People say you can’t take it with you, but I believe you can bestow your most prized possessions with all the loved ones you leave behind.

I thought about these words each time I was faced with sorting through a family member’s belongings after they passed away. First it happened in my twenties when I organized my mother’s beloved genealogy work, then one year after when I packed up my father’s well-worn work tools. Then a decade later when I sold my twin brother’s vast DVD collection, and shortly thereafter when I divided my sister’s cherished artwork and supplies amongst her closest friends. And finally when I donated my oldest sister’s treasured book collection to our local library.

Memories flooded my mind of the blessed life I shared with my beloved ones and a commotion of emotions pulsed through my heart. I smiled, then cried, and also laughed as I reflected over the many stories we had created and experienced together. And each day I continue living here on Earth without them, their life stories are all that truly matter to me.

Stories connect and bond us together and, sometimes, can even save us.

We are all storytellers. A story could simply be telling your best friend about a problem you are having at work or it could be a moment when your kids come home from school and blurt out what happened to them that day. It might be a grandparent talking about the painful experiences they had in World War II or a journalist who writes the details of a breaking news story. Or it could be a poet sharing their unrequited love story in a poem or a musician singing about their hopelessness in a song. Or a fictional story a talented novelist writes in an entertaining book or a novice nonfiction writer sharing their personal story in a memoir.

This is why I love and am so passionate about hearing, writing, and sharing stories with others—because in the moments of my life that seemed most dark, painful, and disheartening, I heard or read a story, and it gave me the hope I needed to not to give up and made me feel that I am not alone.