Creative Travel Photos: How to Find True Purpose in Life
Looking to make creative travel photos near Myvatn in Northern Iceland.
What’s your life’s true purpose and how can travel and photography keep you on the right path to realize your dreams? Here’s what I believe and what my own creative journey has taught me.
It may be that the path you’re on right now might not seem to be the one you’ve envisaged, but it’s quite likely that it’s the one you’re supposed to be on. You do have a destiny, and the very purpose of your life is to manifest that destiny.
Nonetheless, we’re all very good at ignoring our intuition and the myriad of subtle signals our self conscious sends us to move us forward, towards our true purpose in life.
As a result, we ignore the calling of our heart, and delay the most important journey of our lives.
Most folks become so well practiced at this kind of denial that they never even start down the road to self realization.
Others simply begin their quest far too late in life.
But that doesn’t have to be the way of it for me, or for you.
“If you don’t know where you’re going
any road will get you there.”
I made the photo at the top of this post, well after midnight, as I approached a lonely mountain pass near the town of Myvatn in Northern Iceland.
It was the peak of summer and day’s are long and full of adventure for travel photographers in Iceland at that time of year.
I’d just taken photos at the nearby Krafla geothermal power station and was looking for a carpark to find a place to sleep for a few hours.
But there was something about that hillside that grabbed my attention. I turned around and, almost immediately found a carpark.
Before I knew I was out of the car and heading off for several hours hiking around the Leirhnjükur Lava Fields.
It’s an amazing place, with a landscape akin to what I’d expect awaits intrepid travelers finding themselves in Mordor.
Sunrise was extraordinary and, after getting back to the old camper van I’d hired, I enjoyed a good sleep dreaming about the amazing adventure I’d just experienced.
Travel Photos: How a Positive Attitude Determines Success
There’s certainly something to be said for starting out, without even being sure of exactly where you’ll end up.
As they say, “All roads lead to Rome.“
What matters is that you start. What happens between the moment you walk out your door and your ultimate arrival is, quite simply, life.
So, why delay. Distractions be dammed.
Just get on with it and make the most of the opportunities that arise.
Expect the unexpected and embrace the unusual and unpredictable nature of the journey ahead.
You’ll have good days and bad days, but at least they’re your days. What you get out of them is, ultimately, dependent upon how you perceive what happens to you along the road.
Moving on and off the path involves choice, and you need to take responsibility for the choices you make.
But what matters is that a bad choice can be put right by refocusing your thoughts and energies on your life’s true purpose.
To do so we all need to let go of so much of the nonsense that fills our daily lives.
Doing so makes space for clarity, room for experimentation and time for creativity, out of which focus and energy are derived.
Much of life seems a disruption, a series of obstacles, barriers and difficult situations to either confront or avoid.
But let’s face it, we don't always do so in the right frame of mind.
And therein lies the problem.
By framing what happens to us in a negative manner we determine how we feel, at that very moment in time.
That negativity becomes our reality, one that we’ve created for ourselves.
Worst yet is the fact that we become so good at perceiving so much of what happens to and around us that we create a continuous and, seemingly, never ending cycle of negativity.
This the life we create for ourselves. And the great fight in life is to get off that crazy merry-go-round and get back on the true path that’s meant for us.
And I’m referring here to a life of purpose, and of meaning.
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True Purpose: Life Is A Gift, Please Don’t Waste It
Life is a gift and the way we treat that gift is determined by a series of choices we make along the way.
Those choices, in turn, are underpinned by a frame of mind and a particular worldview.
It’s your choice, regardless of the hand you feel you’ve been dealt, to make the most of your life, each and every day.
To do so, find guidance and inspiration where necessary, make the changes that need to be made, and get on with living the life you’re supposed to be living.
Many of those changes will seem small, akin to baby steps, which is why they can be undertaken quite easily and effectively.
But a bunch of one percent changes will add up to real and significant change, quicker than you know.
However, despite all the well intended information and inspiration in the world, only you can take the action required to bring real and long term change into your life.
I understand this battle full well. It’s one I’ve struggled with, like so many other creative folk, throughout my life.
Horrible experiences at school almost broke me, but I’ve continued on. While the road has been rocky, I know I’II get to where I’m supposed to be before my time is done.
Actually, this website and blog demonstrates that I’m on the path. That’s because my true vocation is to help and to heal, to educate and to inspire.
What I’ve learned along the way is that it’s the struggle that, ultimately, moves us forward, along our own journey through life.
Magnificent 'God Rays' illuminate the landscape in the Highlands region of Iceland.
Reality and Perception: Here’s What I Believe
As a way of clarification, I can say that I’m of the belief that it’s not what happens to us, but what we make of what happens to us that determines the actual nature of our lives.
Are you happy or sad, content or frustrated?
For so many of us, simply changing our perspective is what determines how we feel and, as a consequence, what happens next in our lives.
I do believe that bliss is possible and within our reach. In fact I wrote a special blog post about it titled Follow Your Bliss: How to be Happy by Living a Creative Life.
You know the drill, it’s a glass of water. Whether you perceive it as being half full or half empty is a metaphor for your life and how you’ve determined it will unfold.
That concept fits in very well with how I made the above travel photo of ‘God Rays’ illuminating the landscape in the Highlands region of Iceland.
I was exploring the area, without any real idea about where the road would take me, or what I’d find along the way.
The weather began to close in and, at the top of a high mountain pass, I pulled the car over and braved the bleak, windy conditions in search of a great landscape photo.
The light was bleak and my situation was looking quite grim. But I felt in my heart that a sublime moment awaited me.
I set up my camera and tripod, constructed a good composition based upon the repeating mountain ridges, and waited for providence to arrive.
Moments later, the sun burst through the heavy clouds and those glorious light rays illuminated the sky and landscape before me.
It was an awesome experience to behold and I’m incredibly grateful to have had the good fortune to travel all that way and make such a visually compelling travel photo.
Travel Photos: Life Is Not For The Armchair Traveler
Let us not forget that life needs to be lived, and we need to immerse ourselves and embrace life, energetically and with passion.
The clock’s ticking, the sand’s falling and, if you haven’t yet felt the inevitable decline of old age, I can tell you it’s coming.
It’s time for action, time for freedom and time to live that authentic, purpose driven and meaning rich life you’ve long desired.
While a spectacular landscape photography adventure to Iceland might not be possible in the near future, you can still do a little something for yourself.
And if not for you, then do it for me.
Leave the dishes where they are, get up and get outside, into the fresh air and into the light.
Go for a walk and begin to find time for yourself. Do it often enough and the rest will look after itself.
If you don’t take your camera out with you today, perhaps you will tomorrow. Either way, repetition determines what happens next.
Build the habit and, before too long, you’ll be out and about taking photos in your neighborhood. Where you go after that is up to you and where ever your dreams take you.
Finally, I’d like to mention an interesting interaction between travel, photography and your true purpose in life.
I believe the purpose of photography is to inform, to inspire and to heal.
As creative beings, we have the opportunity to heal the world, one photo at a time.
But, before we can heal others, we first need to heal ourselves.
If you’ve enjoyed the photos in this post and, perhaps, some of the thoughts I’ve outlined, please feel free to LIKE and SHARE it widely and wildly.
