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We have names for everything. What if we forgot about those names? And we stopped seeing things as something? What if we just observed things, watched things, without giving them a name, without coming to a conclusion? What do you think would happen? You would transcend everything.
Robert Adams
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Interpretation

What this quote means

This quote suggests that detaching from labels can lead to a deeper understanding of existence.

Robert Adams explores the idea that names and labels can limit our perception and understanding of the world. By suggesting that we observe without naming or categorizing, he implies that we can achieve a higher state of awareness and transcend our conventional understanding. This perspective encourages mindfulness and a more profound connection to our experiences.

Themes

PerceptionAwarenessMindfulnessLabelsExistenceTranscendence

In practice

Example use cases

This quote could be used in a meditation workshop to encourage practitioners to observe their thoughts without attachment to labels.

More from Robert Adams

There is always a subjective aspect in landscape art, something in the picture that tells us as much about who is behind the camera as about what is in front of it.
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Part of the reason that these attempts at explanation fail, I think, is that photographers, like all artists, choose their medium because it allows them the most fully truthful expression of their vision... as Robert Frost told a person who asked him what one of his poems meant, 'You want me to say it worse?'
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If I like many photographers, and I do, I account for this by noting a quality they share - animation. They may or may not make a living by photography, but they are alive by it.
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When photographers get beyond copying the achievements of others, or just repeating their own accidental first successes, they learn that they do not know where in the world they will find pictures. Nobody does. Each photograph that works is a revelation to its supposed creator.
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The only things that distinguish the photographer from everybody else are his pictures: they alone are the basis for our special interest in him. If pictures cannot be understood without knowing details of the artist's private life, then that is a reason for faulting them; major art, by definition, can stand independent of its maker.
Robert AdamsRead
Why do most great pictures look uncontrived? Why do photographers bother with the deception, especially since it so often requires the hardest work of all? The answer is, I think, that the deception is necessary if the goal of art is to be reached: only pictures that look as if they had been easily made can convincingly suggest that beauty is commonplace.
Robert AdamsRead

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