The Zen Art

It's easy to figure out that there is more to taking great photographs than just being at the right location at the right time; a great photographer and a novice both with same exact equipment at the same place at the same time can't produce equally good phtographs.

What prevents most of us from capturing a great photograph even if we are at a great location? It's the ability to really "see" the things around us. This seeing is different from just looking at the things in our surroundings - we all know how to do that. But this art of seeing I am referring to goes a level beyond just looking at something.

When we look at something, our mind comes into play and puts a label on it based on what we have learned and studied about the subject in the past. For example, one may look at a bird and know right away that it belongs to species x. This habit of mind to analyze things in front of us and putting label acts as a barrier between us and the what we are seeing. The bird in this example just becomes just one of the millions of birds belonging to species x and after realizing this, the mind moves on to look out for something more "interesting".

In fact, the more we know and have studied about thing being looked at, harder it is to really "see" it since there are more labels and images for the mind to overcome. That may be counter-intuitive to some, but think of two people looking at a bird, one who is a zoologist who has studied everything about it and second one is a person who has never seen that bird in past. Who is likely to really see this bird in detail, its color, the texture of its features and so on? For zoologist, it's just another bird that he already knows everything about from analytical and logical perspective, so his mind makes him think there is hardly anything there to see for him! This is how knowledge acts as a barrier to seeing.

(Please note I am not trying to say that scientists can't be artists - the zoologist in this example is just to represent someone who primarily looks at things in an analytical way which may not be true with many scientists.)

When it comes to being able to truly "see" things around us, an analytical mind does not help us - a Still mind does! Only when our mind is still, can we start to become aware of the beauty in simple things around us in everyday life, things that our mind would have ignored otherwise.