The funk

I will not be in my funk this year, I will not be in my funk this year. 

Ok, well it will probably happen, no matter how many times I click my heels and repeat it. The dreaded fate of the artist, the funk. In the beginning of the year, I never think about the funk, because I'm ready in action, my hands are on fire, I sleep eat and dream about the days of green grass and blue skies and getting my hot a** couple to pose like they are on the cover of the latest cosmo. Ahh yeah, that's the stuff photog world is made of. I crave that goodness. 

Fast forward a few months and you have shot at the same effing park over and over again, the couples rave about your engagement blog posts and don't want creative they just want they have been seeing. And you're thinking AM I GOING TO RIP MY EYEBALLS OUT?!?!!?!? 

For the sake of your income, please keep all eyeballs in tact. 

I'm thinking what if you could prevent the funk ahead of time, instead of waiting for it to happen. You know, that whole plan ahead thing. 

This year I have decided to mind map. Mind map, I don't know what the literal definition of it is, but whenever I get an idea... putting it in a notebook. Not necessarily to plan my shoots, but thinking ahead for the times, when my brain is dead, when I may  not feel like shooting. GASP, yes, I did just say there are times where I don't want to shoot. 

Times where I don't want to shoot, where I go thru massive hide phases of photogs on my facebook and where I block all blog stalking. I went thru 7 months of this last year. I get so caught up on the competition of it all, that I forget what I fell in love with in the first place. 

Photog world is petty. Photog world is annoying. Sometimes, I dislike all the photogs and just want to get out because situations have got so out of hand. If you have no idea what I'm talking about, just wait, one day you'll go thru something and then that light bulb will go off and you'll think to yourself, "hmmm I bet this is what she was talking about." 

Here's what I wish all photogs would know. A ton of people are getting married each year. If you all just work together, you're going to make more of income than if you run your mouth. I'm a strong believer in karma... and... I want as much good karma as I can get. 

I'm 25 now, done with this stupid drama, I just wish other photogs would take that stand and be done w/ it as well. Why I'm ranting about this is, I feel like sometimes the petty drama shiz that happens directly affects my shooting life. Because I don't want this reaction, or I don't want so and so to think this or that. For the love, I'm done with living like that.

If you don't like what I do, what I shoot... if you don't think I'm creative enough or talented enough, smart enough. If you think my photos aren't technically right or because I don't have a degree, I can't shoot worth a shiz... than that's fine. Stop reading my blog, stop talking behind my back and be done with it. Stop wasting your energy on it and in return I'm going to stop wasting my energy on actually caring what you or what other people think. 

I'll have you know that last year was the worst year of my life. I won't go into to much detail here (I have a personal blog to talk about that, so if you want to read that click here), but I got a divorce, several things happened in my business life that were awful. These things I would never wish upon anyone.  You know what happened, certain photographers got wind of this and instead of coming to me and asking me about it and being supportive the complete opposite happened. 

I was spun into a whirlwind of, what in the world. I didn't mean to get this reaction, I didn't even know these people knew I existed let alone had enough energy to talk about it publicly. This kept happening over and over again, with different photogs. Enough is enough. I may do things in my business that you don't understand. I run different specials, I change my pricing, I have a name your own price section, I have an offer like the dreaded Groupon photographers, I am that person. I'm ok with it, I'm not asking you to be like me, heck I'm not asking you to like what I do. All I've ever wanted is respect and acceptance. 

Isn't that what everyone wants in their life? Whether it be from their parents, siblings, spouse, boss, whoever it may be. Just a little respect here and there. Instead of people saying, "oh my gosh, can you believe she's doing this" or "oh here she goes again." I have crazy antics, I know this. My role model is lady Gaga for crying out loud, that should tell you something. I'm bold, I'm out there, I'm weird, I do things people don't get, and that's fine. I get what I do, I know I do what I do, therefore just read about it, be along for the ride. But I told myself this year, this year, I will not let other people get to me. 

I got back together with Pedro in January. You know when I let the world know about it.. in March. I was so scared of what people would think, mainly people in my business life that I didn't say anything about it. MARCH. Can you imagine how that must have made him feel. That's awful. But when you run a company with your spouse, and it goes to Hell in a hand basket and it affects your business, than you have to deal with all of that. It's an unusual situation and it sucked.

I love my job, I love to inspire people. I've got such a response by putting my editing technique on my blog. People are like, "WOH, you're giving this to us." Yes, I'm giving this to you because no one gave it to me. I used to ask people, "hi, how did you get this look" or "do you mind sharing." You know what I real life had a photog tell me she got the look of hers by an action in photoshop, only to find out after I purchased every photoshop action there was, that it had NOTHING to do with those actions and everything to do with the equipment she was using. 

Now, do I want to sit here and link their blog to this one. Of course that's what I want to do, and a few years ago, I might have just done that. But with becoming older and a lot of therapy, I've learned that is not exactly the right approach to take. 

I'm a firm believer in all you need is love and love is what I want to share. I want to share with you my inspirations, my dreams, my struggles and my life. Yes, this one is geared towards my business life... but I'm an Aries business is my life. I'm working on making business apart of my life and not my full life. Because I let it take over everything I do, I can't stop thinking about it. I get up in the middle of the night writing ideas, thinking of shot locations, new SEO/Marketing ideas... it's a never ending cycle. 

This year not only will I not let the funk get to me. I will not let other people get to me. This is hard, but if you're in business, I want you to know something... there's people out there who are going to act like your friend to get what they want only to backstab you at the first possible chance. Beware of these unsafe people, and be cautious. That's one piece of advice I've learned the past 5 years...be cautious of those that are around you and spend more time with the people who genuinely love you. I wonder how many hours of time I wasted with unsafe people only to ignore the ones that genuinely loved me and had my best interest at heart. 

 

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