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By Mihar Dias October 2026
There is a curious thing about writing. You can spend years telling people what you think about the world, only to discover that some of them are more interested in what you can do with their own stories.
My recent column on Newswav attracted attention from an unexpected quarter. Readers began approaching me with an intriguing proposition: would I consider telling their stories?
That got me thinking.
After more than five decades of writing, teaching, consulting and observing human behaviour, perhaps it is time to put my experience to another use. Instead of merely writing about people, I could write about their lives.
Not a bad idea for an 80-year-old who has accumulated enough stories to fill several lifetimes.
And before anyone asks, no, I have not suddenly developed an interest in writing fairy tales. I have spent too long in management consulting to believe that real life needs much embellishment. Human beings are already sufficiently imaginative when it comes to creating their own dramas.
Everybody has a story. Not everybody knows how to tell it.
Some people have built businesses from nothing. Others have survived setbacks that would have defeated people with considerably more advantages. There are men and women whose contributions have gone largely unnoticed, families with remarkable histories, professionals who have changed lives, and ordinary Malaysians who have done extraordinary things without expecting applause.
Then there are people who have lived fascinating lives but cannot quite find the words to explain what made those lives meaningful.
That is where a professional writer comes in.
I have spent more than five decades as a management consultant, educator, columnist and student of human behaviour. I have worked with hundreds of organisations, advised executives, taught organisational behaviour and watched people reveal their true characters when confronted with power, money, ambition, failure and opportunity.
I have also spent years writing columns about the contradictions, absurdities and occasional brilliance of the human condition.
My work has not been confined to newspaper-style commentary. My textbook received the Public Bank–Linguistic Society of Malaysia Best Textbook Award. My short story won the Write Tales Australia Best Short Story Award. As Mihar Dias, I have received Newswav Creator of the Year and other creator awards, including its Golden Milestone Award for surpassing five million views.
My Newswav readership has since grown to more than 7.7 million views. I have written more than 3,000 columns since 2022.
Clearly, I have not been sitting around waiting for inspiration to knock on my door.
I have also written two biographical works: Unfinished Judgment and Unfinished Verdict. These projects reinforced something I have long believed: recording a person's life is not merely a matter of assembling dates, appointments, achievements and photographs. It requires finding the human being behind the public identity.
What did the person believe? What did he struggle with? What decisions changed the course of his life? What did he sacrifice? What would he do differently if given another chance?
These are the questions that turn a chronology into a compelling story.
A biography tells the story of another person's life. An autobiography is written by the person who lived it. A memoir concentrates on the experiences, relationships and defining moments that gave that life its particular meaning.
All three demand more than elegant sentences. They require curiosity, patience, empathy, careful questioning, research and the ability to distinguish an interesting anecdote from an important truth.
Most importantly, the writer must know how to listen.
People do not always tell their most revealing stories in the order in which they happened. Sometimes the most significant event is the one they mention almost casually. Sometimes a lifetime of achievement conceals a private disappointment. And sometimes the story a person wants to tell is not quite the story that needs to be told.
My job would be to help uncover that story, organise it, verify the facts and turn it into a manuscript that family members, colleagues, future generations and the wider public would want to read.
This would be a professional writing service, not a charitable exercise in flattering egos. Research, interviews, drafting, revisions and manuscript preparation require time and expertise. Fees would reflect the scope and complexity of each project, agreed upon before work begins.
There is also a larger reason for doing this.
We spend considerable money acquiring possessions that eventually wear out, become obsolete or are forgotten. Yet we sometimes hesitate to preserve the experiences, lessons and memories that explain who we are and how we got here.
A well-written life story can become a family legacy. It can preserve institutional memory, document a business journey, record the struggles behind an achievement or offer younger generations lessons that no textbook can fully teach.
At my age, I have little interest in pretending that I know everything. But I have lived long enough to know that every life contains something worth examining. The trick is finding it and telling it well.
So I am opening a new chapter in my writing career.
If you have a life story worth preserving, a business journey worth documenting, a parent whose experiences deserve to be remembered, or a personal memoir you have always wanted to write, let us talk.
You bring the life. I will bring the questions, the experience and the words.
My service has a simple name: I Write Scripts.
Your Life. My Words. A Lasting Story.
Because one day, the people who remember your story may no longer be around to tell it.
And that would be a terrible ending to a perfectly good life.
Mihar Dias (mihardias@gmail.com) is a content creator under the Newswav Creator programme, where you get to express yourself, be a citizen journalist, and at the same time monetize your content & reach millions of users on Newswav. Log in to creator.newswav.com and become a Newswav Creator now!
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