July 29, 2026
Storytelling is probably one of the most important tools out there to hook your listeners and to keep them engaged.
But a lot of the advice that is out there makes it sound so complicated.
What I want to tell you is storytelling is actually pretty simple if you know what matters.
Let’s look at a short clip by Leonardo DiCaprio. You all know who that is.
And then see if you can tell what makes the story so special.
“I was on a plane to Russia and the engine exploded.
I was looking out the window and the entire engine just turned into a fireball. I was the only person there that seemed to see this, but it was a flaming fireball.
I kind of felt like I’d already died and gone to heaven cuz no one said anything. And I was screaming at the top of my lungs, ‘What the hell is going on here?’
And the stewardess came out and said, ‘We seem to have a a slight problem here.’
And the Russian guy finally said, ‘What is the problem?’
I said, ‘Well, we lost one of our engines.’
He goes, ‘How many engines did we have?’
I said, ‘Well, we had two.’
‘Now we have one.'”
All right. Leonardo DiCaprio tells such an incredible story because he zooms into the moment.
Let me show you what that means.
Most of us, we tell stories like this:
“Well, I had a problem. It was very difficult, but then I overcame it and yeah, now it’s done.”
This is how 99% of the people tell stories. In the most high-level way possible, summarizing, not going into the details.
Leonardo DiCaprio didn’t just say, “Oh yes, I had a plane accident or the engines stopped working.”
No, no. He zoomed into the moment.
So, the best storytellers, they go into one specific moment.
They look them in the face.
They show us the emotions behind it.
They zoom into one specific moment.
That is the absolute most important thing when it comes to storytelling.
Nothing is more important than that.
Now, in case you’re wondering, “How can I do this?” It’s actually surprisingly simple and I want to show you how.
Let’s use Carolina as an example. She was a volunteer in my workshop.
I asked Carolina to think about a moment where she messed up. Could be small, could be big, could be at work, could be outside of work.
Then I asked her to give us the one sentence summary:
“The moment when I fight with my boss. And I was fired.”
Wow, that’s a big moment there. The moment that she fought with her boss and was fired.
“Okay, now what I’d like you to do is to relive that moment. So for that, if you want to close your eyes real quick, take a deep breath in.”
“And now when you go back to this moment, tell us where you are.”
“I was in his office and he asked me something that was not supposed to be for me to do.
So I was really, really angry and I thought, ‘He doesn’t have the right of doing it.’
So I start fighting for my position and he tells me that I am too young to have such big opinions.
Technically, I couldn’t be fired, but I was. I don’t know how.
He was so angry with me that he made a movement that allowed him to do it.
So when I realized that, I was like, ‘F*ck.'”
Now did you see what she did?
Carolina was just reliving the moment. I didn’t even have to guide anything.
Usually I have to give some more guidance, but Carolina was already into the zone.
And so if you think about how you can tell an interesting story, it’s about closing your eyes and going back to the moment.
Where are you?
What are you seeing?
What are you doing?
What are you hearing?
You share the dialogue.
You share what was going on in your mind.
That is storytelling.
It’s just about reliving the moment.
Let’s do the same exercise that we did with Carolina, but I’ll give you some more prompts.
But for that, just close your eyes now for a second.
Also, take a deep breath in.
And now think about a moment where you messed up, where you had some sort of problem.
That can be small, big, any type of moment. It doesn’t matter for this.
Now, I want you to see where are you?
What are you seeing?
What is happening?
See it unfold in front of your eyes.
Is there maybe another person?
What does that person say to you?
What are you thinking?
Okay, that’s it. You can open your eyes again.
Now, keep that memory right now on top, and I want you to turn to your neighbor.
And for 30 to 60 seconds, I just want you to share that same memory that right now popped into your mind.
I want you to share that with a neighbor.
And exactly how it was like. Where are you? You describe it.
What’s going on through your mind?
All those details that you just heard, well, share that with a neighbor.
So, share this one challenge or this one time where you messed up.
A lot of people overthink storytelling, that you always have to have the perfect story with the perfect arc.
