The Creation of a Masterpiece and Your Future Lifestyle - Annual, 2022

Daring Vision

Sentinel Rock, Yosemite National Park - 2008

How the Making of a Photographic Masterpiece Relates to the Creation of Your Future Lifestyle 

Grand art born of great, visionary artists often arises from a spontaneous idea, an image in the mind’s eye.  The evolution of an idea that culminates in a tangible work of art, whether a painting or a photograph of a spectacular landscape, requires a blending of grand vision and the execution of exceptional technique.

Similarly, in order to create a masterpiece that will be your new lifestyle, you must imagine a clear vision of your future before you begin to create it. The path to doing so is to prepare yourself by creating and executing a realistic Post Career Lifestyle Plan that will guide you to making your new life an exuberant reality.

I am, by nature a serious person, yet strive to not take myself too seriously.  Certainly, there are some things in life like faith, family, country, etc. that require serious respect and appreciation. Then there are others that stimulate within me a special sort of devotion: fly-fishing and landscape photography.

During my lengthy medical training, I had exceptionally renowned professors who benefited me and my future patients enormously. From them I learned surgery and then the subspecialty of plastic surgery. I learned to appreciate my mentors as valued professionals and colleagues. So it is, that I applied these principles to my non-professional endeavors with the same degree of passion and devotion for excellence, specially landscape photography. My search for exceptional teachers of photography led me to the fabled work of Ansel Adams (1902-1984).

The Visualization of a Photographic Masterpiece

Ansel Adams was already an accomplished pianist when a family vacation to Yosemite National Park in his early teens ignited a fascination with landscape photography. This became his life’s work. I made it my purpose to learn from him by studying his excellent books about various aspects of photography. 

He is credited with developing and teaching the concept of visualizing in your mind’s eye what the image you make will look like in its final form. He described the process of creating a photograph as one of making it, rather than taking a photograph. He practiced and taught deliberate visualization of the final image before even touching his camera. This was followed by the technical steps of making a negative by careful composition, adjusting the camera settings and finally opening and closing the shutter. The undeveloped image would later emerge in his darkroom, first as a negative and then a print. 

He considered the negative to be a sort of raw material from which he would create his printed masterpiece. From his musical expertise he drew a parallel with photography and stated that “The negative is the equivalent of the composer’s score, and the print the performance.” 

So, how can the work of such a master help you in creating the second masterpiece of your life?

Immerse Into Nature, Emerge With Creativity

Begin by entering an environment that stimulates your creativity and couple that with an activity that is a medium for its expression. Some prefer art or other forms. My fascination is landscape photography.

You will likely find that the tranquility that is natural to being in Nature will provide you with numerous subjects.  It is also an environment that will stimulate your creativity and help you envision your future lifestyle. 

Great historical figures provide us with eloquent testaments… from antiquity to the modern era:

• “The physician heals. Nature makes well.” - Aristotle
• “I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.” - Henry David Thoreau
• “The clearest way into the Universe is through a forest wilderness.” - John Muir
• “Climb the mountains and get their good tidings. Nature's peace will flow into you as sunshine flows into trees. The winds will blow their own freshness into you, and the storms their energy, while cares will drop away from you like autumn leaves.” - John Muir
• “Thousands of tired, nerve-shaken, over-civilized people are beginning to find out that going to the mountains is going home; that wildness is a necessity; and that mountain parks and reservations are useful not only as fountains of timber and irrigating rivers, but as fountains of life.” - John Muir
• “In every walk with nature one receives far more than he seeks.” - John Muir
• “Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better.” - Albert Einstein
• "The snapshot is not as simple a statement of some may believe. It represents something that each of us has seen - more as human beings than photographers – and wants to keep as a memento, a special thing encountered.” - Ansel Adams

Words of Encouragement

By immersing yourself in nature, you will experience more than enjoying what you see before you. It's also a wonderful forum to reflect upon your life and the lifestyle you wish to create.

The benefits of this are many and varied. In fact, the awareness of this led the North American Nature Photographers Association to recognize the first Nature Photography Day on June 15, 2006. 

The original idea has become a movement and enthusiasm for this day has increased steadily worldwide.

Become a part of it!

Visualize Your Future Life Before You Begin to Create It

I believe that to visualize your future lifestyle is to create as clear a realistic vision of it as possible.

Begin by making a plan (the negative) and then executing it (the print). This approach will empower you to live in a way that manifests your vision even as you remain wisely flexible to evolving circumstances.

Integral to visualization, Ansel Adams faithfully photographed what he saw through his camera lens. The images he created were of the natural landscape; there was nothing artificial. His means to do so, visualization and camera, were true. Notably, he studiously avoided extraneous distractions that were not part of the natural landscape.

So it is that you, too, can and should create your unique vision of the next phase of your life. 

It is within you to visualize your future, then create and execute your plan. This then, will become a living manifestation of your character and purpose that becomes integral to your legacy.

Updated: Saturday, June 11, 2022

PS: By the way, do you want to learn more about how to prepare yourself and your practice for a fulfilling End of Career Transition and life beyond? I would like to help you. I provide consulting/coaching services that are tailored to your specific needs. Click here to request a complimentary introductory conversation.

Facing the Future

Half Dome, Yosemite National Park - 2004