In Million Miles, I talk about structuring your life like a story so that, when you’re done living it, it will have been more meaningful. I also talk about how if you’re life story were spelled out on the back of a DVD cover, what would it say. Something like:
“Donald Miller desperately wanted the new Volvo, but he didn’t have enough money. So he got a job at a local grocery store and worked the nightshift till he could afford the down payment….”
Not so exciting. But change those elements around (what the character wants and how much conflict they are willing to endure) and you’ve got the stuff of a great story and a great life.
I didn’t say it in the book, but I actually tried this a couple years ago. My storyline went something like: “Donald Miller wants to write more books and pay lots of unhealthy attention to Amazon reviews…” and my heart sank. I think that was about the time I started The Mentoring Project, and I’ve been happier (and more engaged in my own story) ever since.
So I thought I’d invite you into that little experiment. Maybe you and your friends, or you and your family could write a little storyline. What I mean is, what would it look like to write a two sentence summation of your life plot?
Now here’s the thing, most people are living a more exciting life than they think they are. Life doesn’t feel as great as a good movie, no matter how good your life is. If you’re raising a family, just trying to make ends meet, that’s great. Only add something more heartfelt to it…
“Joe is trying to make it through the recession, fighting not to associate his self worth with his lack of money, all the while keeping the love alive in his home.”
Have you ever thought of replacing the mission statement at your church or organization with a storyline? It might help everybody involved see things more clearly. And plus, everybody involved would feel like they are part of a story. And being engaged in a story is more exciting than obeying a mission statement.
Here are some tips on a great storyline.
1. State who the character or characters are.
2. State the single primary ambition. Make it clear and defined.
3. Name the conflict, and if you can, state how that conflict will be overcome.
4. Ask a question at the end that pertains to the climax (Will The Mentoring Project be able to shut down fifteen percent of American Prisons?)
The truth is, a person can be part of many stories. I am part of about five major stories in my life right now. And my guess is you are too. You’re church may be telling a group protagonist story, and your family may be telling one too. You may be telling a story solo, also. Regardless, the clearer these elements are, the better each story will be lived out.
What this will do is give you a greater clarity about what you are supposed to do today, this week, this month and this year. You’ll find yourself in the theater of your own mind watching an interesting story unravel.
Here’s some humorous motivation my friend Susan Isaacs sent to get you started. If you’re in a small group, show this clip and then do this exercise together: (Don’t worry, it’s not a lesbian kiss fest. It’s a funny video, I promise)
P.S. Next week, we will spend all 5 days on the blog working on your catch phrase!
Priceless, priceless, priceless! Thank-you!! I’ll be watching this periodically throughout the day I’m sure!
This morning, during my run, I pinpointed the moment when I should have done what I’ve been wanting to do. Then I had the momentum and the “high”! Then I had verbally realized where my passion lay. But I didn’t have the courageous to go after it. Things would be SO different now. If I hadn’t waited for someone else to give my story to me. Then I became apathetic. Neglected myself. Downward spiral. Wow! What an idiot!
But it’s not too late to jumpstart this story!
Going for a run always jumpstarts a story!
Hopefully I will be able to get Don to sign your book for your birthday…still have the book and my great intentions! We’ll have to wait and see if he is signing books after his talk tomorrow. I wish there was some way to subtly get his attention to let him know you have been patiently waiting 2 weeks to receive a signed copy of Father Fiction in the mail. I will have to think really hard on how to possibly find someone who knows someone who talks to him and could ask him to make sure he signs a book for you being carried by a girl patiently waiting in his book signing line.
I just don’t know Theodora…I just don’t know.
Hey Theodora! I found his blog…small thing, hardly any readers, rarely posts anything
but if I get the courage I might just post a comment telling him about your birthday and how your only request was to have him sign your book.
But I don’t know, I think I may chicken out. I think I will just sit here on my couch and wait to see if God gives me the courage to do it.
Fingers crossed a talking donkey shows up soon…
I’ll certainly let you know!
I’m sorry … I’m feeling virgin birth coming on … Yeah, we both already have kids, but God does work miracles.
You’re hilarious! I wish you didn’t live so far away.
What if we scream really loud …
DON DON DON DON DON DON DON DON!
YOU ROCK YOU ROLL YOU RULE!
WE’LL WRITE FABULOUS BUT SINCERE AMAZON REVIEWS FOR YOU TO READ!
IN EXCHANGE FOR A SIGNATURE!
