PHOTOGRAPHY AS THERAPY

Taking care of your mental health

Amanda Creamer created CLOUDS as a personal photo project – a collection containing 134 pages of images of clouds that she photographed over the past 9 years. Seeing and capturing clouds with her camera became one way to cope with severe, life-long mental health struggles.

Growing up, Bryce Evans dealt with depression and anxiety. He founded The One Project which teaches about using photography for mental health. He knows humans are hard wired for connections. The One Project has evolved into a mental health community that uses photography to reconnect with your intuition and develop healthy habits that are free of stigma, judgement, fear and negative narratives.

“Your mental health often shifts you towards negative thought patterns. But photography opens you up to positive perspectives and healing,” says Evans. The entire process of photography—from choosing a subject matter to discovering new angles to manipulating light—requires absolute focus. This very process of observing, by nature, is a meditative task that draws you into a peaceful state. In this sense, photography isn’t just like mindfulness, it is mindfulness.

TIPS:

• Carefully choose what you want to photograph, thoughtfully decide what you want to focus on and what you will leave out of the frame.
• Change up your subject matter. Change the location, time of day, even different kinds of photography – black and white or play with the color. Try long landscape shots and macro-photography.
• Use photography as a form of self expression. Try to capture images that reflect your current emotions. Or look for something that is the exact opposite of your current emotional state.

You can read more here: https://theoneproject.co/therapeutic-photography/