What I Learned when I Gave up the Perfect Shot to Live in the Moment

It was 4:30 on a Sunday morning. My alarm had just woken me up for a full day of adventure. But I’m not very good at getting out of bed in the morning, so I delayed my start and scrolled through my Instagram feed for a few minutes.  As the internet goes, it wasn’t long before I was on The Outbound reading a new post by Sara Sheehy, Calming the Fear: A Hiking Meditation. I finished the post and realized how late it was getting. I surely wasn’t going to make it to my destination by sunrise, but I thought I could at least get to the mountains and find an overlook to get a good shot.

It was 5:30 when I got on the road. I had a two and a half hour drive ahead of me. That time would normally be spent trying to beat the ETA on Google maps, passing cars on the highway, checking the map for a good spot to pull off. But instead I found myself thinking about the article I had read before leaving that morning and how I often struggle to stay in the moment. I thought about my recent frustrations with the colliding worlds of social media and the outdoors and my role in that collision.  And I thought about how my own experience with the outdoors had changed since I started trying to capture my adventures on camera - more focus on the best light, the best timing, the best angle, and less on the experience itself. All of this left me wondering what I was losing by trying to get the perfect shot.

The sun was nearing the horizon just as I began to enter the mountains. I hadn’t thought much about capturing the sunrise that morning, but as luck would have it, I passed a sign for a scenic overlook just one mile ahead. My timing couldn’t have been better! But in that moment, without much thought, I did something I don’t normally do. I kept driving. I sang along to the song on the radio and let the cool breeze flow through my car. I looked out my window at the layers of mountains and the blanket of fog lining the valley. And I watched as the bright orange sun crept above the horizon and filled the sky with its glow. I was in the moment. I was happy. And not once did I reach for my camera.

The only snapshot I have of that morning is the one in my memory. It’s not perfect - the lines are fuzzy and the colors are faded. There will be no Instagram post; no chance to collect likes or gain new followers. But what I got from that experience was something even better - a reminder of what I had been giving up every time I focused on getting the shot instead of appreciating the moment, and a resolve to change my approach to my time spent in the outdoors. I don’t intend to leave my camera at home; I still enjoy capturing beautiful things and sharing them with others. But when I find that I’m caught up in getting a picture instead of enjoying the moment, I will put my camera down and remember the lesson I learned on that early morning drive in the mountains.