As we move throughout the day from one task to the next, it’s good to slow down, be in the moment and observe the what that is right in front of us, to really see and not gloss over important details that are easily missed.

I believe this exercise will surprise you and over time you will be able to strengthen your observation skills so you can notice the vivid details in all parts of your life.

Once you’re done, if your up for it, share your experience, observations, things you noticed in the comments.

Challenge Instructions:

1. Take a deep breath to settle into the moment.

2. Observe the painting below.

3. Make a list of all the details you notice.

4. Challenge yourself to list as many details as you can.

5. Try taking a break and returning to look at the painting with fresh eyes to see if you notice anything new.

6. Share your experience or observations in the comments!

Artwork Details:
Title: The Poor Man's Store
Date: 1885
Artist: John F. Peto (1854–1907) 
Medium: Oil on canvas and panel
Source: MFA Boston

That’s it!

How many details were you able to notice. Which detail stood out the most to you?

Thanks for taking this challenge to deepen your observation skills.

May curiosity be your guide!

Rizwan

Building on the previous visual perception exercises, I want to empower you to bring more mindfulness into your daily life by sharing tools, techniques, and exercises so you can overcome the obstacles in your way and thrive in work and life.

Anxiety is an emotion we all experience at one time or another. The anxious thoughts we experience can range from subtle inconveniences or so severe that it gets out of control and affects our daily life.

Today, I want to introduce you to a mindfulness drawing exercise to help you deal with anxious thoughts that pop up and do their best to slow you down.

Some of my favorite tools for dealing with anxiety are meditation, breathing exercises, writing, and running, and the underutilized tool that is drawing.

For me, drawing is a powerful tool to deal with anxious thoughts. It helps to get me out of the worries in my head and focus on the present moment. It helps to break out of the story playing in my mind. It's a tool I can use anywhere and anytime to calm and relax myself.

Today, I want to share with you a mindful drawing exercise you can use anywhere and any time to relax and focus so you can break out from the clutches of anxious thoughts.

“The wonderful thing about the path of mindful drawing is that … it’s a dynamic process, which invites us to engage with awareness, not just with our minds, but with our bodies too, with our whole being. All we need to do is — do it. Just draw, and all the rest follows.” – Wendy Ann Greenhalgh

Exercise: Drawing Your Breath

Materials needed

• Pen/Pencil

• A sheet or piece of paper, a notebook, or even a Post-It sticky.

Exercise: Draw Your Breath

1. Hold your pen/pencil on top of your paper

2. Close your eyes or keep them open and notice your breath

3. Visualize your breath as a line on the paper and follow your breath with the pen/pencil as you breathe in and out.

Variations to experiment with:

• Try a breathing exercise such as 4-7-8 breathing, where you breathe in for 4 seconds, hold your breath for 7 seconds, and then exhale for 8 seconds. Using an app such as iBreathe can make this easier, so you don't need to look at the watch and can just follow the audio prompts.

• Mix it up - try creating a continuous line for all your breaths or create a new line for each inhale and exhale.

That's it!

How did it go? Did you like it or not so much?

Please share your thoughts or your drawings if you feel like it.

Hopefully, you notice by doing the exercise that drawing is a powerful tool to break free from anxious thoughts and to put you in a more relaxed state of mind.

We may not be able to change a challenging situation, but we can change how we respond to it, and mindful drawing is a powerful way to help us create the space so we can relax and respond in a way that aligns with our values.

Till next time, stay strong!

Rizwan

As we move fast throughout the day, hurrying from one task to the next, it is a good idea to slow down to observe what is right in front of us, to notice with intention, and not gloss over important details.

Each time I do this exercise, I surprise myself and realize how much information I overlook when I look quickly instead of slowing down to notice the beautiful details.

I think this exercise will surprise you, and over time, you will strengthen your visual perception so you don’t miss important details that are right in front of you and see what others easily overlook.

Your future self will thank you!

Instructions

1. Look at the image below. Notice all the details. Zoom in to notice the fine details and zoom out to notice the next detail in the artwork.

2. Challenge yourself to identify as many details as you can. Look for objects, people, shapes, colors, patterns, objects, etc.

3. Be as specific in your observations as possible. For example, instead of noticing boats in a river, look at each individual boat to observe the details you see in each boat.

4. Share your observations in the comments. What do you observe? How do you know what you observe to be true?

Artwork Details:

Title: Snow at Akabane Bridge in Shiba (Shiba Akabane no yuki), from the series “Famous Places in the Eastern Capital (Toto meisho)”

Artist: Utagawa Hiroshige

Medium: Color woodblock print

Source: The Art Institute of Chicago

A moment of reflection

How was this exercise for you? Share a detail you found interesting.

Woodblock Printing Process

The print above is created using a woodblock printing process, and being curious to learn what the process is; I found this great video showing a step-by-step process.

That’s it! How did it go? How many details were you able to notice? Share your thoughts or observations in the comments.

Leave a comment

Thanks for taking the time to do this exercise.

I hope you have a wonderful day.

Cheers,
Rizwan

Saper vedere or ‘knowing how to see’, was the concept Leonardo da Vinci attributed all his scientific and artistic accomplishments.

Today, I’m bringing back the fun exercise of observing the details of a piece of art. The goal of this exercise is to improve your visual perception skills so you can start noticing both the small and big details, the obvious and the subtle details, that are easily missed.

As Albert Szent-Györgyi, a Nobel Prize-winning biochemist, said,

“Discovery consists of seeing what everyone has seen and thinking what nobody has thought.”

As you move fast throughout the day from one task to the next, it is a good reminder to slow down and observe what is right in front of you. To really see and not gloss over important details.

