Living

So, with all the reflection upon life and between all the uncertainties of what do with myself, I've had a revelation of sorts. I do photography on the side (for free at the moment to build up the start of a business and for practice), and while I was going through my photos of my last shoot, I realized this is what I really want to be doing. I want to be taking personal photographs for people. Preserving authentic moments for couples, their children, their grandchildren, and anyone else. Capturing the essence of who a person is or who two people are together or as a family is such compelling thing for me to do. In addition, it's not just capturing families or couples, it's capturing the universe or something true about it. A snapshot of someone on the street or a picture of a ruined building.

For me, the thought of being able to capture a piece of beauty and relate it to others, is what I really want to be able to do. Of course this begs for the question of how do I do this full-time? The answer became simple for me: I don't. What I realized has to happen for me is an accumulation of a couple of things. The first, to find a job with more stability in my hours. Right now my job varies so much in the hours I work and the days in which I work them. I need a job where I know every single day what I'm going to be working. In addition, my job needs to be full time where I get vacation hours so I can travel. It doesn't matter where, but I just need to be able to take time off now and then. Second I need to make more money. This hinges too, on a better job. I don't need to be making a ton more money (of course it'd be a lie to say that I wouldn't love to make a lot of it - who wouldn't?), but a little more than now so I can more easily save. I suppose if this leads to an eventual full-time profession, I would be delighted. I think what I've been waiting for was to find a solution on how to make it a full time job, right now, and be successful. I've realized I've been looking at it wrong. I need to do it as a full-time interest without the expectation of living on it, but enjoying doing it and living my life in the mean time. I don't know about everything else right now, but within the last twenty-four hours, since this clicked, I've felt so much better.

I've spent a good amount of time with my friends the last few days, and I've always had trouble opening up, but I've realized I need to, so I can see if I'm alone in the way I've been feeling, and as it turns out, I'm not. And it makes me feel better to know that. It seems that my stress is down by being able to let go and share. I don't know if that's what helped me to make my realization, but it helps a bit more with the day to day.