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In between the big moments of life, the moments that define our careers, the moments that change us, there are all these other countless small moments. And during these small moments there is a constant source of change: ourselves. We change because we grow older, we change because we learn new things, and we change because life forces us to adapt.
Life is more about the journey, not so much about arriving at the destination. For every high moment, there will be an equal low moment; for every happy ending there is also an unhappy beginning. Embracing and adapting to the unexpected changes in life makes one open and ready for anything that may come your way. The best way is by focusing on the present moment - right now. We can't avoid the uncertainty of life; it's not something we can control or predict in advance, but we can be prepared for change and adapt to uncertainty. Rather than getting caught up in worrying about what could happen or feeling sorry for yourself because things didn't turn out exactly as planned, just focus on what you're doing in this very moment.
What helps me is thinking about my feelings as an opportunity for growth rather than something negative that needs fixing immediately! The answers to the intricacies of life can't be found in any one thing; they can only be found by examining all the different paths we take in our lives and considering which ones got us where we are now and drew us closer to where we want to be in the future. I'm going to embrace these in-between moments. I'm not sure if that will make me any less troubled, but it will undoubtedly chisel away at the numerous labels I've unfairly given myself over the years.
Imagine a life full of more first moments, with a focus on the people, causes, and passions that matter most to you. It\u2019s within your grasp, but not without a bit of planning and effort. Our mission at Life and Whim is to help you create the space and time necessary to live big through small moments.
We are particularly passionate about children, and believe that the more time kids spend outside hiking in forests, skiing down mountains, and frolicking on beaches, the more they grow and prosper. First moments can happen anywhere, but we're especially interested in the ones that take place in nature. The great outdoors inspires greatness in all of us.
At Life and Whim, we want you to be completely satisfied with your order. If you want to return an item for any reason, we will gladly exchange, refund or give you credit for any item that is in unused and unwashed.
We offer free returns for 30 days. We ask that the items be unworn and unwashed. To process a return, email us at custome...@lifeandwhim.com. We will email you a free prepaid return shipping label. Repackage the returned items along with the packing slip in either the original shipping bag or packaging of your choice (make sure there are no other labels on it), and apply the shipping label. When we receive your return, we will credit your original form of payment, and send you an email to let you know it has been processed.
Then after you finished shooting the roll, you had to wait to get it developed before seeing your pictures. This created an element of excitement and anticipation. But inevitably, some of the pictures were disappointing, especially if you completely missed what you really wanted to capture.
I can look at beautiful pictures of all these locations on any number of web sites or in books. But seeing the pictures I took, many of them faded or out of focus, reminded me that I was lucky enough to see these places in person.
Pictures can help remind us of the people, places and things in our lives for which to be grateful. They are snapshots in time, frozen images that can come to life in our minds as we think back to when we took them and what we were doing at those moments.
Has anyone ever asked you what the craziest moment in your life is? Well, the average person probably spits back a response about the time they went skydiving or a time they experimented with drugs. My response is a little different.
My final semester in college, while taking a class about Bipolar Disorder, having been relatively recently diagnosed, I learned that hospitals diagnose many people with mental disorders. These labels, in turn, become pretty much impossible to tear away. Much like these labels are the labels we as Bipolar individuals put on the emotions and feelings we have when finding ourselves in extremes. Tearing away the emotions we feel when we are manic or depressed is simply impossible. Furthermore, in many cases, we find relief in these states of being, and sometimes wish to pursue them in order to find exactly what we are looking for in our own existence. These feelings and emotions are just too strong to ignore.
We live in the day and age of scrolling through life. Scrolling through trivial information and scrolling through deep and important information. We scroll past photo after photo and thought after thought and rarely pause to truly think about what we are seeing and reading. Information slides in and falls out as quickly as it came.
All photography is documenting something, of course, but documenting a scene as it is, as it was, and as it will always be within the frame poses a challenge for me that I enjoy as much as a portrait photographer revels in nailing the right expression.
For someone whose mind races around in circles most of the day, getting nowhere, documentary photography helps slow my thoughts down and almost forces me to notice the world around me, which I see as a good and welcome thing.
I love these. Also as it happens my first camera was an olympus Point and Shoot camera. I also am not a fan of posed photography. Something that always appealed to me about photography was that it makes you responsible for noticing moments that may otherwise be overlooked. Posed photography is the complete antithesis of that. Just my two cents. Great article.
I'm a mom, wife, writer, photographer, and former journalist. I write a little bit about a lot of things. I enjoy John Wayne and Cary Grant movies, Jan Karon's books, and I have an eclectic taste in music. Welcome to my blog and feel free to poke around. I'm also the author of nine books and a novella.
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While I haven't lived there in decades, it's always been my sacred fortress that I could retreat to whenever I chose for loving comfort and connections with my mother and father, usually over freshly roasted coffee, delicious homemade dinners, and Italian wine.
Not to mention, it was also a convenient place where I could store my high school and college memorabilia, childhood furniture, and a multitude of other items that my New York City and Philadelphia apartments couldn't afford the space for.
While we sorted through the beloved heirlooms that made up the rooms, fond memories came flooding back. It was as if each item was a magical key to the recesses of my mind where so many of my favorite childhood memories had also been stored for a long time.
It was also overwhelming at times. In addition to the positive emotions that were evoked by looking through cherished mementos, I also experienced what positive psychologists refer to as negative emotions: feelings such as sadness, loneliness, and fear.
There were lots of things to unload and let go of, and we no longer have a place for various pieces of furniture, beautiful ceramics, and random tchotchkes. The hardest things, though, to unpack were the emotional ones.
Luckily, I caught myself in this downward spiral of ruminating and realized I needed to stop these negative thoughts as they were only causing me to feel worse. I immediately redirected my attention to two things: what I was taught as a young child by my Mom (my faith) and what I learned later in life (positive psychology).
I first remembered the Serenity Prayer, which is inscribed on a decorative wooden cross that my dear mother gifted me years ago and that has been perched on my bedstand ever since. It reads as follows:
I also stumbled upon a Psychology Today post by our dear friend Rick Hanson that couldn't have come at a better time. It reminded me that there is a time for everything: beginnings, endings, and everything in between.
"This positive 'destroying,'" as he broadly calls it, "enables creating and preserving, as exhaling enables inhaling, or emptying a cup of something bitter enables filling it with something sweet. Dropping loads enables lightening up."
While I couldn't magically make my parents better or hold onto our beloved home forever, there were some science-based things I could do to help me in the moment and increase my overall well-being. I took the following three actions and suggest them to anyone else who might be experiencing a similar challenge:
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