Seeing what’s Overlooked

Essay #8

In my last post, I talked about a practice in seeing / acknowledging the invisible (and essential) elements of life - air, space, sounds, wind, etc. There are also things and people that are visible, yet often overlooked. They are invisible to us. These too are important for seeing clearly.

Around the time that I began writing my blog back in 2010, I attended a local photography workshop on creativity led by Andy Chen. He gave us an exercise to choose an object and photograph it from different roles or perspectives, for example, what would a bird, ant, or runner passing by see? I chose a bamboo grove, nestled between a baseball diamond and a running path. 

What I loved about this exercise was that it made me see the subject, bamboo, in a way that I hadn’t considered before. Looking closely, I saw how beautiful and intricate the stalks were, how they caught the light, and swayed together. It also made me curious about bamboo and, later,  I learned more about this amazing plant, including how fast-growing it is, making it an important sustainable resource. 

I wrote about that experience, in a post called Notice What you Don’t Notice. Little did I know that this would become a major and ongoing theme for me - seeing what I overlook. The word overlooked means to look over, to look beyond, to look past. Developing the ability to see, in a visual sense, what many overlook has added so much richness to my life. These are the pennies that Annie Dillard speaks of in the quote above. Although we can never fully see everything. there’s always something more to discover. 

During the entire TV series of The Office, a never seen film production company is interviewing employees of the office for a documentary. In the series finale, after they all watch themselves in the documentary, one of the main characters, Pam, says that you might wonder why anyone would do a documentary on a paper company. She concludes, “There’s a lot of beauty in ordinary things. Isn’t that kind of the point?”

Much of what we overlook is what is considered ‘ordinary.’ These are things considered to be mundane, plain, simple or uninteresting. They’ve become familiar and have lost their specialness. Yet, ordinary is a concept that we create in our minds. Something becomes ordinary or mundane when we stop paying attention. What if we just stopped calling anything ordinary?

I’ve identified a few categories of things (and people) that are often overlooked, because they’re considered ordinary, unimportant, or different  and therefore become invisible.

What’s Familiar

Things usually become familiar because they’re a part of our everyday experience. Eventually, we stop looking closely at them because we think we know everything there is to know about them. We assume they’re this fixed entity, which is simply not true, and get stuck in seeing them in a particular way. To get unstuck, we have to change how we’re looking, to go back to a beginner’s mind, pay attention, and see them as they are now. 

In his article, You Don’t Need New Ideas, You Need a New Perspective, Oliver Burkeman introduces the term, “vuja dé,” first coined by comedian George Carlin. It means “a strange sense of unfamiliarity in the familiar, thereby revealing opportunities or solutions you hadn’t previously noticed.” 

He suggests a couple of ways to see a situation in a new way – putting physical distance between you and the situation (take a walk), or writing about it to see what emerges from the unconscious mind. Or, you can just take some time to observe closely a familiar object or scene or person. Look from many different angles or perspectives, like I did with the bamboo. With a person that you care about, you can look them in the eye, ask them a question, start a conversation, touch them, and really listen. You may be surprised at what you see and hear.

What’s Considered Small or Insignificant or Unimportant

Generally, we live our lives moving our focus from object to object, landing on what is most meaningful to us. What we choose to look at is often determined by what we’ve previously liked or by what the culture deems important. There are also things we may overlook just because they’re considered small or insignificant, like the bark of a tree or fallen petals on the sidewalk. How would your experience change if you paid closer attention to more of these things? The Japanese concept of Wabi-Sabi illustrates this idea beautifully and is a great way to practice.

In his beautiful little book, Wabi-Sabi for Artists, Designers, Poets & Philosophers, Leonard Koren defines wabi-sabi as, “a beauty of things imperfect, impermanent, and incomplete; a beauty of things modest and humble or unconventional.” It’s associated with appreciating the minor details in life, where beauty can be found in the inconspicuous and overlooked aspects of nature. Wabi-sabi lives by the principle that “all things are either devolving toward, or evolving from, nothingness.” In other words, material things come into being and through a natural process of weathering slowly fade and die. 

You can start by noticing things that are near the end of this process - rusted or tarnished, wrinkled, cracked or peeling, shrunken or irregularly shaped. You can see examples of Wabi-Sabi that I’ve found here. 

In terms of people, we tend to be drawn to people we know well, like friends and family, or people who have power, who are larger than life, or doing spectacular things in the world. Yet, every person is worthy and there are many people who make your life possible or easier who are unsung heroes. 

When I let go of my likes and dislikes, or preconceived ideas about something or someone, and bring my attention back, I’m often thrilled by what I find. 

What We’d Rather Not See

In terms of material objects, there are things that we avoid because we think they’re ugly or broken, like polluted water or trash or a dead animal. Yet, they’re part of life too. 

And then, there are those things we overlook or avoid because we'd rather not see them, either because we don’t know what to do with them, or they’re too hard or painful to see. We can overlook people, ideas, other perspectives. Examples could be the homeless in our midst or a degraded part of town, someone in need, or a polluted waterway. But, denial won’t bring about change if that’s what’s needed. 

