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Matthew Shearer
@indefinitely_lost
Best of the week 50 at #nomadict 2020
How I ended up doing what I’m doing is a long story. If you said to me 5 years ago, that photography and videography is what I would be doing, and relating to myself as ‘indefinitely_lost’ I wouldn’t have believed you. I would even have laughed at you for saying such a thing.
"Yet, it’s in the moments where I felt completely lost I ended up finding myself."
I’ll start with how I ended up loving travel… When I was younger I had no goals, no dreams, no direction and I was getting in and out of trouble very often. One time, I nearly got into a lot of trouble. It was confronting and it hit me, the fact that I might have messed up my life without having done anything with it beforehand. So I packed my bags for a five-week trip to go see something of the world. When I came home, I luckily managed to sort out my problems and from then on, I had a new outlook on life.
Meeting people and seeing how each one lives their life has really opened up my eyes to what I want, and to what I didn’t want to end up like looking at most of the people back home. Where I am from, living such adventurous life is not “the normal” where most people stick to. But every experience I deal with in the extraordinary life I have been living, good and bad, helps me improve in every way. The good experiences lift you up and drive you to want more of them and the bad experiences teach you that it’s not always going to go in your favor and you have to fight for what you want!
"So whether it’s about myself or the cultures I am encountering and experiencing, I learn something every time I set off on another adventure."
But the main thing I take from every trip is to actually go on the trip. When opportunities you want to take present themselves, don’t hesitate. We only get one shot at this crazy time we call life. I thus believe that there should be 90% action and 10% thinking. It will all work out in the end; you might hit a few setbacks but there’s nothing bad about that. We shouldn’t refer to setbacks as something bad – this defines how we think and feel about it and how we act. Instead, if we see a setback as an opportunity, a learning curve that we all need to face in order to grow and adapt in life, we act accordingly as well – It is a choice to use the given situation in your advantage.
How I came to love photography came years after this very first trip. I was in Prague when I met Kelly and kody (@positravelty); we shared a dorm and they showed me their travel page. They insisted that I should start my own page as I had already been travelling for years – yet, I had never given it a thought before! This is the root of my passion and where the creative youngster I used to be appeared again, and it has just grown stronger and stronger every time I set off on a new adventure ever since.
"It was when I first saw the northern lights in Iceland that convinced me."
I was in awe watching the lights dance across the sky and envied the people capturing the moment so beautifully with their cameras. It was so special because the thought of the northern lights are unreal, almost mythical, you can’t really fathom it until you actually stood beneath them – speechless. When I got home I spoke to a photographer friend and bought my first camera.
"I ended up putting most of my savings for a house into a camera bag and epic trips around the world."
Of course it was a gamble and out of the ordinary, but who really dreams of being ordinary? I don’t regret any second of it. Hard work pays off in the end and if it means living a dream life in exchange for a few years of gritting it out then that’s a price I can pay. I’m in control of my own happiness, I’m in control of whether I make it or not. For me it’s a test of character, desire and passion towards my chosen path.
The story behind the winning shot was me just going one step further to find “the shot”. We all camped on reinebringen in Norway and we all had gotten the ‘Instagram’ shots but I wanted my own unique perspective of the spectacle. So in bad conditions I carried on hiking alone for another one or two hours where I reached a peak revealing a lake that I would have never known was there had I not carried on climbing. Even though there was risk in play, coming down with a shot I had not seen before and my own creative perspective on the location I was for sure worth my effort. This feeling of contentment and excitement that a unique shot you just got provokes within you is one of the best emotions to experience as a photographer.
When I edit a photo I want people to look at it and feel like I did, being there and looking into my camera or at my drone’s perspective on the screen of my phone. I want it to stop them from scrolling and really captivate their attention for as long as possible. Make them want to take the time to leave a nice comment or send me a message asking a question or any other sort of recognition of the time and effort that goes into creating something unique. No matter the online presence you have as a creator, having a small or big name, positive feedback always feels good and is appreciated by a creator.
"It can really make a difference to be kind and share your thoughts with a creator, also as a creator yourself."
I’ve grown little by little as a result of each little sign of appreciation and each short interaction. I have many people that I can thank for my development and growth but the main ones are Kelly and kody again (@positravelty). Those two wonderful people basically changed the course of my life with a pat on the back and a push in the right direction to begin with. Along the way they have helped me so much to develop my skills. I also owe a massive thanks to Maxi from @_letsescapetogether_ because he alone inspired me to take up videography by watching his cinematic films religiously. I’m putting a lot of time into improving my videography nowadays, and he’s also been so helpful and supportive during this period of intense learning.
If there’s one thing I learned from my journey, is that it’s never too late to change your life – not even for what seems to be crazy or abnormal. And also, it’s more than fine to have other people influence the direction you are going in. You will discover if it’s the right one by living it.
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