John Green explains why he is thankful for the power that stories have to release us from the prison of ourselves, to broaded our perspective, and to let us break out of our default viewpoints. ----- NerdCon: Stories is an annual conference created to celebrate the institution of storytelling.
"It is absolutely exhausting and infuriating and the more I let myself be stuck inside of [my body prison] the less I am able to acknowledge and celebrate the humanity of others or those who are distant from me who are fundamentally "other" the more the problems of people who live far away or live in circumstances that are different than mine feel like they are 'not my problems' . . .
Fiction for me, stories for me, are the only way out of that, out of this prison that I'm stuck inside of.
I can live inside the lives of someone else for a while. . ."