Following Your Path...

   Being with six other photographers for a week was an interesting experience, both inspiring and challenging.  We all had different focuses for our work and each of us approached the process of photography in our own unique way.  We were each following our own paths.

   Contemplative photographers too have their own paths to follow whether it is to focus on the quality of their perceptions exclusively, as in the Miksang approach, or to delve more into the metaphoric capability of their images which is the path I'm on.  Of course, we can never tell what lies around the corner, as in this photograph of a road on Monhegan Island.  It might take us in a completely different direction or it may even become a fork which will force us to decide which path we want to take.  But the really cool thing about roads is that they go in two directions!  We can always travel back along the path we've already walked and take that other fork.  We can also decide to sit down by the side of the road for awhile and just enjoy where we are at the moment...life is not a race and it doesn't come with a time table for completion.

   It is very easy to begin to question yourself, question the direction of your work when you are in a group of other photographers.  I tried very hard to stay focused on my own path.  Others may join you for a time and you can enjoy their company and learn from their experience but in the end you must continue on your own way and be true to your own vision.  The only way your work will be authentic and worthwhile is if it remains a pure expression of your own soul and not a mirror image of someone else.  That is something you want to keep in mind especially when you take photographic workshops.  Listen, absorb, digest and then keep only what contributes to your special way of photographing the world.  Just because you are on a different path doesn't mean you're lost!