Tag: well-being

Sunday’s Walk Around the Neighborhood

Monday, October 12th, 2015Tuesday, June 7th, 2016exercise, photography, snapshots, well-beingPhoto Life, Slice of Life, Well-being1 Comment

I haven’t gone for a run for about a month now. There’s nothing wrong with me physically; I haven’t had the motivation or desire. Sunday, though, I found some motivation and had time, but instead of running I decided to just walk. And also I left my phone at home and took my camera. I’ve run this same route around the neighborhood many times so everything is familiar to me and I wondered if I would find anything of interest to photograph. My initial thought was that I wouldn’t take any pictures but surprisingly, I did see a few things that I wanted to preserve to pixels. Here are three of the photos I made:

Photo info: FUJIFILM X100T, 23mm, f/8, 1/160 sec, ISO200
USA. Texas. Cedar Park. 2015

There’s a neighborhood pond and fountain that some people fish at but because of the drought, it has been pretty low. Still, there was enough water to support all the plant life there.

The most interesting part of this route is a path that runs through a wooded area. The late-afternoon light filtering through the leaves was pretty nice.

My first walk while taking the camera was a positive experience. I guess it was kind of an experiment too… would I be able to convert this exercise-focused running route into a photo-walk route? The answer is yes! It’s exciting because it kind of opens up more possibilities for photo-walks. And I also benefit with a bit of exercise, fresh air, and sunshine!

Fall baseball

Thursday, September 24th, 2015Tuesday, June 7th, 2016baseball, family, well-beingPhoto Life, Slice of LifeLeave a Comment

Baseball games always cause me to have a lot of stress, so I don’t really like to watch. But I am there at my son’s games to offer him my support and encouragement! And just look at that hit!

BTW, here’s a fantastic article about how to be a good “sports parent”. Valuable stuff!

Traveling Lighter

Wednesday, September 23rd, 2015Wednesday, August 30th, 2017bags, decluttering, travel, well-beingTraveling, Well-beingLeave a Comment

Within the past year’s worth of traveling I have started traveling lighter, paring down the amount of stuff I take, and it has really improved the travel experience! Rewind to last year’s trip to Japan – I took my North Face backpack. It’s large enough that I had no trouble fitting in the proverbial kitchen sink. My thinking at the time is that I wanted a backpack that I could take anywhere. And that could fit my DSLR camera, lenses, and other electronics. My backpack would be a constant companion which I would take everywhere. Here’s a list of stuff I took in the backpack:

Tablet
Keyboard
Mouse
Kindle
Sony A77 DSLR
16-50mm lens
10-20mm lens
100-200mm lens
35mm lens
Spare battery
Cellphone
2 Chargers
Extra cellphone battery
Assorted cables and card readers
Notebook
Pens and pencils
2DS and 3 games
Earbuds and MP3 player
Water bottle
Small bag with medicine, bandaids, lipbalm, gum, etc.

The backpack was large, but handled all that gear with ease. The main problem was that it was HEAVY. Also, my camera gear was stuffed into the main compartment which meant that is wasn’t easy to take out and use. Plus, walking around in the summer heat in the city just wasn’t so practical. I still thought I wanted to bring all my stuff with me, but what a hassle it was!

I remember a previous trip to Japan. That trip I decided to just take a waterproof point-and-shoot camera. That was actually a super-fun vacation! And the small camera was a big part of it. Sure, the picture quality wasn’t close to my DSLR, but I enjoyed my trip quite a bit more. I didn’t have to worry about the weight or how to carry all my gear. I just put the camera in my pocket and was all set! Thinking back to that trip, I wonder why I didn’t connect my enjoyment of that trip and the small camera.

In April, I went on a business trip to Stockholm, Sweden. Because I thought this might be my one chance to go there, I should take my DSLR kit and big backpack again. I thought that I didn’t want to miss a great shot. I also took a small Fujifilm X-F1 compact camera as a backup. As you can probably see, camera gear is an important part of my travel kit…

This was a trip where I learned a lot about what kind of traveling I wanted to do in the future. Once again, the backpack was heavy and I rarely used the big camera rig. It was just too much of a hassle to keep at-the-ready. My compact camera was my camera of choice for most of the trip. In fact, the DSLR stayed in the hotel safe! And I have to say, I was happy with the results I got from the Fujifilm X-F1. The photos were more than “good enough”. And I didn’t have to worry about where to put my backpack when we went out for dinners. I left it at the hotel.

My next trip was a solo trip to California to visit my folks and see a concert. I was catching on to this “travel light” concept by this time! I decided to leave the backpack at home and just bring my small Patagonia bag and my Fujifilm X-F1. Also, I took my Kindle, Tablet, keyboard, various cables, card readers and chargers. Traveling lighter was definitely something I was starting to enjoy! And the photos turned out great! Hey, I don’t need the DSLR and all the lenses to enjoy photography!

On my last trip, I went to Stockholm again on business. This time I pared down even more. I left my tablet/keyboard at home. My camera was now my Fujifilm X100T. I also didn’t take a water bottle… why do I need that when there is water available wherever I went? I only needed one small USB cable and plug. My only personal computing device was my cellphone. (I did take a work laptop, but that was used exclusively for business) Here’s what was in my bag:

Fujifilm X100T
USB cable/plug
Spare battery
Pen
Notebook
Kindle
Earbuds
Cellphone
Cellphone battery
Small bag with medicine, bandaids, lipbalm, gum, etc.
Work laptop

My carry-on bag (the Patagonia Minimass) was so light! And when I was on my day off in Stockholm, I didn’t even carry my bag. Just the camera across my body, cellphone, and extra camera battery in my pants’ coin pocket. It was great not having a bag! And I enjoyed myself even more. My shoulders didn’t hurt, I didn’t have to worry about a bag in small shops or crowded museums. I’ve come to realize that having more stuff just gets in the way of having better experiences. It’s not only the distraction of the extra weight, but the distraction of extra things to think about. The less I have, the less I have to worry about. And that means more time and mental energy to spend on simply enjoying where I am. If you haven’t done so, try traveling lighter. I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised that you can get by with so little!

Thinking About Thinking

Sunday, April 12th, 2015Monday, June 6th, 2016running, well-beingWell-being2 Comments

I’ve always tried to keep my work life and my personal life separate, and I’ve been fairly successful in this. Even in my blog, I rarely mention my work life. I can’t remember if I ever mentioned work in my blog, actually. This separation of work and personal life applied to even simply thinking about work when I was off-the-clock. But lately, work has been on my mind a lot, and my efforts to not think about it have been a little bit draining. Maybe draining is a little too severe a word for it, but it’s in the back of my mind… nagging me. “I should NOT be thinking about work!” It was irritating and didn’t seem right.

But I’ve come to realize that it’s okay for me to think about work on my off-hours, and what was making it irritating was not the fact that I was thinking about work, but that I had a rule that I was NOT supposed to be thinking about work. I was spending time thinking about how I should not be thinking!

So I decided to suspend the rule and see what happened. And the time I spend running is the perfect time to test how it works out. I am happy to say that it’s been going great! When I start thinking about work-related things, I just go with the flow and see where my thoughts go. By not worrying about it, there is no more stress! More often than not, I find myself thinking about other stuff after only a few minutes. This is kind of a relief to me. And surprisingly entertaining as well. Part of my mind sits above the rest, and observes where my thoughts lead. It’s very interesting! The mind is incredible and mysterious, づすね！