tools for living your personal philosophy
In my previous post, I discussed having a Personal Philosophy. Hoping that you have some scribbles and notes so far.
Let’s continue. In this post we will dive into the tools for living your personal philosophy (lets call it PP for this post). This might even help you define or name one.
For example, I have a few tools that I use to bring my values to life that feel foundational to my PP. They feel in alignment with my chosen way of travelling through life, they are my tools for living.
You might already have guessed that my camera is one of my devotional tools. Its how to I love to capture beauty, the lens is literally how I see life, sometimes its a form of meditation. My camera is the lens through which I express my PP. Its also a tool for joy. I love seeing my camera, I love the weight and feel of holding a camera (particularly vs an iphone), its textural and weighty, but also delicate so I need to hold it with tender hands.
One of my personal values is beauty and I bring that alive many ways but one is through the lens of my camera. I see life through a philosophical lens. The good news is there are so many ways available to us these days to help us make sense of life and developing a Personal Philosophy/Perspective is one of them.
Here are some PP’s that you might to look at:
Life Enthusiast – meets life with appetite, curiosity, and warmth
Devoted to Wonder – treats the ordinary as sacred
Joy Is a Practice – chooses joy as a daily discipline
Here for the Beauty – orients life around noticing beauty
Pleasure With Purpose – honours delight without excess
Slow Living Loyalist – prioritises depth over speed
Present Over Perfect – values aliveness more than polish
Life Is a Ritual – treats daily acts as ceremony
Devotion to the Ordinary – sanctifies simple moments
Walking With Mystery – allows not knowing to lead
Sacred in the Small – finds holiness in tiny details.
If you chose Sacred in the Small, how would you express that? You might have an altar with tiny things, a camera roll dedicated to capturing small creatures, you might sit on the grass and spend time noticing. We get to bring our PP to life by finding tools to create and express that.
For example another tool for living my PP is watercolours! How? Well, watercolours ask you to slow down. You’ve got to set up your area, you need to get a container of water, find your paint & brushes, take some paper and think about what to paint. Lately I’ve painted on just regular paper and also on watercolour paper. I’m only doing this for me, and its such a pleasure to slow down and paint. Some nights my husband is watching a show I’m just not into and I take myself to the dining table and do some little paintings. Ease is one of my values, and slowing down to paint infuses me with feelings of relaxation, it slows down my breathing and its such fun to paint (often badly!!). One of my personal values is beauty and I bring that alive many ways but one is through the lens of my camera.
The good news is there are so many ways available to us these days to help us make sense of life. I see life through a philosophical lens and have my camera, watercolours and a few other tools to express that & bring it to life. How about you?
