57. Narratives, self, and values: promoting the SDGs

Storytelling activities, in many cultures, are an educative forum for curious minds to encounter diverse simple and complex dilemmas often with moral or ethical implications for protagonists and other stakeholders in the stories. The solutions proffered for those dilemmas, and the processes involved in implementing those solutions, often shape the development of a participant's understanding of rational agency, especially regarding societal norms and values. This chapter proposes that the practice of storytelling especially in the first-person perspective of self-narratives, could and should be harnessed in addressing the promotion and attainment of values and leadership traits that prioritise the SDGs. It briefly proposes that reflective self-narrative exercises can empower people to be leaders and forerunners in the quest for attaining the SDGs. It advocates for the use of life stories for teaching behavioural change that can promote the SDGs, supported by philosophy and psychology.