i read: A Million Miles in a Thousand Years

As part of my weekly goal setting using irunurun, I have been trying to read more regularly. I used to be someone who took ages to finish a book, and often lost interest because it was taking me so long. Well last week I finished a great book and I wanted to share a little about it with you as it impacted me so much.



Donald Miller is a lovely creative writer, and i have read a few of his books. His latest book "A Million Miles in a Thousand Years" was such an empowering and challenging story I wanted to share a little about it on here, to inspire you to go read it as well.

To give you a little back story, back in 2003 Donald Miller wrote a book "Blue like Jazz" about his life story. This went on to become pretty popular, and Miller got contacted about making the book into a movie, which will be released next year. "A Million Miles in a Thousand Years" picks up where Miller is editing his book to become the screenplay for the movie. To book follows Miller as he learns about 'what makes a good story' and how he implemented these writing theories into the way he lived his life.

Miller writes...

“We have to force ourselves to create these scenes. We have to get up off the couch and turn the television off, we have to blow up the inner-tubes and head to the river."

This may sound a little weird, but trust me, this book is full of inspiring stories of people Miller met, getting off their couch and beginning to really live life. Sometimes in life we need a little kick up the butt, to shake us up and not get complacent. To realise we need to seek adventure and not wait for a great life to come to us.

The following is a paragraph that really resonated with me about conflict...

"I was watching the news the other night, and they were still covering that story in Mumbai about the terrorists who when on a shooting ramage. The man on the news said that before the terrorists killed the Jews in the Jewish centre, they tortured them. I had to turn off the television, because I could see the torture in my head the way they were describing it. I kept imagining these people, just living their daily lives, and then having them suddenly ended in unjust tragedy. When we watch the news, we grieve all of this, but when we go to the movies, we want more of it. Somehow we realize that great stories are told in conflict, but we are unwilling to embrace the potential greatness of the story we are in.
We think God is unjust, rather than a master storyteller.

So, go on, go read "A Million Miles in a Thousand Years" by Donald Miller.
-kim

ps. if you have read this book, i would love to know your thoughts. comment below and let me know what you thought of this book.