A key skill in making a film, including documentaries, is what to leave out. You have about 2 hours to tell a story, but most films cover a period of time that is longer than 2 hours, so everything is cut out that does not contribute to the story we are wanting to tell. Similarly when we recall going on an adventure, going to an amusement park, a hike, a canoe trip, a car ride, we leave most of the experience out when we tell our family and friends the story about it.

The stories we tell, the books we write, the films we make, are about the peaks and troughs of life, not the space between them. And yet, most of our lives is lived in the space between.

And yet, because the stories we tell, the books we read, the films we make are about the peaks and troughs, we reinforce the idea that the everyday is boring, unnecessary, and somehow not wanted or needed.

It is in the everyday that culture is created, reinforced, where norms become rules, and habits are formed. Drip by drip by drip; people like us, do things like this. So when we want to create change, perhaps we shouldn’t look to the films and the heroic, but rather consider the everyday spaces between.

Photo by Kevin Grieve