It’s signed…it took no yelling, bribing, or even a talking donkey. The talking donkey could have been helpful though because I do think it could have stammered a sentence better than I did.
but no worries, I did seem to mumble Alissa and birthday…
It’ll be in the mail Monday.
Happy birthday little lady! I hope it was a great one. May the book bless you as much as it did me.
Don,
enjoyed your talk tonight. You always challenge me and I appreciate that.
SQUEAL! Thank you both! I was praying hard …
Shelly, I just saw your post on my blog. Sorry I left you hanging. I’ve been out of town.
I want to come clean … my name is Alissa Theodora. I went by my middle name at my first professional job and so my email stayed atheodora.
My subsequent jobs were in my hometown where everybody knew me as Alissa. So I stopped fighting it.
There’s a bazillion little Alyssa’s running around these days and I like that Theodora means Gift of God.
Felt kind of dirty … Now I feel better. Not hiding anything.
“this scene won’t make it into the final cut”…
Thanks Susan, thanks Don!!!!
“Catch phrase…. laugh, laugh, laugh”….
Larissa is waking up to a whole new side of her, as she finds an unexpected love for writing, and art to self-expression, despite walking through the residue of depression. Now, she ponders what the next twists of life will bring, eager to throw caution to the wind and let her story be used for good.
I don’t know why, but this just made me extremely grateful that I have never written an Amazon review.
I watched that clip 10 times a few weeks ago. So good! And the initial YouTube screenshot is unfortunate, haha.
I am re-prioritizing some things right now. I think writing a storyline is a great way to help me figure out which story I want to tell. The best part? I can write a few different storylines, and work from there!
This ties in really well with your post this week about whether or not God has a specific plan for your life.
I agree, April. It’s just a great new way to look at things and it’s kind of fun…
With her children off to college at age 41, Andrea was looking forward to the freedom she’d been anticipating for the past 20 years. Little did she know that she would try to start a whole new life with a younger man with a precocious nine year old child.
I will definitely try this exercise, Don. Sounds exciting, dreadful, and revealing all at once.
And here’s hoping you’re not one of the three helpful votes on my positive Amazon review of ‘Jazz’.
I love the video. Easily one of my favorites ever. It encapsulates everything I think when I see overblown movie trailers. Only one thing could have made it more perfect. They should have reversed the order of the kissing and embracing shots and entitled them “Homoerotic Subtext” and “Homoerotic Text.”
Nikki has spent days and days wracking her brain on writing an original, yet succinct about page for her website to no avail. She is anticipating with a grateful heart the posts that will be forthcoming on Donald Miller’s blog, thinking they will be the breakthrough she needs.
So, I’m walking down the sidewalk, out in public, mind you, and this trailer keeps playing in my head. Cue me trying desperately not to grin/laugh like an idiot-and failing.
Thanks, Don and Susan.
I like the phrase, “writing a storyline” because I HATE goals… I HATE what will you be doing in 5 years time.. what about this year. Rather that, but finding a new twist in my story or rewriting what I have thought about doing so that I can actually accomplish it. I know, it’s just words–but for whatever reason, the words resound & they make it possible for me to dream in an unregimented way.
Thanks!
By the way, is the post-script meant to imply that my catchphrase cannot be “catchphrase”? I was already working on the comedic timing of that one…
LOVE it! i’ve actually done the same thing where i’ve broken down my goals to chapters that i’d want my books to look like =]
i love how each chapter is unfolding!
Hey Don,
Great insight. We are in the process of formalizing some documents for a new church plant and this is very helpful. We talk about narrative, in particular biblical narrative, all the time; I don’t know why we never thought to use narrative in defining the purpose and mission of the organization. Brilliant.
Thanks!
I just finished A Million Miles this morning while waiting at Honda for my oil to be changed. I tried to think of how to make that a story, but I was too busy enjoying the free single serve coffees. The book, along with posts like these, are challenging my once pre-packaged views of life and God. Thanks Don.
Have you ever noticed, Don, how a good number of your comments are from the ladies?
I have.
Here’s one of my story lines right now. Not the main one or the one that’s most important, but a fun one. A practice story, if you will.
After reading several of his books and hearing him speak, Cora Hicks decides to attempt to meet famed author Donald Miller over coffee while visiting Portland. But will mere proximity be enough to grant her the meeting she desires? Only one person can answer that question…
i love this idea. i’ll take the time to really think about what i’d put as my storyline. i have definitely taken on the mindset of living out a story worth telling since reading A million miles.
