The Last Week of 2018!
The images sprinkled throughout this little ditty are from the last session I’ll deliver in 2018!
And what is the end of the year without reflection?
Happy to report, 2018 was another glorious year of meeting new humans with important, exciting stories to capture and tell.
I am very comfortable saying I am a passionate, even * gasp * gifted photographer and very uncomfortable saying I’m the subject matter expert at all the other stuff it that goes into being at the helm of a business.
All year long, I very much made an effort to embrace foreign territories (SEO, new equipment, challenging projects) and, regardless the individual failure or success of any specific task, I chose to spend energy evaluating the value of the project by how much I could learn.
Real life example from this past week?
All my photo sessions have wrapped for the year and I’ve been chipping away at the last items on my 2018 To Do List.
One task I’ve been putting off all year has been getting my literal face in front of my brand. Y’all should know what I look like!
Sessions like this for smart + stunning Isabella of The Indigo Fox are absolutely powerful. They are timeless and transcendent and exactly what you want to make them. Personal images that speak to the viewer a thousand different ways in a single look is what I’m hooked on.
If I feel this passionately, I thought, surely I could complete this task for myself before yearend.
Now is the time to let you know, Randy sent me home with a
“it’s gonna be a no from me, dawg.”
I always feel confident posing people as I see a their shape fill the space in front of my lens.
On the opposite side of the camera I was a cartoon of an insecure middle schooler.
I took all my frustration about floundering over my own, free face to my Notes app and, before dinner was done, I had designed a new “What to Expect” tool for all my 2019 clients to dispel max. apprehension.
I failed, but I grew.
• • •
Aside to the audience: with the help of a clever lady boss earlier this year (she writes medicine for the modern soul), I was reminded of HOW much influence comes from perspective. If you’re not quite ready to put crystals all over your home, but you are interested in some easy journal prompts, make your way over to this sort of search on the brilliant donuts + downdog blog.
They’ll having feeling as sassy as Isabella bellow.
• • •
Y’all are still here? LOVE THAT.
I think these fun, centering practices along with the thrill of not having doors slammed in my face during my Secret Homework led me to a few other abstract goals and allowed me to inhabit a particularly adventurous mindset in 2018.
I hope you are all considering taking some strategic risks this next year.
Goals don’t always have to be goliath things like “make 10 million next year” (but they could be).
Practices as simple as dive deeper into X relationships or attend X seminars each quarter are potent too. I knew I would be totally ineffective if I kept working from an undesignated workspace or editing sessions here and there from coffee shops/the couch, so carving out a foxy lil office was a key foundational piece in mental preparedness for all the good I needed to do in 2018.
I was mindful and consistent to pour myself into working relationships, some possibly built on the backbone of mutual love for entrepreneurship and true-crime podcasts. A million high-stakes moments (like signing on to photograph THE ENTIRE YEAR of Aks Mathur’s luxury leather brand), challenging the things I think I’m bad at (writing blogs), and sticking to the things I know can make me better (conducting this entire photoshoot with Isabella on a 35mm lens which is like WHAT? bc I’m the queen of my 50mm prime lyfe) is a lot of what I needed to embrace this past year.
If I hadn’t put those five goals in writing and for the whole world to see, I’m not sure I would have been as zealous about searching for them throughout the year.
I would encourage you to write your goals somewhere, preferably somewhere you are faced with reading them everyday.
Don’t let all the frenzy of the end of the year put you in the passenger seat, boo. THIS is your time to put in the work to make your next year of living so good you want to slap yourself for not doing all the things sooner!
Having no more sessions to look forward to for the rest of year and is the wooOOrrSSssst (insert Jean-Raphio gif here) bc I will miss photographing this next week. But I’ll be recharged and ready to see you in that new new!
I have so much love for every single person that trusted me to come into their lives with my camera. It’s an actual honor to stand where I stand.
Bring on the joy! Bring on 2019!
Love,
Granny Claus
🤶🏼✌🏼