Narrow Daylight

Narrow Daylight

Narrow daylight entered my room
Shining hours were brief
Winter is over
Summer is near
Are we stronger than we believe?

I walked through halls of reputation
Among the infamous too
As the camera clings to the common thread
Beyond all vanity
Into a gaze to shoot you through

Is the kindness we count upon
Hidden in everyone?

I stepped out in a sunlit grove
Although deep down I wished it would rain
Washing away all the sadness and tears
That will never fall so heavily again

Is the kindness we count upon
Is hidden in everyone

I stood there in the salt spray air
Felt wind sweeping over my face
I ran up through the rocks to the old
Wooden cross
It's a place where I can find some peace

Narrow daylight entered my room
Shining hours were brief
Winter is over
Summer is near
Are we stronger than we believe?

(Diana Krall)

I posted this image on my Twitter account a while ago and Diana Krall's Narrow Daylight feels like it has been a permanent soundtrack in my head ever since.

I've been paying close attention to my creative process using a mix of reflective inquiry, therapeutic and meditative photography.  

Here I focus on the process rather than the result - noticing when I feel like I am absorbing myself in something new, rather than worrying about whether the outcome will 'look good' in someone else's eyes.  I become conscious of when I am attempting to make an image already present in my mind or when I am forming image as I go....  I become critically aware of the clichés that are so prevalent in photographic imagery and I try to hold myself open to associations and other expressive, artistic urges.

When I tweeted this image, taken on my iPhone, I wrote that 'I love the promise of shuttered windows..' 

So what do I make of my process?

I realise that my meditative images have been a reflection of a transition that has been underway for several months.  We all go through these periods of change and their successful navigation is key to our growth. In this case I had decided to sever some business relationships that had become stressful, coercive and were killing my own creative sense of self.  

The relief was immediate but transitions take longer and, a few days ago, reflecting on a renewed sense of creative expansiveness and space in my life, together with a host of new friendships and opportunities that have also made their way into my life, I began to think back to the glimpses of 'Narrow Daylight' that I saw a few weeks ago...