In a moment of synchronicity I had been looking at this photo just before my husband watched a video on Wabi Sabi; the japanese philosophy of the perfection of imperfection.

Nothing lasts, nothing is ever finished, nothing is perfect, nothing is complete, everything is ongoing

When I look at this photo, I remember making it. Standing on the beach at Ravencastle, framing the shot. Bringing it home, opening it in Lightroom, adjusting the light, shaping it into something closer to what I felt in that moment. And I remember the frustration too—two tiny flecks of dust on my lens, spoiling it.

But I also remember choosing to leave them. To let the image stand as it was.

Later, listening to the video my husband was playing, I realised something: if I had “perfected” the photo, I might not have remembered all these layers of the experience. It’s perfection would have overshadowed all those memories of the moment of creation.

Imperfection makes the photo so much more memorable to me. The memories around the choice to leave it have turned it into more than just an image. It captures the mixture of joy, elation, sadness and annoyance I felt when creating it.

It’s not perfect. It may not even be complete. But it perfectly captures that moment I felt satisfied. It captures that beautiful moment when imperfection was fine. A reminder that beauty often lives in imperfection and the human spirit lies at the heart of artistic creation. That for the human spirit to shine though art needs to be imperfect.