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How Photography Can Help Cultivate Mindfulness

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The continental divide at the Arapaho Pass in the Rocky Mountains

 

The great thing about integrating mindfulness and photography is that you improve on your mindfulness and on your photography. When you are mindful while creating a photograph, it is called mindful photography. Mindful photography starts when you see things clearly and then it extends with the compositional and technical choices that you make. It also encourages you to align your eye, heart, and mind when you are taking the photographs and helps you to be completely present in the zone, in the eternal NOW.

 

The Top 7 reasons why you should try Mindful Photography and how photography can help you to cultivate your mindfulness:

 

1) See the subject as the camera would see it: When you align and become one with the camera, you just see light and the reflection of the light on your subject from various angles. You can then just start creating your photos and get into the zone. Don’t focus on aspects of the camera; just feel that the camera is a part of you.

2) Use the subject as an anchor: When we meditate, we focus on one aspect which helps us to clear out all distractions and free our mind from thoughts. We do this by either having breathing exercises or by repeating a word, a mantra. When we do mindful photography, forget about the rest of the world and only focus on the subject. We need to ignore the surrounding, the various sensations, distractions… instead, we need to feel what we see. When we engage in mindful photography, we focus everything on the subject.

3) Improve your photography skills: When we create photos mindfully, we focus on the aspects of making photos rather than any distractions. This improves our focus and our photography skills. Some of the best photographs you make are when you are in “The Zone”. This “Zone” is nothing other than being mindful when you are making photos.

4) Express emotions: Photography can be an amazing way to explore and express your emotions. When you are mindful while taking photos, start connecting with your buried emotions and feelings, these feelings and emotions can be expressed through your photography. Teaching convicts Mindful Photography helps them to connect with their emotions and helps them to re-integrate with society. Even giving children a beginner camera, helps them to express themselves and connect with their emotions. Mindful photography helps children in their emotional growth.

5) Self Enquiry: You can use mindful photography as a means to understand yourself. The more that you practice mindful photography and mindfulness in general, the more you start to discover yourself.

6) Letting go: One of the greatest problems that we have is that we hold on to negative thoughts and emotions. Negative thoughts keep playing in our mind. When we are mindful, we are aware of the feelings and thoughts that are constantly in our mind. When applying mindful photography, you can practice to dissolve distracting thoughts and focus on positive aspects.

7) Developing patience: We love photography and being a photographer. But like any skill, photography takes time.  Mindful photography allows you to focus on the “Now” rather than on how good your photographs will be and how well they will be received by an audience. This quality of patience will not only help you with photography but will also help you overall in life.

A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words

When you are mindfully practicing photography, you have an opportunity to clear your mind and objectively focus on the photographs that you are creating. You will react better to the changes in the light setting and visually changes in the environment that you are in.

When you focus on only one thing, you may begin to realize how busy your mind is and how much noise keeps filling it. As you keep practicing mindful photography, you become more aware of the habitual thinking of your mind. You also slowly get into the habit of being in the moment and focusing on your photography rather than focusing on other, mostly distracting or negative thoughts and beliefs.

 

Tips for Mindful Photography

The below tips are to calm your mind and to allow you to make impactful photographs no matter how great the distractions may be. You may be upset, angry, annoyed, fearful, frustrated, or confused. No matter what you feel, you can use the below tips to improve your focus and practice mindful photography.

  1. Make sure that your shooting mode is set up in advance. Even if you are using auto its fine. That way you can immediately and instinctively start making your images. You can also use aperture priority if you want more control.
  2. Oftentimes the view screen distracts us. We spend time checking what we have photographed. You can either switch it off or cover it so that you won’t look at the photos until the end of your creative sequence. This way you are in the moment and not distracted. You will focus and tune in to your actual feelings and emotions that are driving the photographs rather than focusing on clicking photographs.
  3. When you feel strong emotions welling up, set the mode on auto and shut off the view screen as suggested above and just go out walking. Go to any location that your mind and soul are drawn to, don’t look for photo opportunities, just pay attention to what you see, truly see.
  4. You will come across things that will catch your eye. Stop and look at it, move close, tighten the frame and freeze the image.
  5. Keep walking and keep repeating this.
  6. Click instinctively from the heart and don’t keep an attachment to the photos. Once you made the photo and started walking, don’t look back.
  7. Finish when you feel you are done for the day. Consider not looking at the photos that day, but the next. Then check the photos and watch as you try to recollect your feelings when you captured them.
  8. Keep working on this to improve in your ongoing quest for practicing mindful photography.

Afternoon storm cloud formation in the Annapurna range in the Himalayas of Nepal.

Afternoon storm cloud formation in the Annapurna range in the Himalayas of Nepal.

About the author: Dan Barr is a photographer, a parent to two girls, and the founder of KidsCameraGuide.com, a blog which is all about teaching photography to kids and kids cameras. You can visit Dan at his websitewww.kidscameraguide.com

Photographs provided by Marian Kraus, a European born, Chicago based commercial and fine art photographer. You can see more at his website www.mariankrausphotography.com

 


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