We need to tell more stories. And we need to do a better job of telling the stories that we currently have. As our culture and society continues to undergo a great value reset, brought on by a mixture of the end of the Bush administrations’ problematic legacy, the election of Barack Obama, and the Great Recession, American’s are looking to be comforted. We all want to be reassured that things are going to be OK, that there is hope and light at the end of this tunnel. 

Well I think there is a light at the end of this national food nightmare that we are currently experiencing. I see a very bright future for America and, as those of us in the movement know, it all starts each and every day, with the food we eat. For me, this is the departure point for the stories we need to tell. We need to connect that daily, rather quotidian act of eating, into a series of sacred moments where the people, places and stories of the sustainable food movement are elevated into something almost religious.

So Where Are The Stories To Be Found?

They are all around us, but we’ve got to do the digging. Liza de Guia is carving out a wonderful career for herself chronicling all manner of sustainable food stories, just in New York City alone. Liza is one of our most gifted storytellers, and I, for one, would love Liza to help the rest of us find the ability to discover, research and tell those stories.

Is there any doubt that in every city and town there are people hard at work rebuilding America’s broken food system? No, but we do need to activate people to see these stories, to find them out, to chronicle them, and then of course, to use the great revolutionizing power of social media to spread them.

How To Find The Stories?

It all starts on the front lines. The farmers and artisans in the sustainable food movement are walking narratives that we need to decipher. We all know that they are often far too busy to take the time to tell their stories. Of course there are excellent examples of farmers blogging and sitting for podcasts.

But if you are involved in this movement in anyway, either as a student, an amateur blogger or a journalist, a chef, an advocate, there is so much more you can do for them.

Here are some key points that can help you discover their stories:

1. Where is the Fury?

Everyone in the local food movement has dealt with setbacks, either financial, governmental or physical. How many local farmers have been wiped out by a sickened herd? Or a blight? How many cannot scale beyond a certain point due to onerous regulations? How hard is it to raise money? How many local, artisan shopkeepers have been told their products cost too much, when all they are trying to do is provide an honest price to their suppliers?

Find the painful moments, investigate them, discuss them, and then show move on. This is a positive movement and we cannot dwell on the downsides.

2. Look for the Arc

In Hollywood, they teach young writers to look for the narrative arc. So take a page out of that most American of industries and find the pivot point. At what point this story turn positive, or negative as the case may be. If it turned positive, than the tension provided by the difficulties will have been resolved. If its a negative action, make sure you end the story with signs of hope.

3. Connect the dots

At the end of the day, we’ve got to connect the dots. We are the ones who have to demystify the movement, the food, the people, the places, the trends. If we don’t than the local foods movement will remain a niche market, made for rich people, lunatic farmers and everyone in between.

It is as simple as re-framing the questions: Why does this jar of kimchi cost so much?

Answer: It doesn’t cost that much when you consider that this is what it costs to pay the farmers what they deserve, so that they can take care of the land, restore it, earn a decent wage, and feed us good clean food.