What I Learned From Taking (& Posting) A Picture Every Day of The Year

-It’s a lot easier to remember what happened in your life if you document it well. [I suppose that’s why I am a writer.]

-When you know that you have to take a picture of something, you will start looking for the best part of your day as it’s unfolding. Older folks might tell you that this is what’s wrong with the world right now, but it actually makes you actively think about beauty before it leaves you.

-There are some days that are too ugly or plain to photograph. Sometimes your pets are the most interesting part of your day. That’s okay.

-You can take photographs on a plane if your phone is in airplane mode. If you fly during sunrise or sunset, people will dig the view.

-Some of your friends are your secret muses. Some people you know will always look like a photograph to you. As if they walk around inside a frame. You will document them well.

-If you offer to take a picture for a stranger, they will often return the favor. This will teach you something about the good in people.

-When you travel alone, the self-timer is your friend, and often better than the selfie.

-Selfies are powerful tools towards achieving self-love. They don’t make our generation narcissistic. They make us realize that even though the motherfuckers try to hold us down, we are actually often quite babe-ular. 

-Up-close photographs of snails are surprisingly motivational.

-Standing in front of a brightly colored wall, graffiti, or bricks = instant snazzy photo.

-Here are tiny things that you wouldn’t think make great pictures, but do: give your Starbucks barista the wrong name and photograph your cup with the new name on it, pictures of street signs in new cities, pictures of when your manicure matches whatever you are holding (smoothies, books), pictures when your shoes match your bike or your sweater matches your helmet, muscular men with tiny dogs. 

-Pictures of people’s funny wifi network names count as photographs! [Shout out to “Bill Wi The Science Fi”, “Mila Kunis Naked”, and “Not Your Wifi”. Oh. And “Beyonce’s Inferno.”]

-No one has cuter dogs than you. No one.

-We have some of the best technology we’ve ever had, and most of us want to make our pictures look old and nostalgic. This says something about human nature that I haven’t quite articulated it yet.

-Jumping pictures aren’t played out. Latté art may be, unless you made it yourself.

-If you post a photo of you in a dressing room wearing something that you won’t actually buy, it will almost be like buying it and wearing it out in public. Social Media is weird. 

-You’ve been to a lot of places. Coney Island is still the most photogenic.

-If you walk around for about ten minutes in Brooklyn, there will always be something worth capturing. 

-If you take enough pictures in a row, the animal will stick its tongue out for at least one of them. That’s the one to post.

-The fatter the cat, the better the picture. 

-People will want to put their arms around each other and smile. This will never be them at their most beautiful.

-Life looks better candid. 

-You will take an artsy photograph of your father left of center with the entire ocean and sunset behind him, and he will ask, “Why am I not in the middle?” Your art isn’t for everybody.

-The people you love will always be gorgeous subjects. Love is the best filter.

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Megan Falley is the author of two books of poetry published on Write Bloody: After the Witch Hunt and Redhead and the Slaughter King. To see all the pictures she took in 2014, follow her on instagram.