Thank you for always challenging your readers to live… truly live. oh & thank you for warning us that the video was not “a lesbian kiss fest”, lol!
Hey sir. Just finished “A Million Miles” a few days ago (at the insistence of “Jaimie,” above, actually!). Thank you for that.
I love the idea of life-plot summary, even though it still feels…i don’t know, presumptuous (in light of the “God’s will” question you brought up earlier this week). That’s something I’m still kicking around in my head.
For people who instinctively worry about “getting it right,” (cough, hand-raise), another thing to consider is that the story we’re in right now is going to change, maybe drastically. There’s no way to know exactly how it will all play out, and my “plot summary” may look vastly different in a year or five. So, even as I look toward the over-arching storyline, I need focus most of my energy on the stories I’m in right now.
Or, as Someone much smarter than me said, “Don’t worry about tomorrow. Tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.”
Literature can be dangerous. I’m an adventurer at heart so books by people like you and Batterson and Eldridge are like crack. I read your books in high school and moved from Boston to Nashville for a year and then to st. Louis for seminary. Now I’m taking an after school arts program we started here in Providence to Portland in September as well as playing with a jazz quartet out there. All this because I keep asking “What if?” and living life like a story. Adventures. Life is exciting with Christ.
P.s. Don’t accumulate possessions. Accumulate experiences!
Can I ask you a question unrelated to this topic? I saw the revised edition of Searching For God Knows What, and wondered if it’s got new material, like Father Fiction, or is pretty much the same book.
thanks
James Williams
http://www.middletree.net
middletree.blogspot.com
A new intro and afterword is all.
A Million Miles helped me take some general feelings and convictions I had been having in my life and translate them into action steps. Being an English teacher, I’m wondering why I never thought of thinking of my life in a fiction format.
So my story line is now shaping up like this:
Suburban high school English teacher in “award-winning” school actively pursues teaching in the inner city and working with students who are struggling with poverty and low educational expectations.
Robin has recurring thoughts of how to change the lives of others, particularly children in need and through a twist of fate, is that the plot I hear thickening?, she pulls out a book while walking idly through rows and rows of self help and beyond help testimonials. Anything to pass time because the Seattle’s Best is gone and her daughter still hasn’t found the latest Amelia Bedelia, Robin opens the cover and reads the insert on Don and the mentoring project. Oh, and look, he’s from her home town. Realizing that this is not dumb luck but a wake up call that her dreams of helping these kids is possible.
My book is starting to be written thanks to you Don and I hope its a tear jerker with a kick ass ending.
Any input on getting the ball rolling would be appreciated.
You know, its said that if you really want to make God laugh, tell him what your plans are for your life. I think the same goes for your story. Tell Him how the ending goes and He will be the savviest editor ever known. Probably won’t even recognise your story but I can guarantee it will not be dull.
Lesbians are gross!!!!1 I’m so glad they aren’t in this video
Gee, thanks a lot. I am a follower of Jesus who struggles with same-sex attraction. I’m on a journey toward wholeness, but hearing that I am “gross” isn’t cool. Maybe think about who you’re affecting before you post hurtful statements.
Erin, I support you no matter who you love! It sounds to me like you are very whole!
Hi Don,
I read “Million Miles” in January this year and it changed the way I think about how I want my life to be (from shame to pride, because I realised that wanting to be a hero was a good thing). Back then I wrote my storyline, and as a fiction writer it was VERY easy.
A burnt-out missionary writes young adult books featuring true heroes – the kind that readers can look up to. She hangs on the edge of major publication for years as her mental illness worsens. Will she achieve her own dreams before her illness swallows her last heroic spark of hope?
The answer, of course, is yes
And in the meantime, I live a heroic life every day, and inspire others through my blog of Daily Awesomeness. And I owe a lot of that to you.
Louise
Hey Don,
Loved the trailer!! It kind of reminds me of your books in the way it mocks societal norms but it makes you think and even reevaluate yourself while you’re laughing.
Also love your challenge to write our “DVD Covers”–ever so practical! I admit, though, when I first read it I thought I would take forever coming up with one, let alone enough to cover my overlapping stories, but it probably took me 10 minutes at most. Here’s what I’ve got:
While working part-time at a local healthfood store, Darcy(played by Natalie Portman) searches for meaningful distraction during her husband, Greg’s (played by Gerard Butler), year-long Afghanistan deployment. Will she allow God to lead her towards a fulfilling purpose as her husband fulfills his own? Once they’re no longer separated by physical barriers, will Darcy and Greg still be able to meet on the same spiritual ground?