Hey, just take any challenge and tell me what you learned from that, and that is a great story.
That’s it.
Don’t think that you have to have the 17 steps of the hero’s journey in order to change someone’s life.
No.
Zooming into the moment, is the single most important thing.
Reliving it, what you just did in this exercise, helps you get there.
But, I know a few of you, same as I, you want some sort of technique behind it, right?
I’m German, and I love technique.
So, how can you zoom into the moment?
It’s by a framework I call P.A.S.T or past.
The first technique is called place.
What you want to do as soon as possible when you get into your story, is state the location or state the place.
Now, why does it matter so much?
Because the moment you share the location, a movie starts playing in your head.
When I say kitchen, you start thinking, “Oh, I can see a kitchen.”
You’re into the story already and it’s so easy a movie starts playing there.
For example, I can say,
“Hey, 2 weeks ago, I’m in my apartment in Lisbon sitting on the couch.”
You start imagining then a certain couch.
Or for example,
“Hey, I’m standing in front of the conference room taking a deep breath.”
And then again, you’re like, “Hmm, I think I’ve seen a conference room before.”
And you start picturing it.
Now, does it matter whether I describe it in detail?
It doesn’t, right?
Because a lot of storytellers, especially at the start, are told to, “Appeal to all the five senses.”
And then people are like, “Oh, it was a sunny afternoon in Lisbon, birds were chirping, smell the lavender in the air.”
And they go into all those details which are completely useless for stories.
So, just state the place as soon as possible and get into it.
That brings me to the second one, which is action.
Leonardo DiCaprio’s story started straight into the action, right?
Boom, you’re in the plane, something is happening.
If we look at your story as a line, this is the big moment at the end, right?
That’s the most emotional moment, that’s the challenge that you’re facing.
Then we have all these small moments that came before.
So, for an example, let’s say the moment that you share is about having this conversation with your boss, right?
So, that could be this big moment.
And then maybe you started your career here, then maybe here you got a nice promotion, then maybe something else happens.
Now most people start all the way at the beginning, right?
Where do you think you should start?
Start as close to the challenge as possible.
All that other stuff, cut it ruthlessly because I know so many people are like, “Oh, here’s the company history and all the things that I did before.”
No, no, no.
You want to get as close to the challenge as possible.
You want to get to the juicy stuff as quickly as possible.
Trust that your fellow human beings will figure out the context.
Most times they will.
So, what are some examples of actions?
It could be:
“Hey, I’m in my apartment. I open my laptop, 200 notifications pop up. F*ck.”
Right?
That could be into the action.
Or:
“Hey, I’m at the airport putting my bag in the security belt when someone calls my name.”
Boom, immediately into the action.
And so, you want to start with those verbs. With that forward momentum.
That’s how you get into the action.
Let’s then talk about the next one.
This one is actually my favorite.
Now, often times our stories will have more than one character, right?
And when you share about that other character, what do most people say?
They are like, “Well, I had a conversation with my boss and he was very frustrated with me.”
They just summarize it.
But the best storytellers, they quote that person.
So, they say:
“Hey, right in this moment my manager looked at me and he said, ‘Philip, that presentation we can’t do this. This is terrible.'”
I share the exact words of that moment.
The technique is called speech or dialogue.
And so, anytime that your story has more than one character, share the exact words of that moment.
What was that person saying in that moment?
What were the exact words?
Quote that person.
Dialogue or speech is the most powerful way or easiest way to bring your story to life because it immediately takes us into the vivid moment.
If you want to make the story a tiny bit more juicy, well, then pick dialogue that is slightly more exciting there.
And so, yes, we want to be as truthful as possible as storytellers, but sometimes we also don’t remember, right?
I don’t remember what someone said a year ago.
So, there you can use the words that could have been used in that moment.
And you can also make it maybe slightly more concise and slightly more juicy.
This one is a technique that I use all the time.
So, anytime that you have another person in there, use the speech or use the dialogue of that moment.
It works really, really well.
Let’s now talk about the last technique, and that technique is called thoughts.
