A fire burns in the middle of a sculpted fire chamber surrounded by a druid-like stone circle. As the fire’s smoke rises gently to the summer’s evening sky, a short, stocky, barrel-chested man comes into view. The Elfin-like man speaks, sharing a story’s background in a jovial baritone sort of voice. Without missing a word or inflection, he casually turns away from the audience. Then, out of nowhere, another voice flows out of the night air, a voice old, haggard, and a little disconcerting. But, what is the origin of this strange other- worldly voice? As the man’s face returns to view, you find not only is the voice coming from him, but somehow his face seems changed, shifted, into the near appearance of an old woman, one you’d expect to see lurking for Hansel and Gretel. With eyes set and a few mouths open, those present listen, hanging on to every word from the man. We are visiting The Golden Raven Storytelling Circle of Maine where Roland Watier captures the hearts and spirits of listeners while engaging their imagination with an age-old art as a Storyteller, one who brings a sense of living back into life.

Every Friday and Saturday night, from June 15th through September 29th, Roland and other guest storytellers share stories. Enthusiastic about the season Roland says, “To have twenty storytellers appearing in one place in one season is something of a coup. You’d have maybe a single storyteller in a library, but twenty throughout the summer in one location in Maine?” He offers The Golden Raven as an indoor/outdoor venue for storytellers to come sharing their tales with the public.

For thousands of lifetimes, civilizations, cultures, and lives have found themselves shaped by storytellers. They’ve taught people to live life... fully, completely, passionately, with sound principles and morals, while building strong character. People gathered around village fires, visited fairs and festivals, even found themselves huddled at the feet of an elder in her woodland cabin to hear the storyteller. Tales of castles, wondrous creatures, bravery, and even silliness captivated listeners, teaching and encouraging all those who would listen. The listener would leave feeling and thinking about life differently from when they came to hear.

A review of the family website (www.watier.org) speaks of Roland Watier’s many passions, but when you listen to him you hear one of the passions coming through loud and clear – Storyteller. Chuckling, Roland says, “You gotta be a bit touched to be a story teller – I mean that in a good way.” His birthplace is Gardiner, Maine with French Canadian and Maine ancestry. A decorated Vietnam Veteran, he’s passionate about living life. Roland has always been an artist and that’s how he views storytelling, as an art form. As an artist he told stories for years through sculpture, woodcarvings, and bronze. For example, he created the Medal of Honor Bronze in the Rotunda of Maine’s state capital in Augusta. With the artistic background he began considering, “Maybe I should tell stories verbally?”

He remembered a lady heard him tell a story where he had some of his artwork on display. Some time later she contacted him about his storytelling talent. As it turned out, she owned and operated a private school and asked the woodcarver/sculptor, “Would you be our storyteller at the gala Halloween festival?” That experience gave birth to his passion as a storyteller. Now, “I help people find their passion.”

Hunting and fishing experiences with his father and father’s friends supply material for some stories. If you ask Roland he’ll tell you, “I’m just a guy like anyone else with my interests in the outdoors ever since childhood. Walking the footpaths I remembered as a child... that was translated into ANTS nearly sixty years later.” (ANTS, Another Nice Tasty Sweet, is a book Roland and his son Matthew published in 2004. Matthew illustrated the book of Roland’s stories.)

Though many may perceive storytelling as an enchanting form of entertainment, Roland encourages us to understand that storytelling teaches us how to live life. Living life carries a positive attitude, an optimistic outlook, and a renewed spirit instead of just plodding through surviving life one day to the next without hopes, dreams, or passions. A life lived is seasoned with excitement, joy, and wonder-filled events while one survived, maybe just caught up in the mire of the mundane. Some demonstrate the sense of living throughout their life while others lose that spark. Thankfully, events present themselves, impacting us enough to awaken our spirit, causing us to stop and take inventory of our life.

Roland sees stories as “a collective – they teach, heal, and share wisdom.” The story told influences us so much that our values and concepts change to a better outlook on life. In that sense, storytelling takes on the work as a modality of healing. According to Roland, “Storytelling is a great healing process. It helps the storyteller as well as the listeners to develop the individual, so they can discover who they are.”

