A season of reflection and growth

These past few months was in season of reflection and quiet, like the seeds under the fertile soil waiting for their chance to emerge in the bright sunlight of spring, gosh that was corny.  I am not a writer, I am not eloquent lol.  

This winter was a hard one for me.  My anxiety was pretty rough and I was feeling not good enough, uninspired, depressed.  So I took a break.  I put my camera away and rarely touched it, I stepped away from posting my work on social media, and I hibernated from my photography. 

I worried that by not posting on social media my clients would forget me, think I had quit.   I decided to that I needed something that planted a seed in me, or lit a fire again.  I enrolled in a course on film called Everyday Films and I began picking up my camera again.  I slowly started feeling myself getting inspired again, excited again, not just about this new passion of film making but also about still photography.  

Sometimes in our lives I think we need a period of quiet, to reflect on where we have come and to decide on where we want our path to lead. 

I am sharing with you my final project from my workshop.  It is always scary sharing something new but I also know that sometimes you have to trust the magic of beginnings. 

Why I embarked on another 365 project

Last year I decided to try my hand at a 365 project, where I would take a picture a day for 365 days. It was actually 366 days since 2016 was a leap year. I started out strong, but by September I had lost steam and gave up all together. My main issue were days where I was not inspired and felt like the photograph was more of a chore than exciting. I also found that it was hard for me to keep up with uploading the photographs each day and editing and posting, so I would let a week go by and then feel overwhelmed. I have learned that when I am overwhelmed I don’t plow through, instead I bury my head in the sand and walk away, which is exactly what I did in September. So you may be wondering why I would choose to do this to myself again. Am I a glutton for punishment? Do I like to set myself up for failure? No, it is because I need to challenge myself in order to stay motivated. This year I decided to take on the 365 project to actually finish it but more than that I want to push myself. I want to try out new lighting, low lighting, new techniques and this pushes me to do that instead of procrastinate. It forces me to see things differently, take my camera with me when I go out, and document our days. Another part of my 365 project is to do a portrait a week project. I am trying to take a portrait of my kids each week. I want to be able to capture all their silly faces, changes that occur, their moods, etc. and this sounded like a great way to do it.

I hope you will follow along with me. It helps to keep me encouraged if I know people are following along. Also, if you are doing a 365 please share it with me. If you have any ideas for me to try send them my way as well, sometimes I get stumped and having some suggestions would be great.

I hope you enjoy my January photos.  I will be updating the blog at the end of each month, and talk about what I learned, what went well, what failed, how I hate myself for doing this lol, you know that kinda stuff.

You can follow along on my 365 project on flickr My weekly portrait project is also on flickr

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