If life was a movie.

What if everyone got a documentary of their life? What if a sweaty camera crew followed you around for your entire 2021 like you were an Office character in your own silly drama where you shot looks at the lens when someone did something ridiculous?

Side note: if we hangout in real life, I will a million percent be that barrel of the camera for you if you need to drop a look of “did that really just happen?”

I think about this sometimes. Usually when I’m in some sort of mental breakdown or I feel like life has thrown me a curveball, I’ll try to look outside myself and see the role I play in my own story and empathize with her—like I would a character on the screen. To make sense of things, it really does help to zoom out (no pun intended) and see the big picture (no pun intended).

Call these tropes or call them iconic, I don’t care, but I like to lay these “cinematic ideas” over the details of my daily, boring living:

In a movie whenever a character finds herself contemplating big decisions or the state of her life in a bathtub—steaming water, bubbles, maybe a glass of wine and a furrowed brow—you know the story’s about to take a turn. For this reason, I draw a bath fully aware that making grand conclusions about the direction of my life is a strong possibility and I may very well quit my job and move to another country when I dry off.

In addition, reflecting on the tedious tasks of everyday life as actually just a string of details in the setup of the rest of the story, helps to validate the monotonous for me. Think of the first ten minutes of most films—we’re getting to know the characters, their world, and their norm.

All the ordinary stuff like hitting the alarm clock in the morning, the commute to the normal job, the scene of cooking dinner on the stove all serve as precursor moments to the shifts in the story ahead. In between those everyday scenes is the growing sense that life has something in store and whatever it is, it’s about to happen.

Now, in reality, maybe all that those normal living moments lead to is just another day of nothing out of the ordinary, but I can add that day as another reel in the setup montage. All that “same old same old” builds until one day, a twist of fate surfaces, and everything changes. I can’t get to great narratives if I ignore the boring setup.

Walking and listening to melodramatic music? Might as well record my own moody voiceover to accompany this moment.

And consider this: a slow and stunning drone shot of a scenic drive that a character is taking is an anchoring visual of “this story is progressing, this person is moving from one place to another, there is a starting point, and there is the present, and there is the destination.” For this reason, when I find myself on a winding road—be it in the mountains or along the ocean or through the forest—I remind myself that my story is also continuing. I’m not stagnant, time is passing, my pages are turning, and while there is a lot behind me, there’s even more in front of me.

You have to admit, any scene in an airport—whether you’re the one coming or going, picking up or dropping off, on the plane or waiting outside baggage claim—are tell-tale scenarios for significant moments to occur in both movies and life. For this reason, I am always sure to have tissues on hand when I get ready to fly.

Maybe these are cheesy examples, but I have found this little exercise of seeing my story play across a screen in my mind as a handy tool in grounding me in the present and honestly piques my interest about my own life. Perhaps, because I watch a movie expecting the plot to unfold and have meaning by the end, it’s helpful in not losing myself in the “what’s any of this even for” and “why are we here” questions of life. I want to stick with the story even when it gets difficult and things look bleak. I have to see the narrative through.

If we ever get to watch back our days and view the life we lived, I hope I have a lot of montages where I’m laughing a lot, trying again after I fail, petting all the dogs, tasting weird and exotic foods, giving generously without fear of running out, and growing daily beyond my comfort zone.

I hope I see myself on the screen living life as presently as I knew how. And if there happens to be a breathtaking scene where someone chases after me outside an airport terminal to profess their love and beg me not to move to Europe, so be it.