So it’s taken me a lot of years to figure out that the degree to which I experience joy is always directly proportional to the level of appreciation flowing through me in any given moment. Greater appreciation, greater joy. Little or no appreciation, little or no joy. It’s always in the present tense, and it has to be genuine. But it doesn’t have to be big. Finding some small thing, anything at all, that I can focus on and feel gratitude for, is enough to turn sadness into gladness. It can miraculously transform poverty of mind into abundance of spirit.

Understanding this concept and wanting more than anything to feel the headiness that a heart full of appreciation brings, I aspire to reach for gratitude as often as possible. But it can be difficult when the world seems bent on our noticing what’s wrong or what’s missing, and proclaiming “different” to be ugly and bad.

I am fortunate in that I’m in a line of work that to do well insists that I seek out and reveal something to appreciate in each face I photograph. The moments when I “get there”, when all I’m doing is appreciating with camera that which is in front of me, time stops. The dinginess of judgment falls away, illuminating that which is pure and boundless.

What this photoblog did for me in the years I kept it, and what I’m seeking in returning to it, is a way to notice again, and savor a bit longer, those tiny moments of joyful appreciation. And if by chance someone else should run across this and experience some of the same, well, that just gives me even more to be thankful for.



~Cynthia