I will admit, there are times that I feel a bit like my online persona is a cartoon character. I have my signature outfits. I have running gags in my creative work (hello Jenn and our love/hate relationship with Autopia). Heck I even have a few catchphrases that I always spout. However, one phrase that I consistently use, to the point of having it listed in my bio, is “community over competition.” I realize that it is a fairly common phrase, especially in our little corner of the online world. However, there is one aspect of it that I think about often.

For most of my life, my trips to the Disney parks were a fairly self-contained activity. We would visit, create memories and perhaps come back with a few fun anecdotes to share over the years. However, those lasting impressions would really only stay within my family and maybe few friends. However, as I began the process of sharing my work to the “outside world”, a funny thing happened. I realized a key component of my personal enjoyment was listening to how others have experienced the parks as well.

I am fascinated by how others engage with immersion and storytelling on display. For example, my best friend and her husband will have just visited Disneyland for the first time in over a year, and one of the biggest things I am looking forward to is hearing their reactions to various aspects of the park. (“Isn’t it wild how much the Jack Sparrow in the parks looks like Johnny Depp??”) Even though I wasn’t there, the stories they will share will evoke the feelings I had when I was there. And it will bring us closer together.

It is very similar to the feeling I get when I look at different people’s posts. As I read their captions or watch their videos, I get some insight into how they are experiencing the park, and it enhances my own as I prepare to return. Yes, there is the practical part of knowing what the new food items are and what strategies people use to navigate the park. But the other part that captivates me is how they are seeing the park. What locales, characters, moments capture their attention. What is the detail in what they are looking at that causes them to stop, pull out their phone or camera, and preserve it for themselves.  

Not to toot my own horn, dear reader, but I am a fairly good writer. I mean, I have to be in order to have kept you engaged to this point, right? A key component of script writing that I have studied and have attempted to perfect is ensuring that a person’s “voice” is represented. My goal is always to ensure that a person I write speaks like an actual person so that the audience can connect. That skill has translated to the way I take photos and shoot video. If you can capture the essence of why people connect the subject, it makes the photo meaningful. 

The photo at the start of this essay is an example of that. It stemmed from a conversation with Josh, @theparkhopdad on Instagram. He found the spot above in Disney California Adventure and shared it with me as a location I should photograph. I was immediately taken by because, if the location spoke to him enough to have him reach out to someone to capture, then it was important to capture. However, a major reason why it is one of my favorite photos is that it is the result of community. Josh very easily could have captured it himself and posted it with an incredible photo. However, because the goal we have in our community is that we don’t gatekeep or hoard, he shared it with me and encouraged me to capture my own take on it. I will forever be grateful to him for that, just as I am forever grateful to those who tag me in their Disney Zen moments. Each of us contributes a bit of ourselves to the whole and as we learn from each other, we truly become a community.