Donald Miller

Details one man's opportunity to edit his life as if he were a character in a movie, challenging readers to reconsider what they strive for in life and revealing how to get a second chance at life the first time around.

What I Learned While Editing My Life

A Million Miles in a Thousand Years

Full of beautiful, heart-wrenching, and hilarious stories, A Million Miles in a Thousand Years details one man's opportunity to edit his life into a better story. Years after writing a best-selling memoir, Donald Miller went into a funk and spent months sleeping in and avoiding his publisher. One story had ended, and Don was unsure how to start another. But he gets rescued by two movie producers who want to make a movie based on his memoir. When they start fictionalizing Don's life for film-changing a meandering memoir into a structured narrative-the real-life Don starts a journey to edit his actual life into a better story. A Million Miles in a Thousand Years details that journey and challenges readers to reconsider what they strive for in life. It shows how to get a second chance at life the first time around.

How I Learned to Live a Better Story

Claudine

Aksara Alpha

This book is very interesting. I learn not only about how to make a better story of our live and make it meaningful, but also how to make and write a better story on paper. 
"If what we choose to do with our life won't make a story meaningful, it won't make a life meaningful either" is a great quote that I want to keep in my mind :)

Sonja H

Das Buch begann recht vielversprechend und anfangs habe ich einige Stellen markiert. Der Gedanke, dass das Leben eine (er-)lebbare Geschichte ist, die man selbst aktiv gestalten kann/sollte, ist sehr gut und regt zum Nachdenken an. Doch irgendwann driftet der Autor ins Religöse und dann in Erzählungen ab. Ich hatte das Gefühl, er habe den roten Faden ein wenig verloren. 
Ein paar Ideen nehme ich mit, allerdings ist das kein Buch, das man gelesen haben muss.

Marcella Chamorro

Amazing book on stories and life. A must-read.

Also, short. Most things don't need to be long to be great.

Stacey 

I didn't know what this book was when I bought it in 2015. I bought the wrong book four years ago and it has been in my to be read pile since then. I planned after spring semester of school, that I would read the eight books in my to be read pile. I have one book left now! I didn't want to read this book but I was determined to complete the pile. Though, when I started reading it didn't feel like a chore. Again, I had no idea what this was about. I didn't know that God was going to be mentioned as much as He was. I'm not very big on God. Despite this, it was a nice and new perspective on God for me. This book is self help mixed with an adventurous outdoor story. I felt moved and connected but lost at times. There are many themes that felt very real, like the characters in one's life, to stop daydreaming, and showing up for life. I'm happy that I finally read this book. Maybe there is a reason why I accidentally picked it up and kept it for four years! It there was... it would be very fitting.

After writing a successful memoir, Donald Miller's life stalled. During what should have been the height of his success, he found himself unwilling to get out of bed, avoiding responsibility, even questioning the meaning of life. But when two movie producers proposed turning his memoir into a movie, he found himself launched into a new story filled with risk, possibility, beauty, and meaning. A Million Miles in a Thousand Years chronicles Miller's rare opportunity to edit his life into a great story, to reinvent himself so nobody shrugs their shoulders when the credits roll. Through heart-wrenching honesty and hilarious self-inspection, Donald Miller takes readers through the life that emerges when it turns from boring reality into meaningful narrative. Miller goes from sleeping all day to riding his bike across America, from living in romantic daydreams to fearful encounters with love, from wasting his money to founding a nonprofit with a passionate cause. Guided by a host of outlandish but very real characters, Miller shows us how to get a second chance at life the first time around. A Million Miles in a Thousand Years is a rare celebration of the beauty of life.

Danica Holdaway

This book recharged my batteries and got me to take a look at my life and what I want. We DO have the opportunity to "edit" or rewrite our lives at any given point, and what a gift that is!

Adam

I love the power of a personal vision, story or goal. Whether in a job or my personal life, I feel lost without one. Donald Miller comes at this idea from a perspective I’ve never seen before - by learning how to write a good story and applying that to his own life. 

What could have been a dry, goal oriented book is actually a hilarious, fun, brilliantly written autobiography. I loved how Miller recognized and wrote about the littlest moments and somehow jumped around time without it seeming out of place.

His take on advertising was brought back to stories too:

Advertising and marketing try to sell us a story that by buying their products, OUR story will match their perfect one.

If you can live a better story, there is no reason to buy into someone else’s. Find a story you want to live and live it.

A Million Miles in a Thousand Years What I Learned While Editing My Life

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