The Beauty Of Different

Karen Walrond is a writer and photographer and the author of 'The Beauty of Different', a book about celebrating the uniqueness of each individual and proving that everyone is beautiful. I know her from a TED talk video where she talks about the theme of resonance.

In this video she outlines 2 beautiful themes. 

The first is the simple concept of the fact that whenever we are in a situation where we are the ones who are different, we start looking for whats familiar since that is what stands out. If you reverse the situation and you are in familiar territory, and someone else is different, you no longer try to find the resonance and dismiss it as different. This very simple (but powerful) concept is what leads to any number of societal evils: the minute we don't stop to see the familiar in the different we stop connecting to the situation or person and biases begin to form. 

The second one derives from the first and tells us what we could do to make that connection everywhere we go. As in photography, she advises that we should 'always look for the light'. The light that shines from each one of us is what resonates with others and that is what we connect to. Whenever you meet or interact with someone, consider yourself a tourist in their world and look for the light in them that you can connect to and then you shall be able to look past the different and find the familiar which ultimately leads to our own growth and joy. Every time that we don't attempt to do this, we are stunting ourselves and also contributing to the restrictions in society which shun everything different.

Hope you enjoy the talk as much as I did. Cheers!