Matthew Dicks

More importantly, I also had a natural affinity for sharing my less-than-noble moments with others. I’ve always known that embarrassment could get a laugh. Telling about my most shameful and foolish moments had always brought me closer to listeners. Honesty is attractive. A friend of mine once said that I “live out loud.” It describes me well.

You need not spend time in jail or crash through a windshield or have a gun jammed against the side of your head to tell a great story. In fact the simplest stories about the smallest moments in our lives are often the most compelling.

We all have stories. You may not believe this yet, but you will. You just need to know how to find them in your everyday life and then capture them for future telling.

Your story must reflect change over time. A story cannot simply be a series of remarkable events. You must start out as one version of yourself and end as something new. The change can be infinitesimal. It need not reflect an improvement in yourself or your character, but change must happen. Even the worst movies in the world reflect some change in a character over time.