Our views, both internal and external, will always be partial and we can always learn more. What’s missing from your take on things? What are you overlooking? How can you expand your thinking on a particular topic or situation?

Expectations

Expectations are based on what we want to happen, yet the unpredictability of life often gets in the way and we’re left disappointed. They also prevent us from seeing what’s actually happening at the moment. In his book, The Art of Thinking Clearly, Rolf Dobelli calls this the illusion of attention.

“We are confident that we notice everything that takes place in front of us. But in reality we often see only what we are focusing on. Unexpected, unnoticed interruptions can be as large and conspicuous as a gorilla.” ~ Rolf Dobelli

Here’s a silly example from my own experience to illustrate. One day, I was looking for a sweet treat that was supposed to be in the refrigerator. I scoured that fridge at least four times and couldn’t find it. When my husband came home, I asked him where it was, with a slightly accusatory air. He opened the refrigerator door and pulled it out immediately. He had put it in a tupperware container, which was not what I was expecting.

When we have expectations or preconceived ideas about what we’ll find, we tend to miss details that don’t match these ideas. We’re always missing something. This is exciting to me since it means there’s always something new to see, learn, discover. Expect the unexpected!

What We’re Not Knowledgeable Enough About

In her fascinating book, On Looking: Eleven Walks with Expert Eyes, Alexandra Horowitz walks with “experts” in different fields who show her what they see. Each brings specialized knowledge and their own unique way of looking at their surroundings. For example, an expert in architecture sees building details that the average person would not. 

Horowitz explains that we overlook certain things either because we aren’t knowledgeable enough to see what’s really there or we haven’t decided to place our attention in that direction. When we intentionally start looking for something in particular, we suddenly start seeing it everywhere. It’s not that it wasn’t there before; we just weren’t looking for it. 

You can practice by picking something to search for, whether a particular color, a sound, a type of car or tree, or maybe a shape. It could be a smell or a texture. Or, choose one of Horowitz’s suggestions that I outline in this post. How much more do you see when you direct your attention?

Peripheral Vision

Finally, another place to focus on what you overlook is at the edges or sides of your attention or field of vision; that is, your peripheral vision. This is a mostly unconscious, yet important, part of your seeing. 

“Peripheral vision is mountain vision. It's the ability to see far and wide. It captures motion. We experience it as a state of relaxed, alert awareness. The body is calm, the heart rate is low. It allows us to monitor the environment, and to plan and prepare.” ~ The Fearless Strategies, Mountain Vision

We have a tendency to look straight ahead much of the day, especially now that screens make up a good portion of our days. We’ve become myopic and lost the sense of our peripheral vision. Yet, surprising views can be discovered there. It’s also good for our eyes to move them from left to right and up and down, to move from focused vision to a wider perspective for a change; to catch glimpses caught in passing “out of the corner of one’s eye.” 

Lawrence Weschler wrote a fabulous book about the life of light and space Robert Irwin, called Seeing is Forgetting the Name of the Thing One Sees. Through many experiments over the years, Irwin concluded that art was not about the object itself but rather the experience it created in the viewer. He came to see how much the surroundings - light and space and other incidentals - affect the experience of a piece of art. Irwin wondered,

“How might it be possible to make an art of the incidental, the peripheral, the transitory – an art of things not looked at (indeed, invisible) when looked at directly, yet still somehow perceived?” ~ Robert Irwin, Seeing is Forgetting

I took Irwin’s words to heart when I walked down an alley in an industrial area of town and saw this in my peripheral vision. It made my day.

What’s in your peripheral vision made conscious by your looking? What surprises you when you look to the incidental, the periphery, the margins? How does what you find there contribute to your general perception? How are light and space and other elements affecting what you’re seeing and experiencing?

You can also look to people who live in the margins, that is, those who have experienced oppression, are disabled in some way, or are part of a minority culture. I find that people who have experienced different things than me can provide wise perspectives on life, often overlooked. It’s important to listen. 

Conclusion

Bringing attention to what (or who) you overlook is something that can be practiced in your everyday life, beginning with what is most familiar and therefore hiding in plain sight. Whether objects or natural elements in your surroundings, the people you see every day, or things you’ve judged to be “ordinary,” you can practice seeing them anew, exactly as they are. Notice what you turn away from, choose not to see, and ask yourself why.

Through photography, I have been able to reframe many of my judgments about things considered ordinary, mundane, or even ugly. I see fewer and fewer things in those terms. Seeing what you overlook can bring a breath of fresh air into your life and expand the way you see. Of course, we’ll never see everything but through practicing a calm, relaxed, open attentiveness we can receive surprising and real glimpses of the world. What are the pennies in your day? Make a list.

** Book links are Amazon-affiliate links meaning I make a small amount of money should you purchase through my link. This doesn’t affect the price you pay.

Resources

Annie Dillard, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, a classic book on seeing the world around you with mind, body, and heart.

Robert Irwin is in his 90’s now, still living in California. If you’re interested in knowing more about him, see this book summary on Robert Irwin, Seeing is Forgetting the Name of the Thing One Sees.