I use a tool from Matthew Dicks’ book, Storyworthy, that helps me realize something. It is a realization tool, something that takes the quotidien world and makes it into a special something, something ‘storyworthy’. And it turns out that almost everything is storyworthy. Why? Dicks has an answer.
Here’s the thing about that story: We experience moments like this all the time.
This one may sound special and unique and maybe even beautiful, but only
because I’ve crafted this particular moment into a story. In truth, these moments
are everywhere. They exist in multitudes for all of us. They’re like dander in the
wind. They exist all around us. More than you could ever imagine. The problem is
that we don’t see these moments. We fail to notice them or recognize their
importance, and when we happen to see one, we don’t reach out to catch it. We
don’t record it. We don’t save it. We fail to keep these precious moments safe for
the future.
Years ago, I found a way to recognize and collect these moments, and it has
changed my life. It’s turned me into a storyteller with an endless supply of stories.
Stories that don’t rely upon near-death experiences or unlawful imprisonment or
homelessness to be effective. It’s also made me a happier person.
I originally marked this up in the book this way. I love the turn here: the problem is this–we don’t notice these instants as they happen or we don’t note them when we do notice them. We don’t write them down.
Hence, he created the idea of ‘Homework4Life’ as a way to reflect, note, and keep these instants safe for…the future. I write mine down in a Google Form almost every day. The left hand column below were my notes for the day that I copied and pasted from Google Form’s spreadsheet. The image is the inspiration from Dicks’ book for doing the ‘homework’. The right hand column is my take on how that particular observation was storyworthy. We really do pass up on thousands of storyworthy moments every….week?
Each of these items is a take on memory and how we can reflect on it in the immediate past and future. Why? Because to fail to do so at all is to give up on my humanity, to give up on what makes each of our lives, as Mary Oliver puts it, so “wild and precious”.
I challenge you to note your day’s sweet happenings, then reflect a bit on what makes them storyworthy, and, finally, tell the story. I don’t always follow my own advice, but when I do I am rewarded with something just like getting back a piece of shiny from a crow.
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That’s an impressive process, Terry. There’s the acts of noticing, I tend to rely more on noticing things with a camera, letting the experiences simmer, but coming back to them on the reflection side. Takes some dedication!
Hope that possum moves up the road (or stops by hear and munches some gophers)
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Noticing has many stances. I remember the first lesson I got as a guide at a local arboretum: look up, down, left, right, and all around. I still adopt that stance with varying degrees of speed to orient myself wherever I am. Taught my kids to do it to be street smart. Noticing with a camera is superfine although if you don’t have any money you can roll up a paper tube and ‘notice’ whatever the reality kaleidoscope shows you. Every book on my shelf is full of acts of noticing including Rob Walker’s The Art of Noticing. So glad you dropped by. One of the best ways of noticing is to share with someone else how you do something, anything. You are a master of that and we can all bear re-reading your “how to write a comment” from DS106’s blog. Yep, I think that was you, right?
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Over the past 50 years I’ve made a habit of brainstorming while listening to speakers and attending meetings. By that, I mean, as I take notes, I write comments in the margins, about how what the speaker is saying applies to the work I was trying to do. Often these note later became visualizations that I share, and/or blog articles (since 2005).
I’ve spent time over the past 5 years digitizing my notes so they are now on my Google drive. That makes it easier for me to look back and find inspiration for what I do in the future and it makes it possible to share my thinking with others (if any are interested).
Your process looks much more sophisticated, and disciplined, than what I’ve done. Thanks for sharing it.
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I go through periods of intense noticing and then lazy un-noticing. I don’t often know I am in the midst of the shift until I am in it.
Kevin
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I feel the same way. For example, my “homework” of notes about yesterday are…spare. Not finding much in them that are special moments. Sometimes I just dwell and brood over them, but I don’t make something poem or storyworthy every day although it is my fondest goal to share every day something that is shareworthy. Noticing one’s own thoughts is a time honored meditation and often is a form of un-noticing the world. Thanks for dropping by.