The moral of the story is where you’re going to try and sum-up your story as it’s ending, and if you can manage to do so in an eloquent or quippy way that somehow ties things together succinctly, it’s going to signify to others that your story is now over.  The effect can be one of many.  Maybe the moral of your story is a funny one or maybe it’s something more thoughtful.

To end your story with a moral, you can simply say:

“So the moral of the story is _____________”

or

“So I guess the moral of the story is ____________”

The reason I include both of these is because the first is more matter-of-fact, and I like to use the second one when I’m going to have a more humorous or unexpected moral.

Please note here that your moral doesn’t have to be anything mind-boggling or even that good.  You don’t even necessarily need a moral to your story, you can simply say “And that was it,” or something to that effect.  A moral is just an added little something if you’d like to have it in there, and if your story is as strong as it should be then the moral shouldn’t be that big of a deal.