Trauma-Informed Storytelling with Maria Bryan
Have you ever sat through a nonprofit fundraising gala and felt your stomach drop as the lights dimmed for yet another emotionally devastating video?
You're not alone. And according to trauma-informed storyteller Maria Bryan, there's a better way.
In this powerful episode of A Trauma-Informed Feature, host Katie Kurtz sits down with Maria Bryan to unpack the often-overlooked harm happening in nonprofit storytelling. From the marketing director gathering stories to the donor watching from the audience, everyone in what Maria calls the "storytelling ecosystem" deserves consideration.
As nonprofits face funding challenges, story extraction isn't just harmful—it's unsustainable. This conversation offers a path forward that honors both story and humanity.
Learn more about Maria:
Maria Bryan is a trauma-informed storytelling trainer. She is the host of the When Bearing Witness® podcast and facilitates the When Bearing Witness® Trauma-Informed Storytelling Certification Program.
Maria’s work helps nonprofit leaders tell powerful and impactful stories that resist harm. Over the past 15+ years in the nonprofit and public sector, Maria has trained thousands globally in person and virtually—focusing on trauma-informed storytelling and purpose-driven marketing.
Her learning lineage spans a Master's Degree in Public Administration, a Bachelor's Degree in Journalism, and professional certifications in Trauma & Resilience, Trauma-Informed Space Holding, Trauma-Informed Coaching, and Somatic Embodiment and Regulation.
Maria is a firm believer that storytellers make the world a healthier, safer, cleaner, and happier place.
Connect with Maria:
Website: https://www.mariabryan.com/
Show Transcript:
Katie Kurtz (she/her): [00:00:00] Hi everyone, and welcome back to A Trauma-Informed Feature podcast. I'm your host, Katie Kurtz, and I am excited to be joined today by Maria Bryan of On Bearing Witness. Welcome, Maria. So happy to have you here.
Maria Bryan (she/her): Oh, Katie, what a joy to be on your show. Thank you.
Katie Kurtz (she/her): I am curious, if you don't mind just introducing yourself in your own words for people.
Maria Bryan (she/her): I'm Maria Bryan. I'm a trauma-informed storytelling trainer. I work mostly in the nonprofit sector, so I help folks to gather and tell stories in a way that promotes safety and resists harm.
Katie Kurtz (she/her): Love it. We've been connected for a little bit and , you know, having been in this nonprofit world for so long, when I found out like, this is what you do and since, you know, been on your podcast and learn, see you flourish in this work. I'm always like, this is so needed there. I've seen so much cringe , and harm, quite frankly in these spaces, and I think it's such an interesting [00:01:00] thing. To see, especially in any kind of nonprofit, philanthropic space that, and even like health and human services organizations that utilize trauma informed care know what it is, but then don't integrate it into the, business model of their nonprofit, their marketing, .
It's like we always just say it's just for the people. Yes. Or the clientele, but not like everything else. Right. And just like we say with, with trauma-informed leadership in applying it into the business model of like, it's a win-win win, right? We see better engagement experiences and outcomes.
So it just makes sense. Especially when we're telling stories of people. With lived experiences and oftentimes vulnerable that could easily be exploited. Your work is so, so important and I love to see it in the world.
Maria Bryan (she/her): Thank you. And yes, just to underline that you have these nonprofit organizations that have [00:02:00] become really responsive to those in the field, making sure that they're trained to be trauma informed and making sure that they're aware of vicarious trauma. And then you have these storytellers that are sometimes asking deeper questions and holding such precious space for those same folks experiencing trauma to tell their stories.
Yeah, I mean, it kind of boggles my mind like, why, are we not protecting them from vicarious trauma? And of course, why are we not equipping them with as many tools as possible to be trauma-informed as they're gathering these stories?
Katie Kurtz (she/her): Yeah, absolutely. Do you mind sharing a little about your own journey of becoming trauma-informed and how you began looking at integrating this approach into your specific kind of lens of influence and, your field?
Maria Bryan (she/her): Absolutely. So I grew up in the nonprofit space. So I started out in the Peace Corps as a Peace Corps volunteer. I studied journalism actually to, kind of go back to [00:03:00] my roots in storytelling. I'm a career long storyteller, and I used that in the Peace Corps. When I came back home to New York City, I worked in communications and marketing at two very large nonprofits.
Once I had my first daughter, things were kind of turned upside down and I started my consultancy , and that was in 2018. So since then, I did a lot of marketing and storytelling trainings and support for nonprofits. And in 2022, such a pivotal moment, I could like almost tell you the day that I gave a very general marketing webinar, and we touched a lot on storytelling, and one of the students in the q and a at the very end said, how does trauma-informed storytelling work into all of this?
And it kinda hit me in the gut. I had no idea. And of course in your teaching, you feel like you need to have all the answers. I surely didn't have the answers. And very shortly after that, a very dear friend of mine, Cody Hayes, who did the same work as me at the time, [00:04:00] said, you know, I have a, client that just asked if I am trauma informed, and if I have a trauma informed background, if I'm gonna take on their messaging and storytelling.
