The Rhythm of Passing By

I was standing on the corner of 5th and Main this morning, waiting for the light to change. It was one of those days where the city felt like a machine that never quite catches its breath. People were rushing past me, heads down, phones in hand, all of us moving toward somewhere else. I watched a yellow cab pull up to the curb, its driver staring straight ahead, completely detached from the sea of people swirling around his car. It made me wonder how many lives we brush against every single day without ever really seeing them. We are all just ghosts in each other’s peripheral vision, moving at different speeds, caught in the same frantic current. We spend so much energy trying to get to the next destination that we forget the beauty of the pause. Is it possible to be part of the crowd and still be entirely still within yourself? What do you see when you stop to watch the world rush by?

Shirren Lim has captured this exact feeling of urban motion in the beautiful image titled Taxi. It perfectly mirrors that moment of finding a quiet, steady center amidst the blur of a busy city. Does this scene feel familiar to you?