all benefit and grow' – Matt Abrahams, author of Think Faster Talk Smarter and host of Think Fast, Talk Smart
About the author
Ben Ambridge is Professor of Psycholinguistics at the University of Manchester and the ESRC International Centre for Language and Communicative Development (LuCiD). His first two books, Psy-Q: You Know Your IQ – Now Test Your Psychological Intelligence and Are You Smarter Than a Chimpanzee have sold over 100,000 copies across sixteen language editions. These books led to regular columns in The Observer and The Big Issue, appearances on Channel 4’s Sunday Brunch, BBC Radio 2’s Chris Evans Breakfast Show, the BBC’s Tiny Happy People website, talks at Google, The Royal Institution, Oxford Literary Festival, Wilderness Festival and Bestival, and a TEDx talk, 'Nine Myths About Psychology', that has had over 3 million views.
Ben’s day job as a prolific researcher of experimental psycholinguistics keeps him up to date with findings from the psychology, linguistics and neuroscience literature; knowledge that has proven extremely valuable when undertaking a writing project at the intersection of these disciplines.