Whattya think? Decent?
I have another confession: I didn’t expect to be so encouraged by this exercise. I knew it would be good, don’t get me wrong, but I guess I had a negative perception of my circumstances (and when you get the looks I do everyday when people find out your husband’s at war, it’s not hard to be discouraged). Once I added the questions, though–as per your suggestions–it really became a story with hope and anticipation… go figure! It may also have helped that I got to be played by Natalie Portman; Greg has always been a Gerard Butler sans Scottish accent to me, but that’s another story.
Thanks! For everything!
Thanks Darcy for ur incredible willingness to sacrifice for all of us. You and your husband are brave and selfless. May God richly bless you and your marriage for all you do!
Awesome choice of actors!
Long after most have learned, Courtney struggles to Be An Adult. Will she persue love, build a community, and learn to open evelopes or will she die an old spinster, swallowed by her beloved pet python?
Hm. Needs some tweaking, methinks.
funny…and intriguing. a good start.
An everyday woman shares her understanding of God’s absolute love and many, many people turn around and find that same love. That love does not fail, Christ returns, evil is destroyed, and life swallows up death!
I loved this post and I am looking forward to more on storylines and catch phrases… and I would love the video if the person portraying the cliche person with a disability wasn’t called a r*tard–I notice that other possible slurs were not used. I found that very disappointing.
We tried some thing like this at my church a week ago. We held “Coaching Sessions” and walked four rooms of people through your definition of story in a Million Miles. Each group wanted to improve their story in either generosity, service, connection to God, or sharing faith.
For me the best part of the morning was that the coaching didn’t point them toward an institutional outcome– getting more involved in our programs. By stressing the “ambition” piece, it forced people to dream differently… and uniquely.
Everyone walked out with a truly individualized plan, an awareness of what they were up against, a few next steps, an awareness of how our church could and could not help, and a few phone numbers of people who could help them along the way.
That’s great; I like how the language of life-building is changing; “mission statement” becomes “storyline”; “call” becomes “invitation”. These are good, reflective changes. I am a firm believer that language creates culture…Thanks!
[...] oriented. The more I read, the more I grow, the more I change, and hopefully the better I become. Donald Miller wrote an awesome blog post about living life as a story, or as if your life was a dvd and asking [...]
[...] If your life were a movie. [...]
Just wanted to let you know I am just finishing “A Million Miles in a Thousand Years” and told my small group of FB friends to buy it now. I even gave them a “money back” guarantee they would love it. (Hope it doesn’t cost me too much)
[...] Writing a Storyline, An Alternative to the Mission Statement [...]
I want to give a big time review to Date Night. Very entertaining.
Hey Don,
Love A Million Miles in a Thousand Years. Very universal. I’ve read some of it aloud to my language arts classes–which brings me to my question. I am teaching in Brasil and am interested in using Into the Elements, but the link never works. Is this a Brasil problem or a link problem? I want to get a bit more information about it…
[...] Read: Writing a Storyline, An Alternative to the Mission Statement by Donald Miller. Someday, I hope to call him [...]
[...] my friend emailed me one of Mr. Miller’s blog post, specifically this one. In it, he poses the question: what would your life read like if it were a two-sentence description [...]
reminds me of “Cinematic” by Cool Hand Luke…
“I want to live in such a way
That when I’m gone my friends would say
That if my life was turned to film
I’d be standing on a mountain shouting victory in the end
But in my hear I know it’s only true
If I’m supporting actor and the Oscar goes to You
If my life was cinematic
With a soundtrack so dramatic
You’d be the hero and You would save me
And it would have the sweetest ending”
Am I not looking in the right place?
“P.S. Next week, we will spend all 5 days on the blog working on your catch phrase!”
So, what do you do when you want to literally write a book about about what you’re dealing with in life right now, but you ALSO want to REALLY make your life a story. Does that make sense? Can you do the two simultaneously? Is the action of writing this book I want to write part of the overall story of my life?
I loved this post and the book. It has really got me thinking about a lot of things. I was bummed that the five additional blog posts to help us write our catch phrase never happened. Do you think that they’ll ever happen in the blog?
[...] Check out his blog. Here are several of his entries on telling your story well. Can I Tell You a Story? Living a Good Story, an Alternative to New Years Resolutions Writing a Storyline, An Alternative to the Mission Statement [...]