A Creator’s Guide to Finding the Story in Ordinary Moments

By: Cass

 

Here's something I wish more creators believed: Your life doesn't have to be extraordinary to be worth documenting. You don't need to be boarding a flight, opening a PR package, staying somewhere beautiful, or attending an event to have something worth creating. Some of the best stories are already happening in the middle of your completely ordinary Tuesday.

The coffee you make every morning. The drive you've taken 100 times. Your dog asleep in the same ridiculous position. Dinner on the stove. The five-minute conversation that unexpectedly sticks with you. The magic isn't always in what you're doing. It's in how closely you're paying attention.

I've been a creator since circa 2015 and still find myself sometimes focusing on the curation part of "the job," when really, I know the creators I personally love following are sometimes the one's that just post an at-home dinner meal in their pj's on a Tuesday, ha! But...here's what helps:

Look for the Feeling, Not Just the Thing

A cup of coffee is just a cup of coffee. But your first quiet cup before the rest of the house wakes up? That's a feeling. An unmade bed isn't particularly interesting. The slow Sunday morning happening inside it might be. When I'm creating, I'm rarely just asking, "What can I photograph?" I'm looking for what this moment feels like.

That's where the story usually is.

Get Closer

Literally and creatively. Not every story needs the big, perfectly composed shot.

Capture the hands making dinner. The half-finished latte. Shoes by the front door. Morning light hitting the kitchen counter. The tiny details someone might normally walk right past. Those little shots create texture and often make people feel like they're experiencing the moment with you rather than simply looking at it.

Don't Make Everything Perfect

Perfect is beautiful. But perfect isn't always interesting.

Leave some movement. Keep the laugh. Use the clip where something unexpected happened. Capture the process instead of only the finished product. Some of my favorite content feels slightly lived-in because, well...

life is lived-in.

Your job as a creator isn't always to make ordinary life look flawless. Sometimes it's simply to make someone notice it.

Pay Attention to What You Keep Thinking About

This is one of my favorite tricks for finding stories. What have you been thinking about lately? A conversation you can't shake? Something funny about getting older (oh i have a lot of thoughts about this haha)? A tiny luxury you suddenly appreciate? A place you drove past that reminded you of something? A realization that made you think, surely I'm not the only person who feels this way.

There's your content.

You don't always need to brainstorm a story. Sometimes you just need to recognize the one that's already been following you around.

Let Ordinary Be Enough

We're surrounded by content documenting the biggest moments. The trips. The weddings. The new houses. The launches. The milestones. And I love documenting those, too. But there's something really special about learning to see the life happening between them.

The coffee.

The people.

The routines.

The inside jokes.

The drive home.

The dog waiting at the door.

The version of your kitchen you'll someday realize you haven't seen in years.

That's the stuff.

So take the photo. Record the five-second clip. Write down the thought. Tell the tiny story. You don't need to make your life more interesting to create better content.

You just have to get better at noticing how interesting it already is.

Cheers,

Cass ✨

 

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2020 Aug