Frank Basile's Emerging Stories: What We Carry: Stories of Care, Legacy, and Becoming, featuring Sheila Spencer

Sheila Spencer is a professional storyteller, educator, author, and spiritual director whose work centers on story as a tool for healing, connection, and transformation. With a background in education and ministry, she brings an interdisciplinary approach that blends narrative, poetry, spirituality, and cultural memory. Rooted in the African American oral tradition, her storytelling is informed by my experience as a bilingual educator, literacy coach, and speaker. She has presented workshops, keynote addresses, and storytelling experiences nationally and internationally, including in Washington, DC, Los Angeles, Indianapolis, Columbus, Morocco, the Republic of the Congo, and Atlanta. Her work explores themes of self-care, identity, faith, caregiving, and community. As the author of reflective journals including Self Care Is My Divine Right and Gratitude Journal she creates storytelling spaces that invite participants to reflect, write, and reconnect with their own stories.

Drawing from personal narrative, intergenerational experiences, and my work as co-editor of Connections: Tell Your Story – A Family Anthology of Heritage, Gifts, and Legacy, this piece weaves together moments of discovery across generations and life experiences, rather than focusing on a single
stage of life—highlighting unexpected connections, ancestral echoes, and lived encounters that reveal how identity and purpose are shaped over time. While caregiving is one thread, this work expands to consider the broader ways we hold space for others, pass on what has been given to us, and recognize
the impact of our presence in the lives of others. Through storytelling, reflection, and poetic language, the audience will be invited into a journey of
recognition and release—examining what they carry, why they carry it, and what it means to return to themselves with intention. This subject is of particular interest to me because it reflects the heart of my work as a storyteller, educator, and spiritual director: helping people make meaning of their lives through
story. This performance affirms that our stories are living, evolving, and deeply connected to the legacy we are shaping.

Storytelling Arts of Indiana offers an annual fellowship to an Indiana storyteller to create and premiere new material. The Frank Basile Emerging Stories Fellowship encourages and recognizes the talent and skills of our Hoosier tellers. This program is possible because of the generosity and commitment of Frank and Katrina Basile to the art of storytelling.