Do you know, like what? And I'm like, oh my goodness, my student just asked me this. We have to figure this out. So Cody and I kind of started this journey together on figuring out how we can I. Take these trauma-informed principles, figure out what they are, and then integrate them into nonprofit marketing and storytelling.
And so we started this almost like a book club. We took an FSU course together. Cody is still a huge part of my journey, but I. For me, it had such a profound impact that I pretty much shut down shop. I completely stopped all of my services and my programs, and I went into deep, deep learning, including your program.
I took three four intensive courses on trauma on all different parts of trauma. Yours was on holding space. One, I took one on somatic embodiment and regulation, and one [00:05:00] generally on trauma and resilience and one on trauma informed coaching. And then kind of came back with, you know, I had this deep background in storytelling and journalism.
In the nonprofit space, and now I've got these tenets of trauma and I'm, now developing a better understanding of it and then just spent a season connecting the dots. And that's where, When Bearing Witness was Born, which is a podcast and it's also my signature, a six week program where we take these principles of being trauma informed and we integrate them into all parts of the storytelling journey.
Katie Kurtz (she/her): I always appreciate hearing people's. Journey and introduction to this approach because it really highlights how it, it comes from so many different veins, right? And I think that it's also so important to see and hear, , and witness , the connection start to, grow and then. I'm [00:06:00] sure like, wow, this probably makes a lot of sense.
Right. And it's that making sense moment that I hear so often of once people understand it. 'cause it, it seems very like, what is this trauma informed? Right. Right. And you know, countless people are like, can't we call it something else? And we're like, no, no. If we gotta name, a thing, a thing. But it's like instead, you know, if you just sit and understand it a little bit. All the wheels start to turn and people are like, oh, this makes a lot of sense.
And it's like, oh, how can I apply this to what I'm doing? And we, that's how we really start to build a trauma-informed future, right? Yes. Is we start to see how applicable this approach is, how doable it is, and we break down and demystify this notion that it's only reserved for some people to use when really it's applicable to all of us and it amplifies and enhances our, [00:07:00] our whatever the thing we are doing, we're applying it to.
Maria Bryan (she/her): Mm-hmm.
Katie Kurtz (she/her): So how, talk to us a little bit. I'm a big fan of shared language and understanding, so yeah.
My , my husband is a journalist a long That's right. That's gonna call him on LinkedIn. He's fun. Yeah. And it's been really cool to see, although I don't know if he necessarily would identify as trauma-informed is a big advocate for that. I mean, he's in hardcore like. Journalism, like newspaper journalism.
Yeah. So it's definitely needed. And he, has coached, I've witnessed him coach like young reporters on how to protect themselves when interviewing, especially in crime and, really intense things. And also within just how to treat people. But help us for people that may not. Like they hear storytelling, but that may mean something.
So let's like just create some foundation of like, when we say storytelling, what does that mean? Right. Like, [00:08:00] and even in nonprofit, marketing, what does that typically, what are nonprofits marketing? Yeah. So just so people have a general sense of what we're talking about.
Maria Bryan (she/her): I wanna start by talking about the three different people that are in what I call the storytelling ecosystem.
So we have our story owners. And maybe to answer one of your latter questions in the nonprofit space we are, and I think we got we found the magic of storytelling maybe a little bit before this business boom of telling stories, which I think Donald Miller with the story brand really was an evangelical for telling stories.
But nonprofits have been telling stories. You know, for the beginning of time you know, showing impact through storytelling is kind of ingrained in, nonprofit marketing and fundraising. And so what we do is we, show what the problem is, what the issue is, what our solution is to this problem, and the lives that have been changed through the work we do.
Right. This is beautiful. Of course you can imagine all the problematic things underlying it. [00:09:00] So marketing and fundraising, we do the same thing. We want to move our mission and we do that through asking people to, to fund us. Marketing sometimes will also be marketing to community members and to the people that they serve or work with to come to the programs, still using storytelling.
So in this context let's say one of the biggest stories we can do is we have this annual fundraiser that 500 people come to, and we show this video of a person who's been impacted in the past couple of years. It's really moving, everyone's clapping, and then that person comes up onto the stage, right?
And then everyone's blown away and they raise tons of money. So let's say in, this scenario, the story owner would be that person who's bravely sharing their lived. Experience. Now, sometimes the story owner's also the storyteller, they have the mic, but oftentimes they don't. They're sharing their story to one person or a few people, and then those people are sharing it more broadly.
So that's the storyteller. To me. The storyteller is the typical [00:10:00] marketing fundraiser or marketer that is holding this precious story and deciding what stays, what goes, what's the, all the other context in it, and then sharing it more widely. And then we have the story receiver. This is our audience. These are the people that are in the audience listening to this story.
And all of these folks are vulnerable to trauma responses. Of course, the story owner is vulnerable to Retraumatization during any part of the storytelling process. And really a big goal of my trainings is that the story owner should be involved really from beginning to, end so they're probably in the longest part of the Journey, as well as, of course, the storyteller who's kind of like running the ship.
The storyteller is also. Very vulnerable to vicarious trauma. Sometimes marketers and fundraisers have the same lived experiences as the folks they work with. In my experience, it's often not the [00:11:00] case. For me, when I was in the Peace Corps, when I worked at two large public health nonprofits, I. I am a white cis woman.
