Inspiration Fridays: Humans of New York

Humans of New York is an incredible website, and it has an even more active Facebook Page.  If you haven't checked out this website, run, don't walk.  I'm serious.  Get off of my silly little blog and check this stuff out now.  Right now.  Why are you still here?  Go.  Go now.

Welcome back!  If you didn't leave, like, seriously, go.  Then, come back.

Okay, welcome back for real this time.  Thank you for returning.

Humans of New York.  Wow, man, I've been following this site for about a year and a half now and ever since day one, it took my breath away.  Brandon Stanton is a complete and utter genius, and I don't say things like that lightly.  New York City is a wonderfully vibrant, beautiful place, and the soul of it is its residents.  I suppose that is the truth for any city, really, but the melting pot/ mixture that is New York cannot be discussed adequately without focusing mainly on the people.  There is such a gorgeous diversity to the people here, but what makes New York, well, New York, is how much we are all the same. We are humans.  We are together, here, in this city, all experiencing life.  We are sharing the human experience.  Together.  And Stanton shows this with a lovely facility.

I may sound overly superlative, and if you think so, I can tell that you haven't looked at his site.  Dude.  Really.  Check it out.

His attention to detail, and his obvious care for each individual is what truly shines through in his work, for me.  Yes, the photographs are stunning.  Awesome.  But, what is really great are his captions, his interactions, his stories, his quotes- his understanding of how to relate to his subject, and then bring that person's soul into the portrait.  I'm coming back to the word beautiful.  Because, it is.

On his Facebook page yesterday, he posted this:

"When you're feeling down, it's so tempting to focus on your sadness: you wonder why you're sad, you hate that you're sad, you wish you weren't sad. It's completely natural to do this. But it's the wrong way to be. No matter how smart you are-- you will never change a bad mood by thinking about it. You will only magnify it.

Instead focus on your behavior. Focus on what you can change. Go outside. Exercise. Quit isolating yourself. Interact with friends and family. Accomplish things. Your mind will reward you with happiness.

It is so tough to change your behavior if you are feeling depressed. But it's the only way. Don't say: "I'll act differently when I feel better."

Act differently, and you will feel better."

 

Genius.  Freaking genius.

 

Now, here are some of his portraits.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 I'd like to clarify that choosing only a few to put on here was like... I don't know.  It was super freaking tricky.  And, there are many photos here, so I didn't even manage to do a good job of it.  These are almost all works of his from the past two monthes.  If I had gone through his entire portfolio,  I would have ended up copying and pasting his entire website, and I'm fairly certain that wouldn't have been legal or appreciated.  This also would have taken forever and a half to load.  No one wants that. 

Thank you for all of the inspiration, Brandon.  Maybe, one day, I'll be brave enough to ask people for their photos too!

 

New York City, New York, USA

Our World Is Lovelier than We Think it Is

I'm not sure if you are aware, but according to various sources, the world is set to end on Saturday.

 In two days.

Yes, that's right.  You heard me.  The apocalypse is "supposed" to happen on May 21, 2011.  Forget everything you heard about 2012, this stuff is coming early.

If you haven't yet heard about this, a group called Family Radio has been spreading terror, or as many of their advertising campaigns say, "sounding the trumpet," or reminding you to "save the date" for Saturday, May 21, 2011 because, oh, right... you're going to die.  If you die, that's the good thing.  You're going to be "raptured" or taken up to heaven with God. If you don't die, well, that stinks, because you have about six monthes of hellish torture before you are actually sent to the bad place.  How did they determine this?  Apparently, this guy, from the USA, found a mathematical code in the bible, and used it to determine the date of the rapture.  Please, don't mind that the Bible wasn't written in English and, oh, right, wasn't written directly by God.  There is a lot of historical documentation that people wrote the majority of the Bible- perhaps with the guidance of God, yes, I grant that, but he didn't just go BAM!  BIBLE!  And it fell out of the sky.  As cool as that would be, that totally didn't happen.  Ten commandments, maybe.  Whole Bible?  Yeah, no.

I have all kinds of problems with this upcoming advertising campaign.  Scaring the shit out of nice, normal people is my first problem.  I'm scared.  I'm pretty nice.  I donate my time to working at a charity that provides free acting training for low-income high school students in New York City, give homeless people muffins on occassion and generally try my best to be polite and courteous.  Not that I haven't made mistakes, I absolutely have, but I'm genuinely sorry when I hurt people, even if it isn't intentional.  I think I'm a decent person.  And, I am a bit scared.  However, I'm not as scared as some people.  I read recently about a woman who sold her home, and used all of the money to fund this advertising campaign to warn people.  She realized that she didn't have enough time left in her life to have a kid, like she had always dreamed about, so she gave up everything.  Stories like hers have been circulating, and I just feel so badly for them. I feel bad for them if they are wrong, obviously, because there go their life savings, and there goes the would-be kid's college fund.  But, I also feel bad if she is right- because she just then spent the last few monthes of her life warning people about something that was totally inevitable, and that they could not change, instead of enjoying herself.  Also, that she sent her money there instead of, you know, helping starving children, or AIDS research.  I just feel badly.  

Mostly, I think that these people cannot possibly be correct.  The number thing seems sketchy, that's for sure, but wow, have they noticed how awesome people are?  I wrote about this just a few days ago in lieu of the humanitarian, compassionate, and just overall sane response that people have been having to the death of Osama Bin Laden.  People seem to be getting nicer, and the world is a more peaceful place than at basically any other point in history.  If God wanted to punish the human race, why would they punish the people alive today?  The people I constantly see smiling at strangers (yes this really happens in New York City), holding doors for one another (if you don't do this in NYC you are going to get some dirty looks), donating to charities, creating beautiful works of art, helping one another up stairs, encouraging compassion.... these people are supposed to take the fall for all of humanity?  What is going on here?  I thought God was supposed to be loving.

So, there is my opinion.  The Apocalypse, or Rapture, or Judgement Day is not coming on May 21, 2011 because, well, if God is up there and has been paying attention, he will see that we aren't that bad, and he has no good reason to smite us.  I think this world is too pretty.  The little birds sing lovely songs, going about their lives oblivious to the works of men half of the time- are they going to be destroyed by an earthquake sent by a God who is supposed to be benevolent?  My logic is screaming, "No".  

Maybe I'll eat my words come Saturday.  If I do, though, we'll all either be already dead, or enduring so much hellish torment that laughing about it my incurable optimism will make us all feel a bit better about it.  In that case, I feel like I have nothing to lose.

Calm down. You aren't going anywhere on Saturday.  Our world is lovelier than we think it is, and people are better than we think they are. At least, I think so.

I have faith in our human race, faith in the future, and, dare I say it, faith in God.

I mean, just look at these flowers.  See how pretty they are?  Why would God burn that?

Manhattan, New York City, New York, USA

** Sorry for the rant.  It's just meant to increase optimism instead of fear**

~Emily