Tales by Light

I have a few shows and movies saved on my streaming platforms that I dub soul tv. These programs are often documentaries and they almost always fuel my wanderlust. Thrown in with Eat, Pray, Love and Daughters of Destiny is a documentary series on Netflix called Tales by Light.

The series profiles photographers as they travel the world diving into their chosen trade. As a viewer you watch children collect trash in Bangladesh, visit the deserts of Sudan, and watch bodies burn in Varanasi.

I suggest to perhaps avert your eyes from the actual burning of the bodies. It is a beautiful and grounded tradition but nothing can get the image of a smoldering body whose muscles jump like grasshoppers out of your mind. Trust me on this one. 

Anyway, like my other soul tv preferences, this series entranced me. I picked through all of the episodes about Asia in one sitting and since then I have watched the series again and again.

I never really understood the depth of why certain documentaries qualify for my soul tv list except that I like to travel and these programs are about that.  

When I streamed Eat, Pray, Love for the tenth time I finally realized that I am intoxicated by these kinds of stories because I want to be like these people. I want to pursue my desires with the shamelessness of Liz Gilbert and I want to do meaningful work in India like the work done by the Shanti Bhavan School and now it looks like I want to be a photographer. 

Not quite.

I want to write stories about the children who are picking up trash in Bangledesh and about the daughters of the people being cremated on the banks of the Ganga. 

Storytelling is the only work that I have ever genuinely wanted to do. I have never had to fool myself into it, quite the opposite actually, I have spent lots of time fooling myself out of it. 

I have realized I want to dive into my trade in remote corners of the world like the Tales by Light photographers. I want to work with NGOs telling the stories of women and girls so their lives can be improved.

This is the thing I genuinely want to do. I want it so badly that if I could turn my stomach inside out and examine its lining, this is the work you would find there. 

I know it’s not a small feat and a job probably does not exist that encompasses my dreams, but I’ve taken big leaps before and know I am also capable of this one.

So, this is me pulling an idea from the lining of my stomach and throwing it out into the universe. I will continue to throw this idea of mine out there with the same regularity that I watch Eat, Pray, Love, and other travel documentaries, and eventually the idea will come back to me embodied in a real-life scenario.