Something Other Gives Something Meaning

I'm reading through William Faulkner's The Sound and the Fury. Aside from the fact that it is one of the most difficult books I've read, it's a great look into human nature.

Faulkner used a lot of introspective stream of consciousness in his narrating characters, including all of their flashbacks as they move within a certain point in time. After a while I realized that all of the flashbacks involved the relationships and power struggles between the characters. This isn't really that profound, it's rather fundamental to all great stories, or rather any story, but the reality is that a great story includes more than just a protagonist. It is the other characters in the story, even flat characters like a bank teller that wears too much perfume, that provide a context for the protagonist to display his own character, personality, and even flaws. A good story is about so much more than the protagonists.

Really our own stories follow this trend, the more our stories are exclusively about ourselves, and involve only ourselves, the less depth and meaning our stories will have. Think The Bachelor, or Jersey Shore. As our lives become increasingly isolated or self-consumed, they will become increasingly shallow.

Think about the Tom Hanks movie Castaway. What if our shipwrecked friend had simply been on the island his whole life, and it was a story about how he chopped down trees and made fire and bashed his teeth out with ice skates.... The tension in the movie was the looming question... "Will he get back together with Kelley." Prior to his exile Chuck (Tom Hanks) puts off marriage due to a busy career. It takes him just a few days alone to realize he desperately needs other people, anything outside himself, much more than he needs his personal goals. The substitute is of course the famous Wilson "Nooooo Wilson. Come baaaccckkk!"

I think the most interesting people I know are those whose lives are about others, even their profession and personal goals seem to be to directly or indirectly help others in some way. In the end, these people also seem to be the happiest. I know that as a writer my highest moments are when my words and thoughts help someone else in a significant way, and most struggles that I have within writing revolve around whether or not my words reach anyone.

So the question is, is the story you are trying to write about something more than yourself?