Celebrate What's Right with the World

Image by Dewitt Jones

If I asked you to describe the state of the world right now, what would you say? Would you tell me that it is a burning pit of fire filled with COVID variants, terrorism, climate change and uncertainty? Or would you say it’s an extraordinary place full of possibility and wonder?

I wouldn’t blame you if you went for the first option. Almost everywhere you turn at the moment there is something that elicits fear, misery or doom and gloom. Particularly if you are on the internet or anywhere near some form of media.

But what if I told you that you get to choose how you see the world? How would you describe the state of the world if you had the choice?

“Our vision controls our perception, and our perception becomes our reality…Change your lens, change your life.”

That is a quote from Dewitt Jones, former photographer for National Geographic magazine.

I recently came across a TED talk from Dewitt, and it had a message in it that is so important I felt compelled to share it.

In his role as a photographer for “The Geographic” as he calls it, he was instructed to go out and “celebrate what is right with the world”. That was the vision of the magazine, and you only have to look at a handful of photos from National Geographic to see the world around us being celebrated, to see beauty and wonder and magic.

Image by Dewitt Jones

Imagine if that was your job: taking your camera out into the world and celebrating its beauty. A beauty which, as Dewitt points out, isn’t just based on Mother Nature, but on humankind as well.

Celebrating the good in the world doesn’t have to be our job in order for us to do it, but it is something we forget to do so often. No one wants to look at the world with a view of scarcity, fear and misery, but it’s likely that many of us do that because we are bombarded by the internet, media and social media showing us what’s wrong with the world. And when you see that world view everywhere, it’s easy to buy into it.

Dewitt talks about how nature shows us there is incredible beauty and possibility in the world. In a world where sometimes it can feel like it’s “eat or be eaten” or “my win is your loss”, Mother Nature reminds us that there is no one way to see beauty in a forest, for example, there are thousands of ways. There are thousands of right answers.

You might be thinking “okay, that’s all well and good, but what about the fact that there is a global pandemic, climate change, and horror in Afghanistan, to name a few?” Well, I’m glad you asked, because Dewitt has an answer for you.

“Celebrating what’s right is not a perspective that denies the very real pain and suffering that exists on this planet. Rather, it’s a perspective that puts those problems into a larger, more balanced context. A context where we can see that there’s far more right with the world than there is wrong with it.”

Image by Dewitt Jones

Dewitt is not trying to pretend the world is only full of rainbows and sunshine, but the point that he makes is that when you change your perspective on the world, and look for the right answer in every situation, the beauty, you learn how to reframe obstacles into opportunities. There might be problems, but there are also solutions. There might be some doom, but that doesn’t mean we are sentenced to a life of gloom.

If there’s one thing I’ve learnt, it’s that we get to choose our thoughts and our perspectives. You only have to read books like The Choice by Edith Eger, a holocaust survivor, to know that we get to choose what we fill our minds with. So, if you have a choice between viewing the world based on fear and misery, or based on beauty and possibility, what would you choose?

I encourage you to take the time to watch Dewitt’s TED talk. He explains this all with such eloquence, along with the use of some extraordinary photography and a little humour. He also admits that he doesn’t always have the lens of celebration, but tells a story about what helps him continue to choose to see what’s right in the world (I won’t do the story he tells justice by trying to retell it here, but if you watch the video it starts at 13:26 mins).

I love watching videos like this one of Dewitt’s, hearing these stories, listening to these perspectives. I’m inspired by looking for joy in the little things, being optimistic, always looking for the good. But it’s so easy to just watch these videos (or read these blogs) and then go back to the normal routine of scrolling social media, talking about the pandemic and ingesting the day’s news.

So this time I’ve set myself a challenge, one which I’ve already started. Check back in a couple of weeks and I’ll give you an update.

But in the meantime, after you’ve read this blog and watched Dewitt's TED talk, what are you going to do to change your lens?

I’ll leave you with this from Dewitt:

“Every time I (celebrate what’s right with the world), every time I allow myself to fall in love with all of it, I really do see a world of light and possibility. Come on, you’ve all seen it. It’s not just in the faces of your children and your grandchildren, it’s out there all the time.

And you know, the beauty of that world, our world, shows us a wonderful example of how to live, of how to love, of a banquet laid, of a cup overflowing, and I know, I know that if we let that beauty fill us up that we too will overflow.

​And it’ll come out in everything we do; in the ideals we hold, in the passion and compassion we feel, in the love we are no longer afraid to express. That perspective, that lens, it’ll change your life, as it has changed mine. See that vision, my friends, and celebrate what’s right with the world."

That’s all for now,

Jordyn x