Blog Post SIX

Summer, Trust, Blooming

July 27, 2025

It has been awhile since my last post. With the blooming of the flowers, came the busyness of the summer season. Filled with shoots of all kinds, but mostly beautiful weddings and heartwarming proposals. June bringing the blossoming of nature, as well as love. After a cold, dreary and slow winter, I joyfully accepted all the photo and video sessions that came my way. The weeks quickly filling up, and maybe just slightly, overflowing. But I was ready to be out in the world after a long winter hibernation.

I also brought home a new family member this summer. My little tuxedo kitty, Pepper. I adopted her at two months old, and my summer days have been filled with obsessing over her during my work breaks. Since the majority of my work is done from home like editing, phone calls, social media, and session planning, the gentle presence of Pepper has been immensely calming while I knock out all the tasks of the day.

And I also traveled to my home state, Colorado, over the Fourth of July weekend to see my family for a short trip in between the busy weeks of the summer season. We escaped to the mountains which was a  wonderful respite from the chaotic and loud NYC life. Our trip consisted of fresh air, slow days, campfires, and a barn dance to conclude our trip into the mountains.

We are now submerged in the hot, long days of mid summer. The end of July is approaching. And the busyness of the season starts to slow down, as the fatigue sets in from the intense summer heat. People leave the city to get a break from the thick humidity of the long  July days. Weddings come to a halt, until more pleasant weather sets in where couples can actually enjoy their day. Photo sessions pause until people aren’t sweating profusely and grimacing from heat, as that doesn’t make for great photos.

And as I finally got through the last of my editing projects, which felt absolutely never-ending until mid July, I started to get antsy to sit down and work on my blog. A project that I committed to last winter. When I started, I hoped for weekly posts. And when I continued, I decided on biweekly…. then to maybe monthly. And now that weeks, and even months have gone by, I felt disappointed in myself for not keeping up with better consistency on my posts. I hate projects that are unfinished. Tasks not completed. The feeling of everything being tied up nicely makes me feel accomplished. Frees up my mind. And I give myself an imaginative gold star for completing my checklist. But if a task isn’t checked off, a feeling of having failed sets in. The gold star revoked……

 A bad project finished is better than a good project never finished. My subconscious whispers.

But… this was also supposed to be for fun and for my own self-expression. So why the disappointment regarding a lapse in working on this project because I had other things going on? Bills to pay. Clients to focus on. And we all do this to ourselves, I’m sure. We decide on these fun, creative projects or activities, but if they don’t go as we hoped, we get so down on ourselves, or maybe even see it as a failing of some sort. Many of us may even get completely discouraged.

But it’s for fun…….right? 

So why do we lose that in so many aspects of our lives and decide to beat ourselves up over something that was supposed to bring us enjoyment? 

I was having a late night conversation with my brother, and I mentioned that I dislike the question of “where do you see yourself in 5 years time?” A question that for some reason, school teachers and authority figures love to ask young people who haven’t even established their identity yet. I dislike it for multiple reasons. Reason number one is that I usually never expected to be in the present situation I thought I would be 5 years prior. Life can change so much, and so can your identity or that which is important to you. And this leads to reason number two…. why would you box yourself in like that? If you are so committed to a specific 5 year plan, you may hold on to stale ideas that are not working for you any longer. Become so tunneled vision, you don’t see a better path. You never know where life can lead you and sometimes you cannot envision a life that is even better than what you imagined. So why close yourself off to that?

And I said to my brother, “Why can’t I just enjoy what I am doing right now and just let the doors open that are meant to?” And I know I have mentioned in past posts that I have had a complicated relationship with control. And I still do in some ways. But I never would have found my current career if it weren’t for just allowing myself to be open to new opportunities and perspectives on life. And when I started freelancing and working on my own business, I didn’t have a “vision” per-say. I wanted to keep improving my craft and narrowing down what type of work speaks to me, but I also want to allow myself to stay open to the many options of what could be, instead of forcing myself down one specific path. 

And the reason for this is that I love my work now and feel fulfilled. Although I still want to grow, I also want to stay in the moment with my present work, instead of focusing on a future that may never even come into fruition or looks vastly different. Because each day of my work now brings me so much joy and fulfillment. And I trust that if I continue honing my skills and building my network, I will be led to exactly where I need to be in my career. I am learning what opportunities to accept and what opportunities are not in alignment with me, but other than that, I am open to whatever the universe wants to bring into my career. Because what if it is something better than I expected? You could call this a more feminine approach. A more woo-woo approach. Whatever you want. Because I have been told in a patriarchal, materialistic, goal-driven society, that you need to have a “vision” and an “action plan.” You need to have “focus” and “drive.” Which I believe do have all of those. Maybe even a little too much of those at times where it blindsides me. But it has created an imbalance in my life where I thought those were the things that mattered and would bring me success and happiness and my career, and life overall. 

But what if just trusting the world a little more could bring you even greater success and happiness? Having general goals and a vision, but also allowing the universe to bring you to the opportunities that are right for you? Trusting that maybe you don’t have all the information now  and if you stayed open to the unknown, there could be a dream future or career or project around the corner, that you could never have even conceived of. 

And so, I have decided that I do my work for the love of it. Of course, I would be grateful to have success in what I do, but I don’t want that to be the reason I get up every day and do this work either. I do it because the journey of it is fun, enjoyable, creative, social, educational. There are so many opportunities in this industry that I don’t want to limit myself to what could be brought into my path. Part of the fun is enjoying the ride and going into the unknown territory. Seeing what it could blossom into. And what I can blossom into. Co-creating with life and just immersing myself into the everchanging moment. Because I don’t know what 5 years will look like. But I trust that if I put the work in and continue moving forward, everything will align how it is meant to. 

And so with my blog post. I had a “goal” or a “vision” with how I wanted it to look. I wanted it to match my disciplined, routine-loving inner world, and was disappointed that it didn’t. And I feared that it would reflect my looser, undisciplined side. But then I remembered, this was supposed to be for fun. This was for the creativity of it. The joy of it. And aren’t most things in life? Most things we gravitate towards or choose in our lives are for the joy of it. And we seem to forget that. But life is one big canvas for us to paint on. And that doesn’t mean it isn’t hard, tough, sad, or disappointing. But also, we can allow ourselves to enjoy the things we choose in our lives as well, even if they look a little different. Because we choose almost everything in our lives. 

So, I decided, it is ok if the blog post wasn’t put out on a timed schedule or in a disciplined manner. This is for the fun of it and the art of writing and self-expression. And that translates to my life as a whole. Life is a piece of art. Sometimes it gets a little messy. Sometimes, we have to start over. And even if you don’t have a solid vision in mind at the start, if you enjoy the ebbs and flows, the brush strokes of daily life, then you can’t help, but create a beautiful artwork of a life.