Oh hey, Val.

How's it goin'?

You know what? I'm—I'm havin' a really bad day.

What happened?

See, what Val's saying when she says, "What happened?" is: "Tell me a story."

And that's actually what this season of Pixar in a Box is all about.

To make a movie here at Pixar takes years, but it all starts with a story.

Humans have been telling stories since we could speak, probably even before.

We tell stories around the campfire.

We write plays, we write novels, short stories.

We make movies, we take photographs, tweet to each other.

The list goes on.

The power of story is that it has an ability to connect with people on an emotional level.

One of the things you hear all the time, this advice is "write what you know".

Now, as a kid, I was like, "I don't want to write about suburban Minnesota. It's boring.

I wanna write about explosions and monsters and car chases."

Well, what that actually means is:

"Yeah, go ahead and write about monsters and explosions and car chases,

but put something into it that talks about your own life, how you feel."

Do you feel scared?

Do you feel alone?

Something from your own life will make that story come alive and not just be a boring car chase.

When I started directing Monsters, Inc., the way I'd pitch it is:

"It's about a monster who scares kids for a living. That's his job.

He clocks in, he clocks out, he eats donuts and talks about union dues."

And we thought that was a pretty funny idea.

And sure enough, when I would tell it to people, they would smile.

But when we told the story as a film,

people started getting bored and restless, and they're like, "I don't understand what this movie's about."

Well, what I finally figured out was that it's actually not about a monster who scares kids;

it's about a man becoming a father.

That was what was happening to me.

So, why write about what you know?

Well, it's because probably what happened to you made you feel some particular way.

And what you're trying to do really, when you tell a story, is to get the audience to have that same feeling.

One of the big revelations for me telling stories is how much work they are, really.

I always thought you would just tell the story once, and it would be perfect.

And geniuses like Walt Disney or Miyazaki—

this brilliance comes out of their head once, and there it is.

Well the truth is, our stories don't always come out exactly perfectly the first time,

or the second time, or the third time,

or the fourth time, up to the 30th time.

And so you keep going again and again and again,

and only after retelling the story many many times does it really sparkle.

This season of Pixar in a Box is about how we at Pixar tell our stories in hopes that it will inspire you to tell yours.

But, seriously, what happened?

Oh, oh, so the first thing.

I get to my desk, right?

It's eight o'clock in the morning....