The Film-making Process

I prefer not to ‘direct’.

Instead, I follow people on a journey of exploration whose course and direction they are ultimately in charge of.

The journey starts with a minute of rested silence. It allows people to center themselves and become fully present in the room.

Then, when they feel ready, they simply begin. Sometimes, people come with a specific purpose in mind. An entrepreneur wants to create a promotional film for her website; an organizational leader wants to articulate her vision to a team; a grandparent wants to create a legacy film for his grandchildren to watch when they are older.

Even in these cases, though, people will often stray from story they came prepared to tell. They relax and allow themselves to speak from some radically different place within themselves. It is a place of deep stillness, a place of and quiet and unhurried knowing. It is a 'backcountry' place in the human heart they may never have visited before.

Those with the courage and the willingness to stay in this quiet place within will often surprise themselves. They overhear themselves speaking truths they may never have articulated before.

Truths about who they really are, and perhaps have always been.

Truths about what they really want, and perhaps have always wanted.

Truths that have the power to free them from an old story and let them begin one that is new.

I don’t interpret. I don’t presume to know where someone needs to go next. In fact, I say little if anything at all. My only focus is on paying full, undivided attention as people explore their own way forward.

After filming I review the footage in my studio, and spend the following weeks editing it into a short film that captures the essence of the journey the person has just taken.

I then share the film with clients by Dropbox. I invite them to watch it several times on their own.  Doing so often reveals people to themselves in a profoundly new way. It is as powerful as the original experience of being filmed. For the first time, people have the opportunity to witness themselves as they summon the courage to say out loud what they really want and what they truly feel. They can encounter themselves showing up in in the world in a way they may never have before.

My goal is to create this experience where people can feel truly seen and heard both by themselves and by others; we get too few chances to do this in life, and having the opportunity to do so in a safe, caring environment with a film to show for it at the end is a unique and special experience.