Wide-eyed wonder

"...the purpose of life is to give voice to our astonishments." - Annie Dillard

Despite my early years of living with my family in poverty whilst growing up in Hong Kong, I saw those years through rose-tinted glasses, and it was mostly happy memories. Instead of being discouraged by the lack of material wealth, I saw the world filled with opportunities. Can you remember what it is like to be a child? The boundless joy and positivity. Now and again, I like to remind myself the joy experienced in that state of mind, seeing the world with those innocent eyes, how it livens up my daily life and photography practice.

I find the biggest barrier to my creating for joy is bias stemming from lifetime of experiences, and caring too much about what other people think of my work. While it is great to have all the technical skills and experiences that give me a solid foundation to make good images, I also find myself being jaded. My perception of the world is clouded with judgments, prejudice, and biases. I have worries about my work being repetitive, a subject being done to death, whether my work will be liked. All these concerns can take away the motivation of picking up my camera. Blessed the children, they have no such concerns. They are unaware or unconcerned because of their gift of ignorance. Instead of being bombarded by a lifetime of photos with which to judge against their own, or having no bodies of work to compare the next image they make, they are fearless when it comes to exercising their creativity. They are more willing to experiment as they have no concern whether any of their work is good, nor do they have to be handcuffed by this notion of having to adhere to any rules. It is all about the experience, results do not matter.

To me, the best part of being a kid is you don’t care about what other people think. Imagine how free you will feel if you don’t care what people think about you? Not to the extent you completely ignore the conventions, but just enough so that you do things you want to do without worrying what others will think. Honestly, you never know what other people are thinking, and as I get older, I find most people are too busy thinking about themselves and have couldn’t care less about what you do.

Kids are fascinated by everything because it is all new to them. They are not jaded by what the world has to offer. As you age, you learn more facts, experience more of life, and learn what is logical and possible. While it helps to function as an adult having all this knowledge, it unfortunately also cramps one’s imagination. It is harder to take risks because you know when the stake is high. Kids’ imagination is limitless because they don’t care when things don’t make any logical sense. Children have a way of seeing the little details of life that as adults, we often overlook. Do I take time to look at the beauty of a blade of grass, to taste the rain, or to notice the beautiful hues of the sunset?

This goes hand in hand with thinking you can be anything when you grow up. The world is full of possibilities, and you can get in on any of them. Don’t limit yourself to certain things because of who you think you are, or how you think other people define you. The world is full of possibilities for everyone, not just children who haven’t really lived yet. They’re just the only ones who take that knowledge and use it to their advantage. The world is filled with wonders and joy when we allow ourselves seeing through the lens of a child.