I worked in organizations that were almost entirely Chinese or a lot of other immigrant populations. And again, I lived in Ghana and West Africa often told stories of people who didn't have lived experiences as me. And what happens is if you're receiving stories of trauma over and over and over again, and then you're not just listening to them like maybe.
Social workers or, those in the field, but you're doing deep research on it. You're trying to figure out the underlying, because this is part of telling a good story is having data right and being able to kind of connect the dots on the systematic issues that brought this person to, to our door.
So I do a lot of work on storytellers being able to recognize by curious and secondary trauma or their own lived individual traumas. And then we have our audiences, which we always forget that when, you know, there, there was this Princeton study where [00:12:00] they measured brainwaves between a person telling a story and a person receiving a story and their brainwaves started to light up the same.
So it's really incredible what happens when we receive story. We really start living like really. Deeply experiencing this. We know this when we watch a scary movie and it makes us jump or it makes us cry. So how can we be mindful of our audiences and our storytelling? And this is where things like content warning comes up or just being thoughtful on like how much of the story do we really need to dig deep into the details and the pain versus the transformation?
And this is where we also get a lot into ethical storytelling and how we can, educating our community, our communities, and our audiences in a way that's responsible. This is the longest explanation I've given Katie. It's so good. But I'm sure your audiences will appreciate, your listeners will appreciate it.
So there, yeah. Story is story. Story is it's our stories and we, hold space for story. We listen to story, we tell stories and we're all [00:13:00] impacted. In, my world, in the nonprofits. Space. We wanna change minds and hearts and open wallets. This is what we wanna do , through stories.
And I think, you know, 2025, we are just getting hit in the nonprofit sector. We are absolutely being attacked and I see how storytelling is being used in the most beautiful way and advocacy. And I never ever want people to come to my trainings and feel like, well, we gotta throw out storytelling 'cause it can do harm.
No, I know storytelling has changed my life. I mean, we've all been changed by hearing a story. So I just think that we can do so in, in a way that, that again promotes safety and resists harm and still have a really huge impact in the nonprofit sector.
Katie Kurtz (she/her): When you look at story, it's literally how humans began., It's been the bridge of connection of community of. So many things and then [00:14:00] manifest so differently between cultures and, spaces , and everything. And I think there's, I, too have witness to the incredible power of story coming from, you know. A long line of storytellers from my own family and like it being a deep rooted in our culture and , and people who've gone on to become professional storytellers, but also as someone who's witnessed stories change.
And that impact be so profound. And I've also seen the other side when we are not tending to those, owners of those stories, like you said, I love that breakdown. And where we're not centering the story and the person who's in that re we're centering the goal of what we want to accomplish.
Mm-hmm. And when we, when we misalign, like, you know, I teach all the time and with trauma-informed [00:15:00] practice and leadership practices is like, you've kind of really good intentions, but if your actions aren't aligned, then the impact is not going to be. What you desire, and it could be right, a pathway to harm.
And I think, you know, with this, applying trauma-informed care to this specific practice of storytelling and story itself, honors it and protects it in a way for all three of those people in that ecosystem and allows it to just be richer and deeper than. If we weren't being so mindful and considerate.
Mm-hmm.
Maria Bryan (she/her): Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. Mm-hmm.
Katie Kurtz (she/her): And discerning, right? I, we had had Carolyn Brunne on the podcast who talked a lot about she's a trauma survivor coach, and talks a lot about, her journey as a survivor, and, her story and [00:16:00] how, on that episode, she talks about, and.
And she talks frequently about like, , at what point does her story not need to be told?
At what point does she need to share? And I, work with a lot of survivors and, and people who have lived experiences who tell their story. And it's like, how much. How much more do I need to share this mm-hmm. For myself and for others to make an impact. And I I think that's such an important point too, of like discerning , with the story.
Maria Bryan (she/her): Absolutely. And this is where consent is such a huge part of being a trauma-informed storyteller. And we talk a lot about the fawn response and how, you know. FA response is one of those more social, you know, it's a little bit less clear.
But it's really wanting to please and appease. So if you're asking people if they wanna tell their story and they're in the middle of their services and they say, [00:17:00] resounding yes. And you're like, check, they said they're resounding. Yes. But really they're afraid of losing services. They're afraid of disappointing you, but they're really not.
Ready or they don't wanna tell their story. And I think this goes for even people that really, truly are consenting to tell their story. And then you go back to them year after year after year because you feel like you're being trauma informed by going back to this person who has agreed. And I think that's so important to note that survivors or anyone who is bravely sharing their story.
Yes, it can be part of their healing process, but that doesn't mean that every day , they, that needs to be part of their healing process. They can decide this year that, that they want to tell their story bravely. But then another year comes and they might wanna feel like, I don't want to be known for that.
I want to move on. I don't wanna really be thinking about it day by day. And this is probably one of the hardest parts of what I teach, and it's story retraction, which is. Not easy, but what if someone has had [00:18:00] their story up for one or two years and then they just don't want it to be Googleable anymore?
And we don't have complete control over total story retraction unless you're a celebrity. And some people have surprised how they can wipe things off the internet, but most nonprofits can, can't quite do that. So what does that mean? To have an open pathway for story retraction for folks who were really, truly ready , to tell their story and now they, they kind of wanna put it behind them, even if it's for a couple of years.
