My "A-ha" Moment

Do you ever have those times in your life when you have those "a-ha" moments?  When you realize that you were meant to experience something so that you could learn an important lesson or hear an important message?  I just experienced this myself.  A couple of weeks ago I attended the last session of my most recent photography class.  I will admit that there were times throughout this course that I wasn't sure I was getting much out of it.  Not because I didn't think I could learn something from the course, but because at times I felt the instructor talked about things that were not really relevent to the course and not really helpful to us budding photographers.  However, it was during the last class that I realized why I was meant to take the class all along.  The teacher talked about how in our society we are taught to DO so that we can HAVE so that we will eventually BE somebody or something in the world.  We are taught that we should go to college so that we can earn or have a degree and that then we can fianlly be something.  I, myself, fell into this line of thinking as do so many other individuals out there.  I decided in high school that I wanted to be a therapist, so I did what I was "supposed" to do and applied for college, majored in Psychology, graduated, and then went on to graduate school where I earned my Masters in Counseling.  I had done it; I could finally BE a therapist!!!  However, after several years of working in the field of counseling, I started to realize that being a therapist was not what I was meant to be doing.  I never felt completely confident in that role and it actually caused me a lot of anxiety and unhappiness.  Around this time my husband and I started a family and after the birth of my second daughter, we made the decision for me to become a stay-at-home mom.  While I was happy about this decision, it was also difficult because I felt like I lost part of my identity when I was no longer working as a therapist.  Even though I was not quite fulfilled in that role, a large portion of my identity was wrapped up in my career choice.  It has taken me several years to come to the realization that I am who I am, and no degree or career can change that.  Enter the message that I heard from my teacher in class a couple of weeks ago.  He stated instead of the DO > HAVE > BE scenario; he believes it should look more like this: BE > DO > HAVE.  We should BE who we are, DO what we love, and then we will HAVE something that will then allow us to BE who we are truly meant to be.  When I heard this in class I literally got chills because this described my journey to becoming a photographer.  I am finally able to BE who I truly am.  And, as a result, I am enjoying the work that I do and have a happiness and sense of peace that I have never had before in my life.  So, I just wanted to share this experience and this message with all of you, just in case you are struggling in your life to figure out who to BE.  Just BE yourself, and the rest will follow.

And with that, I will leave you with a few images from my most recent sessions!  Enjoy!