by KIAN HOW™
A way of seeing, not a set of rules
When you stop forcing,
things start forming
Have you ever tried to control everything — and life still went its own way?
This is a reminder: you cannot force the result, but you can choose your direction.
I made this series. Behind these six images was a plan that fell apart — and what came instead was better than anything I had planned.
Feeling stuck? Answer four questions. I will show you where you are, and one thing you can do.
If something here felt true, you may be in one of these stages right now. That is where I can help.
I work one-on-one with people who feel stuck. I will not give you a formula. I will help you find your own way out, the same way I keep having to find mine. We look at where you are, what is holding you, and the smallest honest step forward.
For anyone who feels stuck — in work, in a decision, or in life.
Start a conversationEmail me directly — kian@kianhow.com
I'm Kian — the creator behind this. My background is in music — that's where I spent the first stretch of my career — but these days I create across whatever the idea needs: photography, new technology, experiences, and the spaces in between. Two decades in, and I still get stuck and fall into the same trap, again and again.
Here's how this came to be.
One night I went out to shoot street photography. The truth is I don't even like night shoots — least of all on a cold, rainy one. But I had a very specific vision in mind, and that was the only thing that pulled me out the door.
Then I couldn't get the shot. Nothing was working, and the cold and rain just made the whole thing feel like a bad idea. Honestly, I was ready to give up — go home, or find a Starbucks and a hot chocolate and call it a wasted night.
I didn't really know my camera, so I shot on auto. And then — a bump, an accidental press of the shutter — produced something beyond my wildest expectations. I had no idea what a slow shutter was. I had no idea what a long exposure meant. It just happened, and it came as a total surprise.
That surprise filled me with a stream of energy — a new strength, a new determination. To do what? I still didn't know. But I knew I had to stop holding so tightly to my old mindset and expectations. So I set myself free, shook the camera without much thought, and snapped the night away. That's how these images were made.
Then the images just sat there, dormant, for almost two years — until a chance group exhibition came up, and I remembered they existed. That's when it hit me to give them meaning. A life, and a purpose.
So I called it Paradox of Creation.
I've been making things for a long time. And when I look back, most of my most consequential work didn't come from the plan — it came from the unplanned moments, the experiments, the accidents. The happy mistakes I could never have designed on purpose.
Yet we're taught the opposite: have a clear vision, a clear idea, execute it cleanly. So we grip — and the paradox plays out again and again, keeping us in the same loop. I lived it through a whole career in music. And here it is again, in this series of images.
That's why I called it the Paradox of Creation. We're told to create with total intention — but how much greatness was ever really made that way? Life itself is mostly accident. We just keep gripping our plans instead of letting things flow.