It's different , for everyone. And we have to allow for that. It just. You know, as a nonprofit, storyteller, marketer, fundraiser, and anyone who's working , in sales and marketing you, some folks, I always ask people, how many stories do you tell a year? And I thought, telling 24 stories in a year, which is the most I've ever produced in a nonprofit.
But there are folks that are producing hundreds and hundreds of stories a year. And I'm not talking repurposing like they are creating hundreds of stories every year. And actually . I think foundationally probably one of the best [00:19:00] things we can do to move the needle on trauma-informed storytelling is to tell less stories, much less stories.
I tell people like, why don't you tell three stories a year? And it just like blows their mind, like, how can we possibly reach our goals with three stories? But it allows for all of those things. It allows for so much. Space. So yeah, so whenever I, start, I'm like, you're gonna be overwhelmed at the end of this training.
It's gonna feel like a lot for you and your organization. So what if we just start by cutting drastically, cutting down the number of new stories that you are telling, especially if we're bringing in, the people that you directly work with. Where else can we. Find stories, not that staff experience trauma differently, but I think that, you know, telling a secondhand story or even telling fiction fictional stories and composite stories, this kind of stuff that like might make your husband scream.
'cause journalists are, not a fan of [00:20:00] composite storytelling or of course fictional storytelling and. To, kind of define what composite storytelling is. It's taking a pattern of stories, of real stories and combining them into one story. And I think as long as you're clear, this can be a really great way to protect highly vulnerable people.
And if you think that's crazy, why would we do this? You know, a lot of people will create like comic books based on their, the people they serve and you don't think of it as a composite story, you know? But it is so I think we can be creative and tell us stories and leave space to honor and, and protect our story owners.
Katie Kurtz (she/her): I love that less is more. I absolutely agree. And I think that's where we cross over into the cringe , and also the desensitization. I think you touched on a few things that I just wanna highlight are, you know, especially around consent and [00:21:00] retraction, I love those as options. Consent always, I don't think a lot of people know that's an option.
Mm-hmm. To have their story retracted or to say no. And that is because we are not being more mindful of power dynamics.
We know that's such an essential. Part of a trauma informed practice. When we say collaboration, we mean power sharing. Mm-hmm. And so a lot of times, you know, people are never clients of an organization, typically. Never inter interact with the business side of the nonprofit, the marketing fundraiser, until, you know, an email goes out saying, I'm looking for stories or whatever, and it's , we wanna make a movie or I wanna do things and it needs to be explicit.
The acknowledgement of power dynamics and how you are going to use power with the story owners to ensure they have their choice and consent and autonomy is centered and that I, have seen so [00:22:00] many times.
Not happen. Where, what we would think as a typical fawn response that tend and befriend isn't actually a fawn response, it's a response to a power dynamic where there . Mm-hmm. It feels like, yes, I need to, because Right. What power do I have to say no? Right. I received this help, , I should be so grateful.
Mm-hmm. This is the least I can do. Mm-hmm. And it's like, you don't owe. We don't owe anyone our stories, period anyone anywhere. So we need to, , ensure, and it's not currency, it's not, , anything like that. So I love that you touch upon that and I think that's such a vital thing to emphasize.
And yeah, like again, coming back to. , The discernment of for what purpose, you know?
Maria Bryan (she/her): Mm.
Katie Kurtz (she/her): Having a smaller amount of stories told, I think can be far more greater of an impact [00:23:00] than Absolutely. And , I've been on all ends of this, so like even receiving all the stories, I remember going to a. Fundraising Gala for an organization that does a lot of work with grief. And you know, you sit down Fancy Food dinner and we watch the video, and that video was one of the most horrific things I've ever watched. And afterwards someone mentioned like, and it was not horrific in that it was like, it was so emotional, so heavy.
Like no one could eat now and no one could eat. And I was just like, what was that? And was told like, well, that's how we get people to give us money. Yeah. We have to. Mm-hmm. We have to just. Traumatize them. Try to make people cry, make money. And I'm like, this ain't it. This ain't it. Right. Y'all, come on.
Maria Bryan (she/her): Yeah. You're touching on something so important. And it is [00:24:00] how, and like even when we talk about content warnings, even if you were to say , we're gonna watch something really emotional, we're gonna be talking about we maybe infant death or losing a spouse. What are the chances that people are gonna actually feel comfortable to walk out of that gala?
You know, like Right.
Katie Kurtz (she/her): Stand up in the middle of a room from their table, like,
Maria Bryan (she/her): right, right, right, right. And even sometimes when I'm speaking, I feel a little bit more comfortable in Zoom just being, giving content, warnings. I'm trying to get better at it, but when I'm in person, you know, and speaking to a room of 80, a hundred people and I'm like, I'm gonna show this difficult video, feel free to.
To leave, it's not, you know, it's not necessarily an easy thing to do. And yeah, man, we have been seeped in this in decades in the nonprofit space, feeling like the stories that matter are the ones that just break people, that just make them feel so emotional and fortunately. We are [00:25:00] starting to see that it's not sustainable.
