How to Find Great Stories
"I would march into marketing battle with you."
"That was incredible. Your best one yet."
"Seriously, I had tears in my eyes."
How big must a story be to create that kind of reaction?
Turns out, not big at all.
These were the (very much appreciated) responses to my latest keynote -- specifically, to my final story in the talk. I've given the talk enough times and used the story in enough content elsewhere to know that it's a winning bit, a signature story. It's my "closer," as a comedian might say -- the thing you end with when you want to end strong. In fact, I previously used this story as my closer at Content Marketing World 2016. That year, I was the #1-rated speaker according to audience survey scores, and that rating meant I was awarded the opening talk the next year in front of all 4,000 people.
I know it wasn't JUST the closer that did it. But I also know if I didn't trust myself enough to turn a "nothing" moment of my life into that closing story, you probably wouldn't be reading me right now.
I'll share a video clip of that story in a moment, but first I want to answer a common question I hear among content creators:
How do you find great stories?
In the case of this particular story, the answer is simple.
I didn't find it.
I built it.
* * *
Stories, Stories, Wherefore Art Thou Stories?
How do we find great stories? I think most of us want the process to look like this:
We're stumbling through our lives when suddenly, a character reminiscent of PT Barnum flags us down. He's barking at us and waving his top hat to show us the hidden path towards this giant circus tent, where we're an audience of one. There, we're privileged to see all these remarkable acts play out in front of us. We witness and even participate in extraordinary things, and we think, Damn, the world is gonna be so amazed when I share my stories...
But how do stories really happen? Where do they come from? Where are they hiding?
When we encounter a great story as a consumer, we feel grateful, excited, amazed. But when we encounter a great story as a storyteller? You'd be forgiven if gratitude gave way to envy, excitement to anger, and amazement to ... well, still amazement, but dragging with it, a gnarly-looking dog named Ugh.
How did *THEY*...?
Why can't *I*...?
What the *HELL*...?
Naturally, we wonder: "Where are my amazing stories? Where can I find my own private collection of incredible stories, and can someone please wave me down with their top hat so I don't miss them?"
Step right up!
"How do I find great stories?"
Well, if my keynote's closer has shown me anything, it's that (A) my jokes are really cheesy (I promise, a clip is coming), and (B) you don't find great stories. You create them.
Everywhere you go and everything you do is like shopping for ingredients at a store called Whole Life (as in, yours). You drop them in your bag, and later, you slice and dice and sauté and flambé. You cook your ingredients and season the dish to taste (as in, yours).
As Ira Glass said, "Great stories happen to those who can tell them."
Isn't that just so ironic? That the only things worth sharing are found by the people who know how to share them?
Of course, what he's saying is, "Silly, storytellers, you don't experience stories. You experience your life. Then you turn that into stories."
Storytellers don't experience anything extraordinary. Instead, they know how to imbue meaning into things that are ordinary.
There's this extremely self-helppy idea that "life doesn't happen to you; you happen to it." I'm paraphrasing someone, I'm sure. Probably a former NFL coach. But anyway, the way stories really happen maps to that idea pretty closely. Stories don't happen to you. YOU happen to stories. (See this is why we can't have nice things, Jay. You push too hard on the pithy maxims.)
In other (better) words, stories are more like creative acts than experienced moments. You don't just document and report what happened beat for beat. You construct the story, imbuing it with emotional meaning, extracting a valuable insight along the way. Something felt noteworthy to you (NOT newsworthy), and you saved that as a story thread (NOT a completed story) to pull later.
You’re not a Life-Recording Device, playing back the footage of what you saw or heard. You're conveying what you FELT. Said Ishiguro, "Stories are like one person saying to another, 'This is how it feels to me. Can you understand what I'm saying? Does it also feel this way to you?'"
Stories turn action into emotion, facts into meaning. Stories convey to others why something matters -- broadly, sure, but mainly TO THEM. The emotional labor between moments you experienced and words they receive makes a story a story. Remove the creative act in between the moment and the words, and you'd just have a transcript of your life. Not a story. You need to imbue that transcript with a sense of drama and emotion. Sometimes, that's based on how the experience is described, and sometimes, the lessons you convey.
