Keep Digging: Finding Solace in the Self I’d Forgotten to Love.

An interesting thing came up today.

As I ran through my morning thoughts — my daily ritual

catching up on the train of mind, a few wagons back from the front, revisiting a journey I’ve taken a million times…

the words came again:

“Keep digging.”

I’ve heard them before. Over and over.

I know them, or thought I did.

But today, they landed differently.

Like a key I’d held all along but never dared to use.

Why this phrase again?

Haven’t I already learned what it means?

Apparently not — or maybe not in the way my soul had been waiting for.

And then another word arrived: Solace.

Familiar, soft-sounding.

I’ve carried that word like a tattoo under a sleeve

close to the skin, but never exposed to light.

Was the solace I knew real?

Or was it just a concept I clung to, a quiet corner I drew on the wall of my mind but never stepped into?

Maybe it was a shame. Maybe I thought I wasn’t strong enough to love that part of me.

Maybe I feared that if I touched it fully,

it would unravel everything I had built to survive.

But today…

The choice was taken from me.

And rightly so.

Today, I’m ready.

To be that little big part of myself, fully.

To love it, to cherish it,

but most of all, to accept it.

Because solace isn’t escape.

It’s return.

It’s the soft soil you reach only after digging through all the stone.

And I wonder…

How many of us are quietly standing at the edge of that place.

mistaking it for emptiness, when really, it’s the beginning of finally coming home?

Until next time,

Michel

Michel Perrin

About Michel Perrin

Photographer. Fine Artist. Seeker of Light.

Michel Perrin is an award-winning photographer and fine art visual storyteller based in New Zealand. With nearly three decades of experience behind the lens, Michel’s work weaves the quiet poetry of light, form, and feeling into every image he creates. Whether capturing the soft elegance of a portrait, the architectural rhythm of a structure, or the sacred stillness of a landscape, Michel brings a unique sensitivity to the unseen beauty that lives within the world around us.

His photography has been exhibited internationally and is held in private collections across the globe. Rooted in a deep reverence for truth, emotion, and visual harmony, Michel’s approach goes beyond technique — it is an invitation to pause, reflect, and feel.

Over the years, he has developed a signature aesthetic that is both timeless and soulful — a blend of classical precision and intuitive vision that speaks to the heart as much as the eye.

Michel’s work continues to evolve alongside his inner journey, with new expressions emerging through spiritual symbolism, poetic storytelling, and visionary design. Through his camera, he doesn’t just document moments — he reveals portals.

https://www.michelp.co
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Reflections From Opposite Sides of the Mirror By The Navigator of the Unseen