the lines of life itself

A lot of human experience is shared, global and recognisable, most of the imagery we feed our gaze with is not.

The little portals we carry in our pockets - the ones that allow us to feel connected to people across the planet, the ones we blindly trust with directions when we’re headed somewhere new, the ones we pull out in the morning when deciding which jacket to wear - those little, magical, portals often hold us hostage from our very own lives.

While mindfulness has entered our vocabulary and is here to stay, we don’t always have the tools to incorporate this ancient Buddhist practice into our lives.

Our eyes have become progressively myopic in the observation of life happening here and now.

After spending a lot of my life chasing novelty, I arrive at a place and time that begs me to slow down and acknowledge the beauty in the banal, ephemeral and repetitive moments of the everyday.

My own meditative ritual sees me curiously investigating my surroundings for 21 minutes each day. Inside the home, my eyes rest on dirty dishes, misplaced clothes, fruit forgotten on the kitchen counter. The sound that waltzes in through my open windows transports me into my neighbours’ homes. I am welcomed in and fuse myself into the tapestry of their routines. As I return to my little piece of this row of suburban terraced houses, life carries on and I try to remind myself to not overlook the beauty that is hiding in plain sight.