Yeah, it might work that night, but it's really not a good way to build relationships. And something that I, I think about often is the. May, unintentional likely in this case, but subconscious affiliations that we're making with nonprofits. So let's just say right now you are, and I say this a lot for environmental issues, which are very close to my heart, but if you were just sharing doom after Doom after Doom post even if you're raising money, doing so, 'cause people will give out of that kind of urgency, which is also not trauma informed.
This like fake urgency, not that like environmental crises isn't real, but really tapping into anxiety and guilt and shame to get people to donate , is absolutely not trauma informed, but also people are. Going to be anxious when they see your logo past, you know, your organization at night, not quite know why, not be able to put their finger on it.
And you did that. You [00:26:00] did that by sharing so many difficult, painful anxiety and stress provoking stories. And right now, in 2025, folks are losing funding. The people that they serve are. Just in, in dire need. And I think that there is this pressure and this urgency to want to tell stories in a way that does break people to wake them up.
But if we can be a little bit, again, just slower and strategic , the long game in storytelling and marketing and fundraising is. Is building trust with our audiences as much as we're building trust with our story owners. Absolutely. It's,
Katie Kurtz (she/her): It's similar to traditional marketing too, like moving away from these pain points, like how do we Right.
Go after the shame and the guilt and all of that. Like we're seeing this movement away from poking at people's pain. Yeah. To creating more consensual and [00:27:00] ethical marketing and. It is, so true. Like this doom and gloom and , I mean, I see this in mental health, like it's just so interesting, to witness mental health and the de-stigmatization process.
And I feel like with stigma of so many things, we could have destigmatize a lot sooner had we not continuously, perpetuated it. I used to do a lot of. Training in the addiction recovery world around recovery centric marketing and, storytelling. Mm. Because during the height of the heroin epidemic people, and it's very traditional in addiction recovery to share your story, that's literally part of recovery.
, And especially in the most prominent, like 12 step, like sharing your story, all of that. But I would , see these people. In recovery, be dragged up on stage and show these stories. And then the dark, you know, alley with the [00:28:00] spoons and the, I'm like, stop. We have got to stop. Because what happens where we sort shows us is when we see these images or you know, the stock photos of the person in the, their head down.
We know all of it. I can't stand any of those things. Yeah. Yeah. It's like. Yeah, there is darkness. There is that heaviness to these things. But if we're only showing these depictions of the doom and the darkness, our minds are gonna be associating addiction only with this horrible, horrible thing.
But then that's all we're going to see.
Maria Bryan (she/her): Yep. We're not gonna see the transformation, the hope, who wants to donate to an organization that like there's no transformation, there's no solution, there's no, and I know, listen, these, not that like every nonprofit is in 10 years solving all their issues, but like folks really do want to donate to organizations that are coming up with creative solutions and can show their impact. [00:29:00] Absolutely. And I get that when you learn about issue, when you're steeped in the issue, when you're really in the weeds, this feeling of wanting to have a megaphone and to wake people up, and we do this with these kind of shocking stories.
But just to know that yeah, again, , it's not a good long game for sustainable. Long term, yeah, I might get someone to open their wallet and give 25, even a hundred dollars, maybe even a thousand dollars. But from a fundraising perspective, those folks that, like when they talk about planned giving,. Turning over their estate to an organization, the, those kind of folks that are donating millions of dollars are gonna do so because they are rabid fans that just really believe in your impact and are inspired and hopeful and excited about your mission, not just squirming because of the issue that you solve.
, And I do, again, wanna say that doesn't mean that we need to just be telling stories. With, rainbows and butterflies. I think we do [00:30:00] need to make sure that we're sharing the nuances and how complicated and how much pain the people that we are working with are in. But we can do so. We can do so and still at the end of this story inspire and inspire hope
Katie Kurtz (she/her): Absolutely. And I think that's what's key here is we need to. Move away from, well, this is how we have always done it. This not putting real strategy like. Putting empathy and strategy into the same line, like Right. And I think that that's something I've heard Julie Johnson of integrate networks say, like, where empathy meets strategy is what trauma informed care is, right?
Mm-hmm. And trauma informed care is human informed care. So if we take a human first approach to this, and that's what I always tell people, you will see better experiences better engagement, which means better outcomes for sustainable results. And the same applies to literally every industry, anything you ever apply it to.
Just insert whatever that [00:31:00] thing is that you need. But we are gonna become des like we have, we already are desensitized to the horrors of the world. And if we keep only showing that. Then what's gonna happen? We need that balance of being able to have context and humanity first, and trauma informed care is how we do that.
Yeah, and like you said, with that ecosystem approach, you're looking at it in a really intentional way for even deeper impact. Mm-hmm. Which I love and. I get really fired up about this if you can't tell us. I'm like really excited that you're in doing this work. So let's talk about that impact.
So now that you've worked, you've.
Really focus on trauma informed storytelling. And you work with these organizations, these people in those departments that are responsible for telling stories to help sustain their mission driven organization. From I'm sure very small nonprofits to very large foundations and [00:32:00] things like that.
Yeah, absolutely.
What kind of impact does trauma informed practice have? , Tell us like what this looks like in real time.
