Where do trolls live in the Scandinavian forests?
A few days ago, I went on a photojob with my partner. It was a job where we would highlight ordinary people in their day to day job, to attract more people to come to this municipality in Stockholm to work.
It was exciting in a way, to se the person behind the work. To talk to them and se the passion they had for the job. And also as a fellow human, se the insecurity in them as an individual to se themselves with another pair of eyes. And get the opportunity as an artist to show them the beauty in from another person's perspective.
Between the sessions I had an interesting talk with one of the persons starting the project. We noticed the insecurity of the self image in almost all of them. We talked about how appearance is everything in our digital society today. Imperfections are something bad, the social media wants perfection from an imperfect world.
The flaws that you see in yourself, is probably not what another person sees. The person probably see the things that make you being you, and not the things you feel bad about yourself.
And that started my thoughts to go a little deeper. How much of today's society controls how we should be. I guess often many times it goes unnoticed for us, and we're starting to question if there is something wrong with us.
Even myself can go down that rabbit hole from time to time.
I think we somewhere on the way lost our connection to our inner voice. Connection between our soul and body. Not seeing it as one living creature depending on each other, but we see it as two separated parts that needs to be fixed separately. And after that can be put together.
Not healing together in harmony, and grow stronger together.
Text from the song below 🌼
If you feel that you lost the connection with your soul, how do you connect with it?
For me, I’ve always look into what I miss in my life. As an example, when I lived in the city, I always longed for the forest. All my evening walks went to the closest forest. Feel the the bark of the trees, feeling the ground beneath my bare feet. The fresh air.
But then the forest always been my first home since I grow up. So that's what I’ve turned to when things felt unbalanced in my life. When something was missing in my life.
I turned to what my heart needed. The thing that’s been closest to my heart. What my soul needed.
And when I look back, I think this is also how it's been in my artistry too.
What's been closest to my heart and soul when it comes to photography and painting, is and will always be everything I feel, sees and find on my walks in the forest.
I’ve had a long true love for the forest since I was little. I grew up in the north of Sweden, with the trees and the river around the corner. Always existed with the seasons around the year:
Biting my cheeks red season,
Dripping ice and celebrating sun is back season,
Slow snow and little spruces season,
Beginning of the blooming and sleep drunk insects season,
Midsummer and dancing faeries season,
Welcome the darkness back and feel the cool evenings season,
Colors taking all my attention season,
The foggy and finally scarf is back season,
Slow down season
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I grow up as an alone child, my sister is a few years older than me so she moved away early in my life.
And my family decided to move out in the countryside when I was six years old. It was fun and exciting to have so much space to explore. But where we lived, I didn’t have any friends close to me. So I spend a lot of time doing my own things without friends around the corner.
So my favorite friends wasn't my human friends. No, it was the trees I always was passing by as I walked along my favorite trails. Always talked to the trees and the flowers, feeling in the atmosphere, feeling at home.
Where I grow up, people are close to the nature. I think often closer to the nature than we are to people, haha. It can drive some people crazy, but I find it calming.
I had a wild fantasy when I was growing up, and still have. But that made me feel I always had something to do. I created smaller worlds, find friends in the forest and animals, and made up stories to entertain myself. I think that was the beginning of my creative life.
I remember I used to go to some bigger rocks in a special part of our closest forest, believing that the trolls lived there. Hiding from humans. And that I was an uninvited and too curious guest.
So I always brought gifts, little offerings, In the form of pine cones, special stones, beautiful weirdly shaped sticks and colorful leaves. Things i thought trolls wanted? I read somewhere in some typical Scandinavian fairytale that they like beautiful things.
And that was, and still is things I think is so beautiful. I thought that a stone portal would open, and that they would invite me in. So after my offerings for them, I always climbed up on the rock. Imagining how it would sound from the inside.
And maybe that was a way for me to come closer to my inner spirit? Appreciate the beautiful nature around me, in the form of a child's fantasy. When I think back to these moments, I now realize that was one of my earliest contact with my soul. I found a way to ground myself as a child. And I still find myself walking around in the forest, finding small offerings to my inner child. Keeping the spirit alive 🌱✨
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Found this little buddy on one of my many walks last summer when I lived in the city. It was a mission on the rainy days to go out for walks, you find these everywhere where you walk ✨