It’ll make a good story.

I was ten when our parents told us about their divorce. When we got back home, I trotted up to my room and wrote the story of them telling us as a heartfelt comedy.

We were living abroad, and Dad would bring back CDs from his U.K. work trips. On our way home from being told about the divorce, he decided to play us one of the latest albums for the first time. The album was by The Feeling, who was in the charts at the time, and the second song was titled “Never Be Lonely.”

After the singer sang a few lines of “People in love are sad and stupid, people in love get everything wrong…” my Mom had the good sense to lean over, stop and eject the disk. We spent the rest of the drive home without music. And then I had the good sense to use that heartbreakingly fitting CD moment to end the story I wrote in my bedroom.

Many years later, I had a teen YouTube phase. Post-college, utterly overcome with frustration at not being able to do the things I wanted to do yet, I started a daily vlog. And I must say it helped tremendously. It felt like everything I did was worthwhile. It felt like every event, good or bad, could make a good vlog. If I missed my train or lost my passport, I could always craft it into a good story.

Nowadays, I don’t feel the need to plaster my life across the internet, unless you count this blog. I removed all the daily vlogs from YouTube, except this one. Now, I keep a voice journal and take notes on things that happen in life that I will one day write into a TV show or a novel. Sure, I am often a magic consultant, but my passion is writing.

Luckily, possible employers have spotted this fact, and for the past several years, I’ve only worked as a writer, even on magic shows.

Inspiration is everywhere. I hope by reading this post, today, you’ll start to see how you can turn things that a lot of people find unsettling or hindering into positive and uplifting sources of inspiration.