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How to Make the Most Meaningful Pictures of Your Life: A Free Comprehensive Guide
The most meaningful pictures of your life aren’t about the pictures. They’re about the stories within the pictures.
How do I know this? Why listen to me?
I’ve spent the past 6 years dissecting the stories within the work of photographers from around the world and have published over 300 recorded stories on this very website. In 2014, Fearless and Framed® began championing photographers to move away from traditional, posed portraits and to start documenting real stories for their clients (and themselves). From day one, the heartbeat of our brand has been (and still is) about recording highly meaningful stories—without posing.
I don’t care about “good” pictures. I don’t care about making you a better photographer.
I want you to achieve bottled up, recorded evidence of your most valued stories. In doing so, you will train your brain to notice more depth in your everyday living. This is the gold. The photographs are the bonus.
Let’s explore and talk about all of it.
Stay Fearless,
Marie Masse
Founder of Fearless and Framed® and Dangerously Good Stories™
Contents of This Guide:
- Why intentionally photograph your most valued stories?
- What are your tiny stories?
- The dynamic range of meaningfulness.
- More to know about the dynamic range of meaningfulness:
- Which stories are MOST meaningful?
- Making meaningful photos.
- Making pictures of stories that are already over.
- How do I make sure that my pictures are great?
- Check your perception of photography too.
- Words + Pictures
- Dimensions of Life: a jumping-off point for observation
- Then & Now
- Closing
- One final story
- More meaningful stories from Fearless & Framed contributors + Resources
- About the Author
Why intentionally photograph your most valued stories?
#1 – I’ve been to my grandparents’ funerals. As cool as it was to see the younger versions of them on the photo boards, I was sad to not see the photos of MY memories of them (and with them).
They didn’t exist.
You have the privilege to give a nod to your values today by recording them to enjoy later too.
#2 – Albert Einstein said it best:
“There are only two ways to live your life. One as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle.”
Intentionally seeking to bottle up your most meaningful stories is how to witness more miracles in your everyday living.
You may think you already see all the little things. I’m sure you do, in fact, see many. That said, until you hone your story lens with a filter for high-level meaningfulness, it’s very likely that you have overlooked stories ready to be unearthed and savored. What a shame to leave catching the miracles up to chance!
As you hone your radar for meaningfulness, it’s like turning the lights on. You can’t not see your tiny stories everywhere.
In his book, Storyworthy: Engage, Teach, Persuade, and Change Your Life through the Power of Storytelling, Master Storyteller, Matthew Dicks’ sums it up beautifully:
“As I reflected on each day of my life and identified the most storyworthy moments, I began to develop a storytelling lens—one that is now sharp and clear. With this lens, I began to see that my life is filled with stories. Moments of real meaning that I had never noticed before were staring me in the face. You won’t believe how plentiful they are.”
#3 – You want to make the most out of this one and only life. Don’t we all? When you break down “making the most of this life” into measurable outcomes, one measurable is your awareness. More specifically, how much you noticed, instead of overlooked. You want to look back and believe, to your core, that you lived awake.
You didn’t sleepwalk through.
You didn’t take anything (or anyone) for granted.
You celebrated and savored the great, valued the mundane, and were ripped open and grew from the hard.
Living awake isn’t about experiencing (doing) more; it’s about seeing deeper. It’s about noticing and responding to the moments you live out.
So far, we’ve covered two truths behind meaningful pictures:
- Your most meaningful pictures are about the stories, not the photography.
- Photographing your most valued stories adds vast value to your life.
Now, let’s define what your stories are—tiny stories, to be specific.
Continue Reading
To continue reading, download the guide. It’s free. You don’t even have to opt-in.
It’s way too big to put the entire thing into a blog post.
How to say thank you?
Share it with everyone. Email it to a friend. Post a link to this page in your favorite Facebook Groups. Post a quote and tag me @dangerouslygoodstories on Instagram.
Most of all:
Make a meaningful picture and then share it with me!
Hey Storyteller... Pick one and pass this onto a friend: