Some V Important Reminders

#1 The week started off with surprising news… I woke up to a pleasant email from Glossier inviting me to become an official rep. I accepted obviously. That means you can shop with me here and get 20% off your first order or just be kind and help a girl out! Thank you so much in advance.

#2 One of my roles at Zanita Studio is to create beauty content, which I’ve been doing for about 15 months now. Over this period, I’ve worked assiduously to train my eye, push my creative boundaries, and just really drown in the craft of photography. A PR rep reached out to me and asked if I’d be interested in freelance work – shooting product images for beauty brands. WHAT?! Hell yes. Sign me up now.

#3 A friend showed another friend my photog work and was impressed enough to ask me to shoot her business in another two weeks. Now, I never market myself as a photographer because I’m embarrassed to put myself in the same class of creatives I really admire and look up to (i.e. my boss). I’d be insane to think I belong to the crazy impressive shooters that exist. (Now this isn’t to say I’m not confident in what I do – it’s just mind blowing when someone else recognizes my passion if you know what I mean.) So when people actually want to pay me to shoot, I’m flattered and befuddled (in a good way of course). Again, I humbly accepted.

Three amazing opportunities for me in one week brought back several much-needed and v important reminders. Let this be a model for you.

#1 Never stop working for something or trying to improve just because you don’t think anyone is paying attention. EVERYONE LOOKS. Maybe not immediately, but someone eventually will. Brands are seriously scouting out micro influencers guys!

#2 That also means you need to publish your work. If you’re not sharing what you create, no one will know you exist or whether a photograph belongs to you. It’s not about bragging so don’t make it about that. Confidence is a mind game. No one really gives a shit about what you’re doing so you might as well do it proudly and loudly.

#3 Don’t forget about the big picture. In the process of getting angry and impatient with my kids to stressing about deadlines at work and shooting images for my blog, everything comes together eventually. Chill out. If you’re working hard and doing your best, the shit you’ve always wanted will fall into place.

#4 Rewind. Yes, I write courses for Azalle, but I don’t follow all the advice like I should. I’m a busy bee… Anyway, I finally created a personal media kit like last night 🙂 Doing so meant that I had to pour through everything I’ve shot in the past year and it was a refreshing eye-opener at how much I’ve improved. (That’s why I decided to post old work here…because for once, I actually felt semi-accomplished.) So as you tread along, don’t forget to stop and look back. This progress will become your top incentive for going forward because the only thing that guarantees perfection (or at least close to it) is practice.

#5 These things take time. Had I been more committed to blogging and shooting from the start, these opportunities may have came faster, but I really didn’t commit until maybe late 2014, and then I fell off the face of earth in 2016… It’s 2017 and I actually started blogging in 2010-2011. That should tell you a lot.

Well, I won’t go into details about everything, but the one that really pissed me off this week was YouTube. I try to keep this space as positive as possible, but I just can’t right now… So it turns out three of my videos were flagged (which I believe was total bogus because I’ve never posted anything offensive, sexual, or hateful nor did I violate any copyrights). As a result my account was suspended and the videos were deleted. WTF? So of course I appealed and it’s a waiting game. If any of you have any advice or input on this, I’d be so grateful to hear more because I’m honestly baffled as to how I got flagged in the first place.