You create stories out of ingredients life presents to you.
If I said it once, I said it a thousand times: Storytellers don’t experience extraordinary things. They help us see the meaning in ordinary things. This is the difference between "learning story" and BEING a storyteller. You can take anything -- because everything is inspiration to a storyteller -- and turn it into a story.
This is an active process. It doesn't happen to you. You happen to it.
* * *
There's a reason the headline above says, "Stories, Stories, Wherefore Art Thou Stories?"
That doesn't mean "where are you, stories?" It means "WHY is something a story?" What makes a story A STORY? (There's a reason "wherefore" dropped out of our modern lexicon. It's confusing. It's a synonym for why, not where.)
When Juliet cries out, "O Romeo, Romeo! Wherefore art thou Romeo?" she's not asking where Romeo is. She's asking why Romeo is the way that he is. What makes him act the way he does? Why does this man she loves have to be Romeo, and all that it means to be Romeo?
We need to ask, "Wherefore art stories?" In other words, what makes a story a story? What makes it act the way that it does? What makes it trigger feelings of gratitude and excitement and amazement in audiences -- and jealousy, anger, and amazement-but-also-frustration among peers?
It was built that way. It was DESIGNED to do that.
I imagine stories NOT as these grand events unfolding at the circus, but as these ephemeral little creatures, glowing bright purple or yellow, floating happily around the world. But most people are so closed off to the details of life around them, that the moment they set foot outside ... FIPP!--those creatures dart into the bushes.
Or maybe they're less like fairies and more like microscopic rock trolls, hardened into the deep, dark caverns of our brains. It's only when we happen to see or say or hear or do something that a tiny pinprick of light wakes up one story from its slumber. "Wait, this totally reminds me of that time when...!"
But most people don't allow enough light in, or else don't give any credit to those brief moments where the troll snorts himself awake.
But all those things? Those little life moments and those tiny memories that pop to mind? THAT is material. THAT is inspiration. At least, it is to an effective storyteller.
When we long to tell better stories, we start asking, "Where do I find them? How do I find them?"
They're everywhere, but they only happen to those who know how to tell them.
This isn't mystical wisdom. Ira Glass and I aren't trying to be oracles atop the mountain, legs crossed, eyes closed. "When your mind is open and your heart sensitive to the world, your stories will appear to you." The thing is, you DO need an open mind and a sensitive heart, but all that appears to you will be ... everyday life. It's up to you to turn that into stories.
We are asking the exact wrong question. "Where art stories?" That ain't it. "Wherefore art stories?" Now we're talking. But let's talk in plainer language. "WHY is something a story?"
It was created, not experienced.
It was shaped by the storyteller, as they press everyday life through their perspective, molding it to include or omit the right details, to contain the right flow and musicality and sense of drama and tension, and rising and falling action, all to share or at least imply some kind of universal lesson, all so a seemingly mundane moment the storyteller experienced ceases to feel like a transcript and starts feeling like payload of emotion and meaning and insight -- all to move you.
Nothing extraordinary needs to happen. It can be something ordinary, imbued with extraordinary meaning.
Stop wishing stories appeared to you. Start creating them. Take a tiny lived experience, a memory you can't shake, a moment that felt noteworthy (not newsworthy). Start with a question, a frustration, a random, raw feeling. Save those ingredients. Then season to taste. Because storytellers aren't reporters. They're chefs.
Now get cooking.
See this in action (and do it yourself)
1. Here's the 5-minute closing story to my latest keynote.
2. This episode of my show is a rare look at a master storyteller dissecting how he imbues a single moment of his life with meaning.
3. If you'd like a framework to turn little life moments into high-impact stories, try this.
This essay was originally part of my newsletter, sent every other Friday. My mission is to help you make what matters to your career, company, and community. In my newsletter and on my show, I talk about storytelling, resonance, content, and creativity. Subscribe free below.