Understand the stories around you. Author the one you’re in.
Ever feel like you’ve drifted off course?
Story lights the way.
It helps us see where we are, where we’ve been, and where we can go next.
I’m Michael, a writer working at the intersection of cinema, literature, and a nomadic life. The Lighthouse brings all three worlds together. It’s for creatives and curious minds navigating those liminal moments when one chapter closes and another begins.
Here, we publish field notes from that journey roughly 1 - 2 times a month, with reflections on how stories shape us - and how we shape them - across three arenas:
Stories in media. Film analysis that sharpens insight, empathy, and craft, helping us see how stories explain a culture to itself.
Stories from new places. Dispatches from my life lived across borders, offering new lenses on creativity, culture, and identity.
Stories from the day-to-day. Essays on the thresholds we all face, exploring creative blocks, life pivots, endings, reinventions, and the choices that define us.
Because story isn’t just entertainment. It’s how we make sense of our lives.
If we don’t, then someone else will do it for us. We risk accepting unconscious scripts we never chose, or stagnating as a version of ourselves we no longer recognize.
I know I’ve been there. Maybe you have, too. At some point, everyone gets lost in the plot, creatively, personally, or both. It can look like this:
Writing draft 40-something of a screenplay in development.
Drifting through the wreckage of failed or flailing projects.
Wondering where the spark has gone and how to get it back.
Wishing you knew more people on the same wavelength.
Questioning if you’re on the right path or if there’s a different way.
Picking up the pieces of a broken relationship.
Starting over in a new country, on a different continent - again.
So pull up a chair.
Let’s reflect, reorient, and reclaim the stories we’re telling, on the page and in our lives.
I’ve spent the past fifteen years helping people make sense of their stories.
First as a travel videographer shooting around the world. Then as the director of Lights Film School (RIP), where I helped thousands develop their work for the screen. And now as a screenwriter, novelist, and mentor living and working cross-culturally.
I develop screenplays on commission and on spec, including The Dirty Oyster, an Austin Film Festival Finalist now in development with Echobend Pictures in Los Angeles. I’m also in the midst of writing my first novel, House of Snow, a journey I’ve been documenting here at The Lighthouse to inspire fellow creatives.
I consult one-on-one with creatives, founders, and other curious humans, too. No matter the medium, every important work begins with a story someone is trying to tell.
And you don’t have to figure it out alone.
What makes The Lighthouse different?
More than a publication, The Lighthouse is a global, interdisciplinary conversation that supports a rich inner life. People have shared that they leave with clearer direction, sharper creative instincts, and a stronger sense of where their work and life are headed. Many describe The Lighthouse as a sort of refuge that gives them:
Language for transitions
Renewed creativity
Frameworks for better storytelling
Companionship through uncertainty
A sense of light and belonging
Connection across distance
Courage to make the next move
A different way of seeing and moving through the world
This is a place to think deeply, ask better questions, and follow the thread that pulls you toward your next chapter. It’s where we can meet and find the way through, together - alongside 15,000+ others in 140+ countries, from New York to Kathmandu.
In a world where story shrapnel are attacking from all directions, with each one attempting to bamboozle my brain into attention, it is very soothing to listen to your gentle invitation to share in your experience… With what feels like a sincere and humble empathy… you reveal small and simple, yet rich and often overlooked, experiences which remind us of how big and round the world is, and how little I really know of it.” - Danielle C.
“I love what you’re doing with The Lighthouse… It’s such a great way to offer deep thought, information, and analysis.” - Lauren H.
“Somehow you are writing and thinking about the same things we have been wrestling with… I believe that we human beings understand and process life through story, and that we need stories to keep understanding it better. Thank you for your work!” - Victoria B.
If you’re curious, here’s where most people start:
🧶 Stories in Media
The Opening Pages of HOUSE OF SNOW. A first look at my novel-in-progress, after a year of research, rewriting, and reckoning.
On DUNE: PART TWO. A blockbuster film analysis exploring imperial spectacle and viewer complicity.
On THE BRUTALIST. A deep dive into awards-season craft and the tension between art and commerce.
🗺️ Stories from New Places
Exploring the Roof of the World. A travelogue people love. Bundle up and trek with me through The Himalayas of Nepal.
The Best Fabrics for Travel. A nomad’s guide to packing light and surviving (almost) any climate, in style.
🧭 Stories from the Day-to-Day
The Search for the Ninth Path. On finding a way of life that makes sense for you, whether or not it’s a road well-traveled.
The Plot Against You. SEVERANCE and the work that’s truly “mysterious and important” in your life.
Waking the Wind Fish. Finding the courage to let go.
This is your invitation to live a little more mythically. I’d love for you to join us!
If you’re navigating a creative pivot and want a focused 1:1 conversation, I offer free storytelling consults. We talk projects, direction, & how to shape your next chapter.