Each time I do this exercise I surprise myself and realize how much information I overlook when I look quickly instead of slowing down to notice the details.

I think this exercise will surprise you, and over time you will strengthen your visual perception so you don’t miss important details that are right in front of you and see what others easily overlook. Your future self will thank you.

Exercise Instructions

1. Observe the image below. Notice all the details

2. Challenge yourself to list as many details as you can. Look for objects, people, shapes, colors, patterns, etc.

3. Be as specific in your observations as possible. For example, instead of a bear, you can say a small brown bear next to the woman facing the left with its head down.

4. Optional: Share your list in the comments. Let’s see how many things you found.

Artwork Details:

Trade cards from the "Flags of the States and Territories" series (N11), issued in 1888 in a set of 47 cards to promote Allen & Ginter brand cigarettes. There are also approximately 100 scroll color variations. The museum's collection contains the full set of 47 cards, as well as 54 scroll color variations and one cutout card.

Source: The Met Museum - Public Domain Archives

That’s it! How did it go? How many details were you able to notice? Share your thoughts or observations in the comments.

Leave a comment

Thanks for taking the time to do this exercise.

I hope you have a wonderful day.

Cheers,
Rizwan

Instructions:

• Take your time to look at the image below and challenge yourself to identify as many details as you can.

• Plus points for sharing a detail that you didn’t notice the first time you looked at it.

Tip: 👀 Zoom into the image to see the finer details.

Slow down and enjoy this moment!

Once you’re done, share your observations in the comments.

Instructions: Make a list of all the details you notice in the picture below. 👇🏽

Did you notice the chairs piled up in the van, or the direction the wind is blowing the flags? Thanks for taking the time to practice. I would love to see what the list you came up with. Share your observations in the comments.

I learned about this exercise from Amy Herman, author of Visual Intelligence: Sharpen Your Perception, Change Your Life in which Amy helps us understand the importance of careful observation.

Exercise Instructions:

1. Set a timer for 10 minutes.

2. Make a list of all the details you notice in the picture below.

3. Challenge yourself to list as many details as you can.

4. Share your list in the comments.

That’s it! How many details were you able to notice? Did you notice the blue tiles around the fireplace or the books on the nightstand next to the red lamp?

Thanks for taking the time to practice. I would love to see what the list you came up with.

Share your observations in the comments. 👇🏽

I learned about this exercise from Amy Herman, author of Visual Intelligence: Sharpen Your Perception, Change Your Life in which Amy helps us understand the importance of careful observation.

The goal of this exercise is to improve your visual perception so you can start noticing both the small and big details that are easily missed.

As you move fast throughout the day from one task to the next, it is a good reminder to slow down and observe what is right in front of you. To really see and not gloss over important details. I think this exercise will surprise you and over time you will be strengthening your visual perception so you don’t miss important details that are right in front of you.

Wednesday exercise: Improving our visual perception skills

Instructions:

1. Set a timer for 10 minutes.

2. Make a list of all the details you notice in the picture below.

3. Challenge yourself to list as many details as you can.

4. Share your list in the comments.

That’s it! How did it go? How many details were you able to notice?

✌🏽Share your observations in the comments.

Leave a comment

Backstory: I learned about this exercise after watching Amy Herman’s amazing Google talk Visual Perception, Change your perception, change your life. You should definitely watch the video and then read the book.

Subscribe now

On to the exercise!

The goal of this exercise: To improve your visual perception.

As you move fast throughout the day from one task to the next, it is a good reminder to slow down and observe what is right in front of you. To really see and not gloss over important details. I think this exercise will surprise you and over time you will be strengthening your visual perception so you don’t miss important details that are right in front of you.

Instructions:

1. Look at the picture below.

2. Start a timer for 10 minutes.

3. Make a list of all the details you notice in the picture. Observe the big and small details. Challenge yourself to list as many details as you can.

4. Share your list in the comments.

I learned about this exercise after watching Amy Herman’s amazing Google talk Visual Perception, Change your perception, change your life.

In our fast-paced and productivity-focused world we often look but don’t really see what is right in front of us. We are busy worrying about the next moment that we miss out on experiencing the present. A consequence of this harried way of being is that we don’t notice the important details that are right in front of us which could help us make better decisions in the future.

Don't worry, there is an antidote to our predicament, which is strengthening our visual intelligence. Visual intelligence is our ability to see and understand the details in the information that is presented to us, basically our eye to detail. I first learned about this important concept when I read Visual Intelligence - Sharpen Your Perception, Change Your Life by Amy Herman, the founder of The Art of Perception, a New York-based organization that helps people strengthen their visual intelligence skills. I also watched a video of her Talks at Google presentation on Visual Intelligence in which she shares why we need to slow down and think before acting by carefully understanding the information we are being presented with along with some wonderful examples which opened my eyes to this important topic. Being aware of what we see in front of us is a crucial skill which needs to be continually practiced so we can deliver quality work, build trust, and strengthen our relationships.

All this to say that I’m going to try something new in this newsletter which I believe will be helpful for both you and me. I am adding an exercise into the rotation of Low Fidelity posts, an exercise to improve our visual intelligence.

Each week I will present a picture, it could be artwork or a photo and I will ask you to write down everything you see in it. Let’s go!

Exercise Instructions:

1. Look at the picture below

2. Make a list of all the details you notice in the picture

3. Share your list in the comments

Well done! 👏👏👏

By practicing examining the details consistently we can build our visual intelligence muscles which will help us become more aware in our work and everyday life.

As always, I would love to hear any thoughts you have about this exercise or the Low Fidelity newsletter so hit reply and let’s chat!

Till next time,

Rizwan