What stories and fables can teach us.

This column describes the influence of narrative on individuals and societies. More importantly, it describes the importance of story in dealing with health and quality of life issues. The idea of story as an epistemology is discussed. Individual stories which were created in seminars on writing for publication are presented along with stories and fables that lend further understanding to lived experiences of health. Ideas for teaching-learning in nursing regarding the issues in the stories are presented. Parse's human becoming theory is used to further explicate understanding of these ideas.