In this case, the writer is recommending that you should take time to listen to the person's "life story," or to listen to them when they talk about their goals or their motivations. This is an idiom. The writer is not referring to an actual fictional story.

It means every one of us has a story, because all of us have suffered one time or another in various ways. A person can easily be judged by outside appearances, but once you speak to them and hear their 'story', you not only find out who that person is now, but how he/she became they way they are.