Maria Bryan (she/her): Oh, , it's huge. It's huge.
And also. It's long like any kind of movement is because I do feel like trauma informed storytelling is a movement. We're moving away and we're doing this together, right?
This is nothing anyone can do in a silo. One of the most immediate things that I'm seeing are storytellers taking care of themselves. And really recognizing vicarious trauma, compassion fatigue, burnout. I host a monthly storytelling circle where storytellers just come in to zoom for an hour and I'm not teaching, we're just talking.
And this year we just are sharing joy. And yes, we talk about really complicated, tough stuff, but we really just take the time to just uplift one another. I really challenge [00:33:00] storytellers. To think about what their nervous system care is every day, but especially the day that they're doing tough interviews or writing really difficult stories.
A little bit more long term is I am seeing storytellers have tough conversation with leadership and pushing back, but with with Grace, you know, and it's not easy. I also work with a lot of consultants who support organizations, and if you've got 10 clients and , you, you can't. There's no guarantee that they're gonna know anything about being trauma informed.
So helping folks just lead in this to, and again to do so with empathy and grace. Yes, , some of it's, and this is like, feels urgent, right? This feels really urgent to all of us. But how we can model this behavior because changing policies and procedures, which is a big part of what I teach, is gonna take time.
Especially if you're middle management, even if you're not middle management. I've worked in organizations where it takes six months to a year to [00:34:00] change the slightest, you know, workflow, you know? But I, I've also seen people completely change how they tell stories and just kind of like rethink how they tell stories.
I had one person who was recently in the Wind Bearing witness program and her whole team was trying to think of a really. Exciting way in their gala to to raise money. Of course, this is the whole point of these galas and what they were thinking of doing was bringing someone on and through video telling half the story and then raising money.
So essentially you're raising money for that person to help solve their problem. And this is. Fundamentally not trauma informed because it's stripping the agency away from this story owner. And you're saying like, you can come in through your money. I mean, this is just like saviorism at its worst , at its best.
And she's like, what do I do? She came to you like we're having these conversations [00:35:00] and. And then she's like, well, we were gonna come in the second half and show the transformation, but it doesn't remove this feeling that you're now giving all of these folks that they can save this one life through this one family, you know, through, through raising funds.
And and she told me like, , this you know, method is something that she had been seeing a lot of people teaching. And it just seemed like this really exciting thing to tell the story halfway through. And then to raise money. So , , we talked about how it could be prob, you know, how it could be problematic.
And she came back to me a long time afterwards and said, Hey, we completely did something very different. And she did something that I thought, like, really, I. This is what excites me about trauma-informed storytelling, and it's just telling stories differently. We've had this model of storytelling where we put the person who's experienced trauma in front of the camera or feature them in the story, even if it's just written.
We can do things differently. We don't have to do that. And so she brought on a staff member who didn't [00:36:00] directly, so they serve youth that didn't directly receive services, but had the same. Issue as the children that , they serve. And so he told the story from his point of view and you do get a sense of the pain and how that was difficult.
But the music throughout I thought was like on point. Like you could have used audio and b roll in a way that is traumatizing. And or would have made the story more exciting, but they didn't. And they just tied it to their services so beautifully. And you really got to see and this is another thing about telling youth stories is really tricky.
Telling anyone's story is really tricky, but especially telling someone's story when they're still in the thick of it. I always say, talk to alumni, talk to people where there's been a great deal of time. And so they're talking to someone who's had. Decades since this experience to process it and to really own their story.
The video was beautiful. It wasn't your traditional story, Katie. They raised almost $2 million [00:37:00] at that event. Wow. They raised so much money, and this is what I love because people are like, we will do it differently because we don't wanna cause harm and we just have to accept that we're not gonna raise as much money.
Right. This is kind of like what it feels like. Yeah. And like, no, like they told this really amazing, impactful story that was. You still learned about what it's like to be a youth with this particular issue. You also learned about their services and their impact and then you this beautiful transformation of this beautiful person and people opened their wallets in a really, really big way.
Katie Kurtz (she/her): Of course they did.
I love that story because it highlights once again that we have to burn this binary. Well, if we put people first, then we're just gonna have to accept. You know, less profit like Yes. Says who? Right? Like, yeah. You're gonna have to do things maybe a little more intentionally or a little differently.
Or you're gonna think a little more innovatively than you did before. [00:38:00] Relying on these very old, deeply rooted, ways of doing things, but who says you have to forego profit when you put people first or you know? I, I have only seen when people truly put this practice into prioritization, they see an increase in both.
Right. That's why I always say like, it's a win-win win. We see it happening and that's such a great. Example of, yeah, we chose the human first way. Mm-hmm. We did it differently and we raised a lot of money. Yeah. Which is like the whole point. Right. Exactly. A win-win. Right, right.
And yeah, I love that example. And again, I think it just highlights that we have to stop , and ask ourselves these questions of what are we trying to really do here? Mm, with, with these people? I think, you know, the, the amount of [00:39:00] exploitation, the saviorism, these really problematic ways that we have created, again, that power over dynamic.
