I started shooting again...

I have officially decided to be my own photographer. I have been photographing for nearly 17 years professionally and I am ready to hang up my hat  and only photograph for myself. This has not been an easy decision for me and took me nearly 2 years to make the decision final.

As a mother of two young children I found that I am more interested in becoming a better mother. I am more interested in spending time taking parenting classes, learning to cook and renovating my old home rather than spending my days going to WPPI, joining yet another photography club and spending hours editing my images.

Over the past two years I realized that I was comparing myself negatively to the other photo-businesses that seemed to put their heart and soul into their work. Where I found that I was not able to spend the same amount of energy with the amount of time I would RATHER spend with my family. I started looking at my own work and not enjoying it. I didn't even want to pick up the camera for myself any more. This year a close friend (a wise, wise woman) and I were talking about our art and the balance between family and our professional lives. I had been expressing my concerns to her about my photography and the toll it was taking on me and my family. She told me that "Women can have it all, just not all at once." When she said that to me, it was as if a spear of truth went right through my heart. I knew that is what I needed to hear.

So then came the day I went to my "free" website that no longer was "free" and it was no longer available. I set this website up three years ago to post my prices and portrait portfolio. It was as though I had been released from shackles. I know, that is a dramatic statement, it is true, I felt as though someone had freed me from something I was hating.

Let me be clear, I love my clients. They are what made it a hard for me to decide to step away from photographing professionally. I enjoyed getting to know them and creating images for them. However, it was time for me to take a step back for myself.

The day I made the announcement on facebook to my 450 some odd friends and family, I had mixed reactions. Yet, it still felt good. I also turned down my first client that day. I received a gracious congratulations from that client, for making my family number one. It was rejuvenating! Soon after I sat up from the computer I looked at my husband square in the face and started jumping up and down, hollering, "WAHOOOOOOO!!!" He likes it when I act crazy (I tell myself that every day). :)

Do you know what I did that day? I picked up my camera again and started taking my own lovely pics of my scroungy, totally happy family in the beautiful desert behind our home. It was a breath of fresh, FRESH air. I felt free to be me. It felt good to shoot them, while they were shooting. Love photographing my baby eat mud and just enjoy the desert day.

It is high time I rediscover my style, re-appreciate me, stop the comparing and enjoy this lovely talent that I have so often spent hours and hours working to have. Who knows, maybe after my children have grown I will decide to do this full time, after I have re-discovered myself and learned a bit more business sense.

WAHHHOOOOOOO! I feel free baby. Now comes the time, I get to enjoy photographing all over again.

Have you ever felt that something you loved started becoming a vice? How did you work past those times of frustration?