5 Reasons I Love Photography

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about my little photography business: how much I love it, what it means to me, and why I got into it in the first place. Being in business for yourself is such a labor of love – you pour so much of yourself into the business that sometimes it’s hard to see where it ends and you begin. That being said, I came up with 5 reasons why I specifically love photography (and why I pursued building a photography business instead of any other sort of business)

FOR THE MEMORIES

I simply do not have a good memory. Call it baby-brain, or old-age, or the blonde hair from my childhood taking over, I simply cannot remember things. Ask my husband. He thinks it’s fun to “test” me – he can remember dates and times and places and the exact order of what we did while we were there. I remember big things, and a few memorable small things, but I can’t remember what I had for breakfast yesterday, let alone the order of events after we got off the plane in California on our trip there a few years ago! But Derrick can (see why we make a good team?) So, to combat my “memory-loss”, I take pictures. Images jog my memory and suddenly I remember more! It’s brilliant! So, call me obsessive, but it’s how I roll.

FOR THE CREATIVITY

I have always been creative. Here’s the thing tho, I’m not the messy, outside-of-the-box, carefree creative – I’m the tedious, draw-within-the-lines, in the safety of my comfort zone creative. I like there to be order and rules and I love to follow those rules. That’s just who I am. I took piano lessons for 10 years and at one point, was a very talented sight-reader (it’s one of those skills: if you don’t use it, you begin to lose it, so I can still sight-read, it’s just a little more challenging). Put a piece of music in front of me and I’m good to go. No music, and I’m completely lost. My sister & my husband are so gifted that they can just sit down at the piano and create gorgeous melodies straight off the top of their heads. I’m at a loss. I need music. Photography is my creative outlet with rules. I know how my camera works and the “laws” of light. I can push on the sides of the box, but don’t have to go completely outside of it to get gorgeous results.

FOR MY OTHER JOB

My photography business places me in a very unique position. I can be a stay-at-home Mom while still bringing in an income for my family. I can be home with my little babe almost every single day, working during her naptimes and after her bedtime, and still spend as much time playing, reading stories, and snuggling with her as I want! It’s absolutely luxurious! It’s been my goal since Day 1 to build my business to the place where I could bring in an income from home. It took a lot of work to get here – so much time and effort and late nights – but I’m here and I couldn’t be happier!

FOR THE CONNETIONS

I am a strange person – I can be very introverted and shy, but given just a little push – I can be friendly and open. That literally doesn’t make any sense, but somehow, it’s true. I need people in my life as much as I need time alone at home. I need to make connections with people, to make friends, to share my knowledge and have people share with me, to realize just how small this world really is, and to be pushed out of my comfort zone. I need people! I used to be a teller at a bank and the people who walked thru the door were my absolute favorite part of the job. It’s easy to hide at home and watch the world go by thru other people’s Instagram accounts, it’s safer that way. But being out there in the rush is so much more fun! I get to meet so many incredible people thru my business, it’s amazing! Gorgeous, caring, generous, loving, fabulous people that I otherwise would never have the pleasure to know!

FOR THE LEARNING

Photography is a crazy skill. It’s always evolving and growing and changing. New equipment is released, new techniques taught, new information provided – it’s a skill that feeds my desire to always be learning. I have always been passionate about knowing everything I can about a certain topic. I want to master it. And the beautiful thing about photography is, there is so much to continually learn! Different ways to see light, posing people, communication, flash, how to make a wedding day run smoother, finances, taxes, copyrights, contracts, manual camera settings, lens flair, hoods, filters, diffusers, reflectors – the list of things to learn about literally goes on and on and on! And it gets me super excited, because I simply cannot wait to learn more!