What happens when Veterans stop trying to tell the “perfect” story and start telling the honest one?

In this episode of Common Veterans, the table gets practical about the power of storytelling. Not storytelling as performance, but storytelling as a tool for resilience, connection, healing, and helping others understand what lived experience really means.

Guest host SGT Eric Donoho, U.S. Army Retired, joins the conversation. Eric is a decorated combat Veteran, Purple Heart recipient, author of Canyon of Hope, and a national advocate for Veterans and military families. His work focuses on moral injury, healing after war, and helping others find meaning through truth and connection.

This discussion breaks down real stories in real time: what to keep, what to cut, and how tone changes meaning depending on the audience. A story told to another Veteran may land differently than the same story told to a civilian, a spouse, a child, or a room full of strangers.

The episode explores how Veterans carry stories, how those stories shape identity, and how lived experience can become more than memory. It can become a tool.

In this episode:

• Why storytelling matters for Veterans
• How resilience shows up through lived experience
• What details make a story stronger
• How tone changes depending on the audience
• Why owning your story can help others find their way

Whether you have told your story a hundred times, avoided telling it altogether, or are still trying to understand what it means, this conversation is about learning how to carry it with purpose.

Guest Host: Eric Donoho
Producer: Sarah Holmes

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