“As you begin to take stock of your days, find those [story] moments — see them and record them — time will begin to slow down for you. The pace of your life will relax.”
~ Matthew Dicks, Storyworthy: Engage, Teach, Persuade, and Change Your Life through the Power of Storytelling
Matthew Dicks assigns his workshop students “Homework for Life.” He is a 50-time Moth StorySLAM and 6-time GrandSLAM Champion, which is a big deal in the world of personal narrative style of storytelling. If anyone can help you how find new stories to tell, he has a track record of winning stories.
Homework for Life
Each day, you must write the date and a couple word or sentence summary of a 5-second story moment for the day. You do not need to write the whole story. It does not have to be a huge moment, just something that you might write a story about that day. It’s a challenge at first to train you mind to see the frame of story, but then it gets easier. If you like, you can start to record any past moments that get triggered in memory. Most importantly, you must write at least one entry everyday to make it a habit.
How do you come up with new stories?
Storytellers struggle to keep coming up with new material. I’ve worked with many different processes, and I continue to explore new ones. This daily practice can change how you see the world (even if you just try it for awhile). I’m one of those people that used to say: I have nothing to write about. My life is just so boring. Why would anyone want to hear about my life? Nothing interesting happened today. I have no more stories. (In fact, some days, I still have this dialogue running in my head.)
Homework for Life is a great way to collect the moments of your life. The stories of the small moments of life are the ones that audiences connect to most easily. These small moments often contain our biggest transformations. These are the aha! moments, the sudden realization moments, the moments that touch our heart, moments of connection, moments where we fall apart, moments where we pull ourselves back together, ….
“I cannot tell you what a blessing this is. I don’t lose a day anymore.”
~ Matthew Dix, Storyworthy
Listen to his engaging story about being a storyteller in his TEDx Talk.
Watch Matthew Dicks, Homework for Life
Check out the book by Matthew Dicks, Storyworthy
