There is something about Canberra in autumn that makes the city feel different.
The mornings become crisp, the light softens and the trees surrounding Lake Burley Griffin transform into brilliant shades of red, orange and gold. On this morning, the low sun was streaming through the autumn leaves beside the lake, turning an ordinary Canberra scene into something full of warmth and energy.
Looking at this photograph now, it feels like an appropriate reflection of where I was in my own life at the time.
I had reached a point where I needed to take a fresh look at my health and what I wanted from the years ahead. Rather than simply accepting the limitations that had entered my life, I was beginning to think more positively about what I could do.
At the same time, something similar was happening in my Air Force career.
Looking at things differently
For much of my career, the path ahead had been relatively clear. There was always another course, qualification, posting or professional challenge to pursue. But my health had forced me to reconsider some of the assumptions I had made about my future.
That could have been entirely negative. Instead, I was beginning to see change as an opportunity.
I started exploring different roles and looking for ways to use the experience I had accumulated over my career in new ways. I found opportunities that challenged me intellectually and creatively, exposed me to different people and ideas, and allowed me to develop skills beyond the traditional path I had followed.
I didn't know it at the time, but those decisions would become enormously important.
A few years later, when the time came to leave the Air Force, I would discover that I had already begun building the foundations for what came next. The experience, confidence and broader perspective I gained during this period opened professional opportunities that I could never have anticipated when I first started down that path.
Sometimes we prepare for the next chapter of our lives without even realising we are doing it.
A season of change
That is one of the reasons I keep returning to this photograph.
Autumn is usually associated with things ending. Leaves change colour, fall from the trees and signal the approach of winter. But there is another way to look at it. Autumn is also transformation — the landscape becoming something new before our eyes.
On this morning beside Lake Burley Griffin, Canberra was glowing.
The brilliant autumn leaves framed the lake while the rising sun burst through the trees. Everything felt bright, colourful and optimistic.
At the time, I was simply enjoying exploring Canberra with my camera and discovering new ways to photograph a city that was becoming home. I couldn't see exactly where my career was heading, and I certainly couldn't have predicted how much my life would change over the following years.
But I was beginning to look forward rather than back.
This photograph reminds me that we don't always need to know where change will lead. Sometimes the important thing is simply being willing to see our circumstances differently, explore the opportunities in front of us and remain open to a future we hadn't previously imagined.
Like those autumn leaves catching the morning sun, a period of change can sometimes reveal possibilities that were there all along.