In, especially in any type of philanthropic endeavor is that then these, we make these people who we've serve intentionally or intentionally, like we, they owe us, right? So they owe us their story or we need to show like, that's what you get, right? That's the currency. You we're giving you this, so you give us, now your story's up for grabs and it's like.
When I talk about and teach power dynamics, we often think of power over dynamics. This extractive, hierarchical, authoritative dynamic as something reserved just for these extremist things. And it's like, no, it's happening all the time. And the way we, I think we see it the most in any type of marketing, whether it's social impact marketing, in fundraising nonprofits or traditional marketing.
That's [00:40:00] where I see it all the time. And putting a trauma-informed approach onto this work. Yeah. Shifts it around, but can yield the same or even better impact?
Maria Bryan (she/her): Yes, it can. It can. And I'm asking people to do things that are really brave to just do things differently. And like I said, I had this really great conversation in the storytelling circle last month, all on telling fictional stories.
And, you know,, I brought up your husband before, and that's because we're not journalists. Like journalists have a different standard, have a different ethical code. They're different. And once we let ourselves off the hook for having these journalistic standards and for being newscasters, we have to tell things that are timely that have happened.
Now we have to tell, singular stories. We don't, we do want to be authentic. We want to tell true stories, and we need to let our [00:41:00] audiences know when we've told a story differently. We need to let people know this is a composite story. Or we've used AI , to create this story, which is a whole nother thing we don't have to get into.
But I think that's what people fear though. They fear like the deep fakes , and things coming out with ai alongside me teaching trauma-informed storytelling. But that's really, I hope people just give themselves permission to tell stories of things that happened 10 years ago. Like this one organization did.
And there's still stories that are incredibly true and impactful.
Katie Kurtz (she/her): Absolutely. And this is all, so much tied into how we just, the philanthropy industrial complex of this country specifically and how , the way we fund. In general, organizations that are service driven or social impact driven is just broken.
Which is a whole other podcast, but Right. A hill I will die on, which is [00:42:00] trauma informed funding and seeing how, like being in so many different nonprofits where it's like, okay, we're gonna solve human trafficking. Here's one year of funding. Right, but nothing happens in a year, y'all Right.
We can't even get a plan and a meeting in place. It takes six months. What do you think was gonna happen in a year? Yeah. You know? And it's like we have to stop thinking that, these things happen very quickly and it makes a lot of sense that yeah, people are , giving money to a cause and you wanna see the impact right away.
But we're humans. We're not gonna reverse a climate crisis in a year. It takes time. And those longitudinal. Studies and those things that take time, that's why you're funding it is for the sustainability, not the urgency. And I think it's also deprogramming us to think, you know, de tangle and divest from these [00:43:00] mentalities of pain and urgency, which is all deeply rooted in these systems that many of these nonprofits are trying to break free.
Exactly.
So like it's also if you're a social impact organization , that holds missions that are. Trying to work against the systemic traumatizing systems that cause and give rise to the issues you're addressing, I always say we can't use the same tools that cause trauma to mitigate, prevent, and heal it.
So are we using the same tools to tell stories that are causing the same trauma these people are trying to heal from? Like we need to get real with right, with it all and then create that alignment. I'd be so curious for the student you had to hear what it felt like in organizationally to do things that way, because you can feel the ripple effect when you know that impact gets rippled throughout the whole organization.
Maria Bryan (she/her): Right, right. And you know, when we do things, trauma-informed, it ripples and when we do harm, the harm ripples. Absolutely. And I [00:44:00] just hear that so clearly when we harm someone. In our storytelling, how deeply rooted, how we are just pushing stigmas around their community, how we're creating, we're the power dynamics that were already there, we're setting them on fire, really..
Katie Kurtz (she/her): For people listening who are like, okay, I'm really into this. I'm interested, I'm not really sure what to do, how to get started, right? , What are some first steps people can take to really start to lean into this approach.
Maria Bryan (she/her): Hmm. Well slow down. That's always where I start , is slow down and tell less stories and think about telling stories a little bit more creatively.
If you are either working with clients or you. Or an organization, you're not in a silo. And so that means involving other folks. , And this is sometimes pressing pause again, slowing down on rethinking [00:45:00] how you gather stories, how you write stories, and how you tell them. So do an audit or when someone has.
When you need to tell a story, let's say you're, a marketer and you go to the program staff, what does it look like to decide if that person's actually ready to tell their story? Do you have any kind of conversation before you even go to them because you should. And then when you're going to them, are you the one going to them or is the program staff going to them get this all on paper?
What is this gonna look like when you're deciding story readiness? When you're going through the interview process, which again, we do interviews differently today as well, and there's a lot more tools to do trauma informed interviews than when I was a storyteller working in house, literally taking a train, going borough to borough, meeting people in their homes or in their workplace which brings me a lot of nostalgia.
But we can actually let people record their stories on their own time in their own space and have complete full agency over their story. [00:46:00] So anyway, yes. So do an audit of how you tell stories and think of ways that you can just insert as much agency, give agency, and not just to our story owners, but also to our audiences.
Where are the moments that you can provide as much agency as possible? We can't promise safety, but how can we strive for that? What does your con your consent form look like? You know, when you are interviewing, what does that room look like? Are they reviewing the, questions before you give to them?
