Thought River
Our thought flow and emotional wellness
I had wanted to create this concept for quite a while.
I knew the brief outline of the message, and had three pages in my creative journal filled with thoughts, ideas, possible final images.
This one made me work for it.
I knew the colour scheme and spent a few hours behind the camera trying to create what I could see in my mind, but I couldn’t quite get there. Trying to find blue flowers can be tricky, and the ones I found were not quite the right shape to provide the flow I needed.
I wasn’t sure what to do. It wasn’t coming together, I couldn’t find the right blue flower I needed, so I put it on the back burner and moved on to other concepts.
The three pages in my creative journal and the importance of this story kept pulling me back though. The message this photograph would send was one of the most fundamental but also one of the most important in the portfolio.
Waiting on Nature’s perfection
I remembered my Grandmother loved the colour blue, and she loved blue flowers. Her favourite flower was the Corn Flower. I couldn’t picture a Corn Flower in my mind but googled blue flowers online to see. While it is a beautiful flower, I needed a length of blue and green to create this concept, Corn Flowers have quite a small petal and sharp shape.
I remembered I bought blue Iris flowers for my Grandmothers funeral as it was the wrong time of the year for Corn Flowers. Blue Iris flowers would be absolutely perfect! I would have a length of blue, and also green. I have no idea why I didn’t think of the blue Iris earlier!
Sadly, blue Iris flowers were still a month or two away. I had a bunch that didn’t open, clearly the time wasn’t right just yet. This concept went back onto the back burner once again.
My Dedication
In waiting for Iris flowers to become available, my beautiful girl (my loyal German Shepherd) became very unwell. Shiloh was with me all day long and was my sole company until my kids came home from school for the day. Shiloh and I pretty much spent 24/7 together. She would sleep beside me while I photographed each and every story in the portfolio. She was always just simply right there, by my side.
I had a few concepts in the early stages, but I was so close to completing Thought River and desperately wanted to take this one last photograph with her by my side as we always did.
Shiloh gave us another 6 weeks with her, we are forever thankful for that and on week 3 I sourced some beautiful blue Iris flowers from my florist and Shiloh and I spent a rainy day working to get this photograph finished.
Shiloh stayed even closer during those 6 weeks, I even had to slide her along a little as she was bumping my tripod when she stretched.
While Shiloh was with us still when I completed the photo, I didn’t get a chance to write the story until a week or two after she passed. I didn’t realise the concept of this photograph would become more important to me than ever.
The message this photograph holds was one that I had to remind myself of constantly in the few weeks before and after Shiloh’s passing. As I completed the last few details of Thought River I absolutely had to dedicate it to Shiloh’s memory.
Emotional Wellness
Our emotions flow like a river, constantly, all day, every day. Most often those emotions are just cruising along in the back ground. What those emotions are depends on our regular mindset, personality and default outlook on life.
Sometimes random, small encounters of tough emotions flow through, sometimes those tough emotions flow to us in bucket loads. Between when we realised we could only keep Shiloh comfortable and happy, to even today where we all have sudden, random bouts of sadness, we have all been inundated with so many incredibly tough emotions, thoughts and feelings.
Our thoughts, feelings and emotions can sometimes be very hard to talk about, especially for some people but processing and experiencing ALL of your emotions is a part of having a full, enriching life.
When hard emotions flow through our river of thought, it can seem much easier to ignore them, numb them, wait for them to go away. But those hard emotions flow to us for a reason, they are here to serve a purpose. If we block them, our thought river will turn into a turbulent dam. Those hard emotions are still very much there, they will wait, try again and grow in your thought dam until you let them flow through.
As hard emotions come in, it is so important to make the time to be with them, feel them completely. Allow yourself to be angry, to be sad and to hurt. Acknowledge those hard feelings, knowing it is really good for us to sit with them for a while as they flow by. Knowing they will flow past you shortly. Emotions come and they will absolutely go, but only if you let them flow.
A useful analogy
Of course, if a hard emotion stays too long, or keeps continually flowing for too long you need to take note of this and use your strength to reach out to a professional for help. There is lots of great help available to us.
But it’s important to know that if you numb sadness, you also numb happiness. And that by struggling and resisting hard emotions, can lead to more suffering. To hold off, is to hold on.
Think of your emotions that flow through your mind as a river. Usually rivers flow along beautifully and peacefully. After a storm things get rough. Emotions we may not want to feel may flow through. Acknowledge them, let those hard emotions do their job in the process to healing.
Keep your thought river flowing at all costs. In doing so, those hard emotions will flow on by and go on their way. They may flow past again a few days later, maybe in the same form, maybe in a different form. Whatever form they come in, they are happening FOR you, they are not happening TO you.
The photograph Thought River needed to be in a landscape orientation in order share the message of our thoughts flowing past us. The green leaves provide the calmness that is always around, and always there for us to fall back to. They also provide a constant in our world. They provide stability and boundaries.
In clear focus are the curves of the Iris petals, they move across like waves. They move in a soft manner slowly but they also move with intent. This intent is reflective of the purpose they serve, a reminder they are here for a reason. A rush of happiness, a rush of sadness. This is the thought, emotion or feeling we are currently experiencing. To us this is also the emotion in our focus.
To the left and right, the blue Iris petals are softened, moving across with less strength, slowly fading. Demonstrating the river flow and how each emotion will flow by us if we allow.
The blue petals have a depth to them, highlights and shadows, then even deeper shadows reminding us again that our feelings are here for a reason, there is more to them than we realise. That there is someting else behind the seemingly superficial emotion of sadness, there is a reason for it, there is a purpose and a lesson if we sit with it, feel it and look deeper.
The colour psychology in Thought River comprises of two colours, blue and green.
Blue brings great calm, trust and loyalty, makes us feel supported and protected, opens lines of communication and makes us feel reliability and confidence, security, peace, honesty, intelligence, acceptance, wisdom and reflection.
Green makes us feel balanced and healthy, rested, rejuvenated. Green makes us feel safe, slows us down, slows our breathing and our heart rate. Is calm and soothing, offering hope, encouragement, health, and growth.
The story of Thought River is a beautiful one; Like a river our thoughts and emotions flow, every minute of every day. Flowing through us, each emotion serving a purpose of understanding and advancement, bringing awareness, opportunity and expansion if we allow.
Acknowledge your emotions. Exercise your capacity to surrender.
Feel them in their fullness. The reward is the gift of permission to set them free. Safeguard your momentum in the flow.
I hope many enjoy our latest artwork. I hope it speaks to you, assists you, and guides you through.
Thank you so much for being here,
The Humble Hunter x
If you feel you’re starting to drown in hard emotions the best thing is to reach out for professional help. We have all been there, we are all only human, but there is help available for us https://www.beyondblue.org.au/
Buy your copy of Thought River or click through to see more examples of fine art photography available.