Really Seeing.

I was laying in bed with my little girls this evening, waiting for them to drift off, and to pass the time I was reading - a book about photography - of course ;)  It seems it's all I eat, drink, breathe, sleep these days.  It's grand really, to feel such passion.  

I was reading a book called "Photography and the Art of Seeing" by Freeman Patterson.  I came across the following....

"Seeing in the finest and broadest sense means using your senses, your intellect, and your emotions.  It means encountering your subject matter with your whole being.  Good seeing doesn't ensure good photographs, but good photographic expression is impossible without it."

I found myself comparing this to parenting, in terms of how my best parenting comes when I really *see* my child.  Not the surface behaviour, but their truest selves.  Their vulnerable, sometimes hidden side.  Not the anger, or the acting out, but what is hiding underneath that.  

When I can get to that place - of seeing them, that is the heart  of it all, because when I really *see* my child - I make the right parenting choices.  I *know* what they need.  Which is usually connection.  Most times.  So simple really, and yet in the heat of the moment it's so easy to forget.  

My children challenge me to be my best.  Every.  Single.  Day.

Some days I feel like I've got it.......others I'm quite sure that I've failed.

Good thing another day comes along, with another chance to get it.  Perfection?  No way.  Learning?  Always.  

Pushing through the hard stuff, finding a new way to look at things.

And love.  Always so much love.