(#023) Live a story. Tell a story.

On the first of August, 2010 — some 15 years ago — I wrote in my journal: “Moving into yet another office... right in the middle of the storm with my [then business] partner. Sometimes I don't really understand how I made it through all of this sh*t. I would be crazy to allow it to be forgotten.”

Early on, I realized how easy it is to forget our own experiences — what we’ve been through in life.

And I don’t mean forget as in failing to recall the outline of events, or being unable to tell the story if prompted. Most of us are quite capable of that.

No — I’m talking about developing a practice of living life as a flowing line, stacking meaning into each day, rather than as a series of isolated dots. I mean having vivid, present, readily accessible memory of the unique moments in our personal history — how they shaped our evolution, define us in the present, and steer our trajectory forward.

The difference between a master-chef’s soup — where all the flavors blend into one defining creation — and my homemade ones, where, if given a hint, you might identify most ingredients one by one. Otherwise, they land more like a juxtaposition than a composition.

And this forgetting happens even when our lives are avalanches of breakneck experiences.

Especially then — because the present is so intensely novel, so demanding of attention, that it keeps wiping away the past to make room for the next version of ourselves.

That’s how I started documenting my life — and reflecting on it. First through words (it’s been over twenty years now), then with photography (five years and counting).

More recently, I’ve turned to video.

You’d think video is the ultimate format — just look at how a well-made film can transport you to any place, to any time, or drive you too feel any emotion.

But here lies the paradox: you can’t fully live a moment and document it in video at the same time.

That’s why so many popular content creators — people with millions of followers — end up telling the story of how they became content creators. Or how they continue to work at their craft.

In other words, in more or less subtle ways:

They tell the story of how they have learned — and keep learning — to tell stories.

And it’s not for lack of talent, or effort, or discipline. Quite the opposite — many of these creators are astonishingly gifted (here’s one of my favourites, for example: Gawx — https://www.youtube.com/@GawxArt).

The challenge is this: if you’re telling a story through video, you rarely get to be spontaneous.

You don’t just stumble into a scene and capture magic. The best footage isn't captured. It’s produced. That means setups, takes, camera angles, gear, light, audio, intention. And all of that makes it almost impossible to live the adventure you're trying to record.

Sure, you can include spontaneous shots — even your phone may suffice there — but an entire video shot casually, handheld, while you go about your experience? It’s usually awkward to live through and painful to watch.

Take Casey Neistat (https://www.youtube.com/@casey), who famously reinvented and elevated modern video content. His defining moment? A daily vlog series: 800 consecutive days of story, adventure, and craft — everyday life turned compelling narrative. That got him 12 million followers in under 18 months.

And yet, his core business — his company Beme, which he founded, built into a media sensation, and sold to CNN for over $25 million — barely gets mentioned in those vlogs. It was his lifeline, the 51% of who he was (paraphrasing from his interview with Jon Youshaei: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bWh0ktqZNCU) — and yet it was nearly invisible in the story he was telling every day.

Because the best words are crafted.
An excellent photograph doesn’t need to be made — it can be taken.
But a good video is never just captured. It is produced.

I still haven’t figured out how to live fully through all the adventures in my life and also tell the story of it through video.

But I’m still working on it.

L.F