Our Stories: A We Care Storytelling Workshop

$1,436

Raised

Donations

$7,000

Goal


"We're more alike than different. No matter what color, shape, or size, we're just in different packages, and I appreciate experiencing that here." 


- Kathy, past workshop participant




Over the past 18 months, at our monthly storytelling workshops in Woodland Terrace in Southeast DC, we've seen how storytelling fosters emotional connection, empathy, and understanding. Storytelling artist Renee Brachfeld leads the workshops. Everyone gets a prompt, then devises a story and shares it with someone in the group they don't know well. Prompts have ranged from "a time you got in trouble" to questions about grief, connection, and community. (Think The Moth.)


Every workshop has included people from all walks of life. We've laughed, cried, found real connection and friendship.


In September, we're launching Our Stories, a deeper version of this. Twelve people from all across DC have committed to meeting weekly for eight weeks to learn how to find, shape, and tell a true story from their own lives. In November, they'll perform those stories at a celebration in Woodland Terrace, with music, food, and everyone's friends and family.


Everyone's history is richer, stranger, and more human than they think, and almost nobody ever gets asked to tell it. This asks. And it asks a whole group of people at the same time, so you're going through the same nervousness and the same discoveries as people you'd otherwise never have met.
It's a practice of vulnerability and fun.


Our Stories is free for everyone who takes part, and we're asking you to help make it possible. We need $7,000 to cover the room, meals, printed materials, Renee's work, and the November celebration.
Community Renewal Capital Area is a 501(c)(3). Your gift is tax-deductible.


Suggested amounts:


  • $30 covers food for one participant for two Tuesday nights
  • $50 covers printed materials for one participant
  • $125 covers the room for one Tuesday
  • $600 covers one participant's full way through the program
  • Other amount - no gift is too large or too small