In this post, I want to show you a way to find special subjects. Or even better: how you can be found by them.
A question of strategy
It is, I think, surprisingly simple. And it depends on our inner state.
On whether you want to zero in on something specific or let yourself be surprised by what’s on offer.
Because what doesn’t work is “Don’t think about the pink elephant!”.
If you try not to think about the pink elephant, you’ll end up doing just that. And in the process, you’ll miss the checkered and striped elephants.
At its core, there are three possibilities: “Searching,” “Finding,” and “Being Found.”
Search
Of course, it’s perfectly fine to look for something specific.
It’s actually a great exercise. It sharpens your powers of observation and your sense of the seasons—the signs through which certain subjects “reveal” themselves.
But “searching” is also a rather… exhausting strategy.
A thoroughly conscious and less intuitive one.
If you know what you’re looking for, think about and research places where you might find it. The time of year and day also play a role. As does the lifestyle of your target.
Control
By trying to control your subject, you might as well do everything you can to control the environment.
You can look at the surroundings, calmly pick out spots that you return to and watch.
Unless you’re lurking for birds with a telephoto lens, you can work with reflectors and flags (in the simplest case: black or white cardboard).
You can see how the light works and choose the direction from which you want to take your shot.
The rest is a game of patience.
And a fine art. Image control is difficult to achieve in nature.
Finding
Finding is a bit easier. Basically, finding is the reverse of searching.
The strategy here is that you choose the place and the time. By simply kneeling on a patch of grass, in front of a tree, or whatever.
Sensory
One criterion could be that it’s comfortable. Another, that you find it beautiful there or that it smells good.
You can use all your senses.
And your heart.
On the spot, you open yourself up to the impressions of your surroundings.
Without prejudice (see also “Mindfulness, Respect, Humility”).
Please assume that you can find something beautiful, simply because it is there (because it “is” and because it “is there”) and it will catch your eye.
Because you simply find it.
Being found
Being found is my favorite strategy.
It’s wonderfully intuitive.
It’s like “mobile finding.”
If you want to be found, stay in motion.
Take a walk. Stroll a bit through a piece of nature that you think would do you good to be in right (and) here.
And then be here. With all your senses. Don’t be at work. Don’t be with your child. Or at the bank.
Be fully here. Be fully now. Be open.
And then, for a start, do nothing. As in the previous strategy, let yourself engage with this place and its surroundings.
Wander around a bit. With your eyes, with your legs.
In this way, you practically offer yourself up.
Your thoughts touch your surroundings. Like a handshake.
Let it happen
Sooner or later, quite by yourself and if you don’t force it, you will become part of your surroundings.
And when that happens, something changes.
You change.
You change your perspective. You look in certain directions all on your own.
Up to the sky and the trees.
Ahead at paths and shrubs.
Down at the world in miniature.
You look at things from further away or up close.
Just as you like.
From this point on at the latest, I don’t need to write anything more.
You will be found.
Perhaps something finds you that can’t quite be captured with a photo.
Then it’s a moment intended only for you.
No less beautiful. But such that you would have to pass it on with words.
Then I ask you not to struggle with it. Be happy.
And once you have savored the moment, just wander on.
Lightly and without mourning an impossible photo.
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