Bad storytellers, they just describe the situation where they’re like, “Hey, I had a conversation with my boss and it was tough.”
Right?
That’s what they do.
Amateur storytellers, they go already one step above that, and they say, “Hey, I was very nervous in that moment.”
Which is good, right?
They’re sharing an emotion, but they don’t fully take us there yet.
The best storytellers, they share what they were thinking at that moment.
So, they don’t just say, “Ah, I was nervous in that moment.”
But, they say:
“I thought, oh man, this is going to be the worst presentation of my life. People will walk out of this and will laugh at me.”
So, they share whatever is going on in their mind.
And that’s what you want to have more and more in your story.
It’s to share what was going on in your mind.
If I sometimes look at my stories, I think my stories are usually 90% just sharing the thoughts and then some other stuff.
But, usually the thoughts are what makes you connect to other people.
So, if you want to make it more emotional, that’s the way to go there.
Speech is outer dialogue, what you speak to the outside world, or what you hear.
And thoughts is inner dialogue.
I know some of us, at least to the outside, we often try to sound as sophisticated, as smart as possible.
But, when you share those thoughts, the more raw they are, the more interesting it will be.
Let’s take a look at one more short clip from former President Barack Obama.
Then see whether you spot all the different elements that we used before.
“I open up the curtains. It’s pouring down rain outside. Pouring down rain.
Horrible day.
I make myself some coffee and I get the newspaper outside my door and open it up.
There’s a bad story about me in the New York Times.
I get dressed, shave, walk out, just kind of still groggy, still staggering.
My umbrella blows open. Did that ever happen to you?
As I’m walking out, and I get soaked.
Soaked. I’m just soaked.
I get in the car.
I said,
‘All right, how long is it going to take to Greenwood?’
‘An hour and a half.’
‘An hour and a half.’
So, we’re driving and we’re driving and we’re driving.
Doesn’t seem like we’re going anywhere.
Sheets of rain are pouring down.
So, I’m about to make my pitch. I’m trying to muster myself up. Let me make the best of this.
I’m going to do it quick and then I’m going to get out of here.
And suddenly, I hear this voice from the back just shout, ‘Fired up.’
And everybody in the room says, ‘Fired up.’
And then I hear the voice say, ‘Ready to go.’
And everybody in the room says, ‘Ready to go.’
And I don’t know what’s going on.”
All right. What did you observe?
Where are we? How does it start? What’s the place?
Boom.
In his apartment, right? We immediately enter it.
We know exactly where.
I obviously have never been to this place, but I can see him right now in his apartment.
Action. Tons of action, right? Everything is like, “Ah, the umbrella.”
Tons of action throughout.
What’s the speech? “Fired up.” “Ready to go.”
Good speech in there as well.
What about thoughts?
“And I thought I would do the speech quickly.”
There were some thoughts here.
And then, repetition of when he said, “Oh, an hour and a half to drive.”
That was also going on in his mind.
I think this one is probably the strongest on the actions, right?
The actions are very, very precise.
Very, very vivid.
This is also just a reminder:
I know oftentimes in storytelling you think, “Well, we have seven minutes to tell a story.”
It’s great.
But oftentimes, when we share a story in front of friends, in front of co-workers, you can do that in 60 seconds.
You can do that in 30 seconds.
In 90 seconds.
And tell the most incredible story out there.
So, I would actually encourage you, when you tell your story, train yourself.
How can you tell the most magnetic stories in the shortest time possible?
With the single most important thing when it comes to storytelling:
Zooming into the one moment.
You just relive the memory and you share it out loud.
And if you want to have it more technical, you focus on PAST.
So, zoom into the past.
Place. Action. Speech. Thoughts.
And if you want more tips on how to become a magnetic storyteller, check out this next article.
See you there.
P.S. Want to become a stronger communicator?
Here are two ways I can support you:
👉 Want to tell more engaging stories? Join our next Storytelling Workshop.
👉 Want to speak with confidence and clarity? Check out our Communication Skills Training.
Both are fun, practical, and designed to help you grow fast.
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