This art also guides the spiritual traveler as they learn to search within themselves to become a better person. “A big part of storytelling causes us to re-member; to remember is to put back together that which has been forgotten as the inner journey of the human being.” So storytelling, as a vehicle, returns us to the ways of our ancestors. For example, The Golden Raven Storytelling Circle of Maine will host the 18th Annual Men’s Circle, scheduled for September 18th-19th, as they have for several years. This sacred event creates an opportunity for men and boys to connect with their ancestral ties.

Roland describes the Men’s Circle as “rooted in the moment as well as nature. Leaving the modern world behind, the men virtually take a step back in time where they can experience simply being in the moment.” The Men’s Circle is oriented from a Native American perspective where men and boys gather for the weekend centered around a heartbeat rhythm of a drum and a sacred fire for three days. The spiritual experience has helped to shape and change lives. Time is spent in workshops, storytelling, and just sitting around a sacred fire till the wee hours of the morning discussing what it means to be a man, concepts of living simply to simply live, maybe even quantum physics. Or you can just spend time by yourself. The men and boys that come spend the night under the stars or in tents, and if needed they can accommodate small travel trailers on the 40-acre farm.

“Storytelling reminds us of what did and didn’t work in the past – if we aren’t told stories we have no sense of place. You know the path between your house and your neighbor’s? That sets a stage for stories formed from childhood experiences.” Our lives are a series of experiences that may also be translated into stories. Many experiences, blended and seasoned by our own life lessons, can be the tales needed to encourage and teach others. Roland recognizes a need for recruiting more storytellers and talks about teaching the art of storytelling. He also expressed a concern that storytelling has lost popularity in recent decades.

“The word itself, ‘storyteller,’ is dropping out of existence. We need more storytellers. The art is becoming extinct. It’s very hard to get audiences to attend storytelling, for that reason storytellers have had to refer to themselves as something else.” He says storytellers refer to themselves as entertainers or list themselves under entertainment in the yellow pages. They are more than entertainers. “They’re teachers. I’d like to see a storytelling circle in every state of the United States.”

In times long gone by, storytelling shaped lives. Stories, myths if you will, taught morals, respect, honor, how to care and share, compassion, and many other core concepts. Children eagerly waited bedtime expecting the next act of a continuing bedtime story. Oral traditions still contribute to indigenous societies around the world, but sadly storytelling lost its popularity in recent decades, particularly in the western world.

Roland references Michael Meade as an influence on his life and describes him as “a renowned Celtic Irish storyteller, steeped in Celtic European and African lore that explores and illuminates the inner lives of men and their ancient initiation rites. Michael Mead once said that stories come from a time and place when human beings believed that they could not have a meaningful life without the other person.” So people were educated, encouraged, and entered sacred rites through stories and myths. This same activity avails itself to all, listeners and storytellers alike.

Roland related how Joseph Campbell, the philosopher and noted authority on mythology, talked about a childhood experience. Ten-year old Joseph Campbell walked into a museum of modern art and noticed totem poles. He was so struck by the totem poles that he wondered what these were all about, and what stories did they tell. “Stories can be so influential, as if the listener hears the quintessential calling of the gods. If you continue to ignore them, your life will be a quagmire.”

The gift of the story is revealed when the listener is empowered to walk around inside the story. “A vast difference exists between someone telling a story and a storyteller guiding you on a journey, a journey around inside their story that‘s why it takes years to become a storyteller.” Thankfully, storytelling’s passion still exists through today’s storytellers. New England is fortunate to have a few, including one in Maine, namely, Roland Watier.

If you’d like more information on Roland Watier, The Golden Raven Storytelling Circle of Maine, or The 18th Annual Men’s Circle visit www.watier.org or telephone Roland Watier in Union, Maine at 207-785-4730.

Storytelling is positively more than just sharing a story to entertain. Storytelling is an ancestral art handed down from generation to generation to encourage, teach, and heal the listener and storyteller alike, so they can truly live life in all its splendor. To storytellers everywhere, thank you for your devotion and thank you for sharing your lives.

Kevin Pennell, an author from Bethel, Maine, wrote Two Feathers - Spiritual Seed Planter and has written for other periodicals and media. Kevin is also an Usui Reiki Master, Certified Hypnotherapist, Ancestral Healing Techniques, and Psychic Empath. He conducts Reiki workshops and other workshops that assist spiritual and personal development. Kevin, with his wife, Vickie Cummings, operate SpiritWings, their Compassionate Healing Center and therapeutic Store located in Bethel, Maine.