Heart and Soul Present: Meditation and Negative Feelings

Painting with light self-portraits by Studio Metsä Photography

Lately I have been semi-absent in the Studio Metsä social media world and I apologize for that.

In addition to photographs, Studio Metsä also makes websites and the final deadlines of a few websites have kept me busy in the last week or two. On top of that I was hit by a massive wave of depression this week and after wallowing in it for a few days, I finally picked myself up today and decided “no more!”. These kinds of things are not often talked of in public, especially as business owners, maybe because we think it will somehow harm our reputation. But if you are a human being (which I assume you are since you are reading this blog post ;)) you are not immune to negative feelings so why shouldn’t we talk about them?

After all:

It is not about the negative feelings, it is all about how you handle them.

A big factor in me slipping down that slippery slope was the fact that I had started to neglect my very sacred morning routine of reading and meditating. Whenever I have started my day by reading something new or inspiring about business and/or self-improvement followed by even just 5-10 minutes of meditation, my day has been laid with a strong foundation to stand on and my mind has been clear and focused to take on the tasks of the day.

These few days have been a great reminder to never neglect it again.

So in honour of meditation, I wanted to talk about another form of meditation I take part in.

Photography.

(Shocked?! ;P)

Never having been much of a self-portrait photographer, I first took upon myself to find myself and my emotions in self-portraiture (this is not to be confused with the ever-growing world of selfies) back in 2011 when I was on exchange in the Netherlands. Self-portraiture is actually harder than it seems as you have to try to imagine what the photograph is going to look like without actually being able to see through the viewfinder (although with the advances of technology, this seems to be lost now too as a friend of mine demonstrated just earlier this week with her new Canon 6D: you can connect it to your phone via WiFi and use your phone as the viewfinder and shutter release). In the old-school world of self-portraiture, it is a string of trial-and-errors and in its repetitive form, extremely meditative.

The following photographs are from the autumn/winter of 2014. They were shot in pitch black darkness with some light from my cell phone. This is how they were in camera, they haven’t been cropped or edited much. The only exception is the very first photo which I used as a trial for a tad darker, colder blue and some sharpening of edges. Other wise the photos are exactly as they were shot.

PHOTOGRAPHIC MEDITATION

Painting with light photographic self-portrait meditation by Studio Metsä Photography Painting with light photographic self-portrait meditation by Studio Metsä Photography Painting with light photographic self-portrait meditation by Studio Metsä Photography Painting with light photographic self-portrait meditation by Studio Metsä Photography Painting with light photographic self-portrait meditation by Studio Metsä Photography Painting with light photographic self-portrait meditation by Studio Metsä Photography Painting with light photographic self-portrait meditation by Studio Metsä Photography Painting with light photographic self-portrait meditation by Studio Metsä Photography Painting with light photographic self-portrait meditation by Studio Metsä Photography

Thank you for reading!

I would love to hear about your routines and your own form of meditation! Please connect with me by using the comment section below :)

Until next time lovelies,
xoxo Erika

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