Storyworthy - living in the moment

Suhail Idrees -

Let's take a journey down memory lane.

How much do you remember about the last 3 months? Do you remember everything you did? Or is it a bit of a blur and you remember just a handful of moments?

When I think back, I almost always find that time has flown and I remember much fewer things than I'd expect – was it really 2.5 years ago that we first went into lockdown?!

Learning to remember

In his book "Storyworthy", Matthew Dicks describes a method to keep track of your days in an interesting way.

Don't worry, I'm not going to suggest writing a diary!

The exercise is called "Homework For Life". At the end of every day, ask yourself "what was the most storyworthy moment of my day?" and record it in your favourite notes app (or a spreadsheet if that's your jam).

I know you'll have a couple of questions so I'll answer them now:

  • Yes, you definitely have storyworthy moments everyday. It doesn't need to be a once-in-a-lifetime moment, just something that stood out to you as an interesting occurrence and you would mention to someone else.
  • Yes, it takes just 5 minutes, and yes you definitely have a spare 5 minutes for this.

But what's the point?

The benefits

There are 3 things you'll get in return for the time you spend on Homework For Life:

  1. You'll realise that even if you think your life is relatively boring or mundane, you have way more "storyworthy" moments than you'd expect. At the very least, this can help you in your daily life in making interesting conversation.
  2. Over time, you will train yourself to live more in the moment. This is because you'll start wondering even before the end of the day, "is this the moment I'll record tonight?" and as a result you'll find yourself being more "present".
  3. You'll never again feel like "time has flown by," because now you can always look back and remember how a day, or week, or month really went. Time will seem to unnaturally stretch.

So there it is. Do give "Homework For Life" a try – even if just for the next 7 days.

The book

There is much more to the book "Storyworthy." If you've ever been interested in being able to tell better stories, or if you like the idea of being more present in life, do check it out!

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