The 365 Project

On October 1, 2016, I started what I have come to call my 365 Project.  I was standing in the middle of a beautiful fall scene on the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire campus when the idea hit me hard.  Mind you, it's not a unique idea, but it required a creative commitment that could have been daunting if I thought about it too much.  I didn't.  Then and there I took and posted the picture for Day 1.

The simple goal was to take and post at least one photograph a day on Instagram and Facebook for an entire year: October 1, 2016 to September 31, 2017.  Simple to say, not always simple to do. But, to become proficient at a craft, you have to do it everyday. It has to be a habit. It has to become ingrained in you. My 365 Project has definitely done that.

It was relatively easy at first. I found all sorts of things in my neighborhood, near my office, and on my daily path through the world.  Soon enough, however, the obvious images become fewer and fewer, and that is when I began to truly create. To see beauty or humor in the mundane. To find art in simplicity.  To find joy in the ordinary.

I've got a little less than six months of my 365 Project left. And though I both look forward to and dread that time, I know that, through the project, I have been given of the tremendous gift: the gift of seeing the world and the people in it in amazing ways that I never thought possible.

Check out the 365 Project on my personal Facebook page or on Instagram: @jgvigil23