As a new year begins, I find myself taking stock. Of what was accomplished. Of what was lost. And what we're carrying forward with intention.
This edition of The STORYSMART® Way reflects that mindset.
Our feature explores how moments of loss can reset priorities.
Our Media Lens examines the power and responsibility of those who shape industry narratives from the inside.
Our recent Storytelling for ALL™ articles explore meaning, memory, and shared sacrifice.
I’m grateful you’re here, especially at a busy time of year that always arrives with a mix of urgency and ambition.
While deadlines don’t pause and momentum matters, remember that reflection is often where the next chapter truly begins.
1. Feature Article
When Death Hits The Reset Button
When I saw the headline about Rob Reiner, I felt that familiar internal jolt. I stopped. I stared at the screen. I let the weight of it settle before my mind immediately went to reflection.
I have a photo of Rob Reiner on a shelf in my living room (the one you see above). We met once, briefly, nearly two decades ago. It was one of those special moments that, with the passage of time, has become something else entirely.
Not because of fame, but because of what that moment now carries with it: memory, absence, and the quiet accumulation of loss.
Even though he isn’t in it, the photo reminds me of my friend Marty Hendin who died shortly after.
The news of Reiner’s death triggered memories of Marty, a reflection on addiction, and sadly, in the weeks following, a host of other complicated emotions compounded by our family coping with a profound loss of our own. On Christmas Eve, my father-in-law Mick McLaughlin died.
This year, Variety turns 120. In an industry built on reinvention, that kind of longevity is rare. Trade publications don’t survive for more than a century by accident.
They endure because they become indispensable, not just as chroniclers of an industry, but as part of its infrastructure.
Variety has helped shape Broadway, film, television, and music for generations. It has documented the business of entertainment while quietly helping define what that business values, rewards, and amplifies.
That’s the paradox at the heart of industry press: it presents itself as an observer, but it operates as a participant. It covers the industry it depends on; and in doing so, inevitably influences it.
