The Inner Path of Photography

One doesn’t discover new lands

without consenting to lose sight of the shore

for a very long time.

– Andre Gide

Image: “Sailing the Unknown”
© 2014, Heidi Straube

When our spirits first imagine them, the lure of new experiences, grand adventures, and making amazing life changes can be very compelling. Seduced and enthusiastic, we decide to take the journey.

Some of us research, plan, set the course. Others leap into the experience and create direction as events unfold.

Either way there is often the illusion that we can always come back to the familiar, the place from where we left.

But true sailing the Unknown has no guarantees. There are highs. There are lows. The winds come up and blow us to places that aren’t on the charts, and we have to correct direction, or choose a new destination – sometimes temporary, other times permanent.

Even if we return to from where we left, we are changed. We have had to draw on courage, trust. We have had to conquer fears we didn’t even know existed before we took the voyage.

Surrendering to the experience, we expand, we flex, we deepen. We become different inside, even if those who we return to see us as the same. The new people we meet on the way are unaware they are seeing a changed person, even from a month before. We are living life from a new place.

When we sail well, we allow life to pierce us, caress us, challenge, uplift us. Throughout, we retain our hearts, our core beings. We nurture and grow the beauty of our souls. And we allow our inner beauty to shine through our actions, thankful to be in this world and on this journey.

To those who find themselves in the Unknown, discovering new lands, whether by choice or circumstance:

I wish you courage, compassion, strength and love.

If you are unable to see the shore – if you feel discouragement, fear, or aloneness –

I wish you the qualities of trust, relaxation, and peace. Yours is a deep and brave quest.

May you find your inner stillness that comes with the beauty of the sail.

Heidi

If you need some nurturing today, perhaps you’ll find grace in my reading of my photo-poem, “Surrender.” The poem and photograph, with the audio link at the end, can be found here.
Other photo poems and mini-meditations can be found here on this blog.