Are you allowing them, the story owners to review the story before it goes out? Who's part of the review process? So I know I'm starting to get in the weeds, but I guess. You know, the start is just to audit and just to think where are we giving safety and where are we stripping safety? Where are we giving agency?
Where are we stripping agency? When it all comes down to, it's really sometimes that simple [00:47:00] even though when it can cause a huge upheaval, how you're of, how you're telling stories. Like I said, and when we talked about one of , the biggest, most difficult policies are retraction policies. How easy is it for a story owner five years after the story's been live to get in touch with your organization to say That story is still comes up every time someone Googles me.
Like, can we get that down? Yes, , so as a start, I, I think it would just be slowing down and auditing how you are telling stories from beginning to when it's out in the wild.
Katie Kurtz (she/her): I love that. And I think that beginning with that pause, that practicing the pause is so essential because so many nonprofits. Functioning from a trauma response. It's like there's so much dysregulation, especially right now with coming from this place of scarcity and fear and like urgency is [00:48:00] coming because of this precarious nature to this work of if we don't make the goal, we won't be able to sustain.
And so what if we could create and tell stories that are different, that could create sustainability so we could get into a place of regulation, are we marketing from that reactionary place that. Nervous system response plays or are we coming back regulating and then do telling the story?
Because , I've seen both. And let me tell you, when you, I can tell when there is a story being told or I'm being marketed to from that really dysregulated stress response, and I feel it, I'm like, Ooh, okay.
Yeah. And that doesn't make me wanna give, it makes me wanna . Step away. Right. So we need to be thinking, I think there's so many ways we can apply trauma informed practices to this.
And I love that you're doing that , and you have colleagues doing that and that you, you're really [00:49:00] redefining how we tell stories mm-hmm. Through this lens. Yeah.
Awesome.
Maria, this is such a great conversation. Before we go into our kind of wrap up gentle s spreads how can people connect with you learn about the work you're doing and maybe begin their own trauma-informed storytelling practice?
Maria Bryan (she/her): Yeah, I would love to support you. My podcast is when bearing witness. You can find that just about anywhere that you listen to your podcast. Katie Kurtz is the second episode and I told her most listened episode. And so that's a really foundational conversation. So start there. You'll find just a lot of great.
Thought provoking questions there. Also, I have my storytelling circle again, this is a free space, gentle space closed. It's not recorded. It's just closed in the fact that it's not recorded. So people come and bring , their challenges and what they're working through. So I'd love to see you at a storytelling circle.
You can find that@mariabryan.com when I have that. It's really easy to navigate too. And [00:50:00] then I have my intensive when bearing witness. Program, which I do quarterly. The next one is this summer will be at the end of July if you want to dig much deeper into this. That's , the when bearing witness program. I encourage you to check that out as well.
Katie Kurtz (she/her): Awesome. And everything can be found in the show notes. Thank you so much, Maria. Are you ready to get started with our, I'm ready. Our gentle sprint? Yes. All Yes. If you can describe trauma-informed care in one word, or if you have more than one, that's okay.
What would it be?
Maria Bryan (she/her): So, there's two pillars that I've, of course have just alluded to, and that is safety and agency. I know there's a lot more that we teach when it comes to trauma informed care, but that's the guideposts that I use and that I give people when you're feeling. Stuck are you promoting safety to the best that you can and are you providing agency and control to the best that you can?
So those are my guideposts in the storytelling world.
Katie Kurtz (she/her): Love it. What is your [00:51:00] current go-to for nervous system care?
Maria Bryan (she/her): Mmm. Gardening, which I'm from Queens, like I'm from Queens, New York, where like we just would have little slabs of grass in our backyard. So I'm now in the suburbs of Tallahassee, Florida, and I still have a teeny tiny garden, but I go out there a couple of times a day and there's something about making things grow getting my hands in the dirt.
Yeah, there's something really has been just like really, really grounding for me to be in my garden. I used to just garden in the summer, but now just year round. This is what really calms me. And then I have , my pup Oscar, who's a great nervous system regulator as well.
Katie Kurtz (she/her): Love that. I'm in my gardening era, so I feel that deeply. It's the best it is. I wish I could do it all year long, but I just, I'm like in the summer. Here we go.
Maria Bryan (she/her): Good.
Katie Kurtz (she/her): Enjoy. And what does a trauma-informed future look like for you?
Maria Bryan (she/her): Hmm. A trauma-informed future to me is when we recognize that if you're working with people, [00:52:00] you should have tools to be trauma informed.
So often when I started this, folks would say, well, we don't, our nonprofit doesn't really deal with trauma, so I don't think if we're a good fit for your training or program. Even if it was a free, you know, a free webinar. And I hope that shifts, I hope that folks know that , if you are telling stories to people, if you're touring, telling stories about people, if you are a person holding space for stories that this is something that we should do.
So in a way that's trauma informed, that's my hope.
Katie Kurtz (she/her): Thank you so much for joining us today. This is such a great and informative episode, and I hope anyone listening connects with Maria follows you on social, learn, listen to your podcast, just learn all the intricacies of ways we can apply this approach , to story and storytelling.
Mm-hmm.
Maria Bryan (she/her): Thank you so much for having me on, Katie. It's been an honor.
