Photographers,
There may come a time in your career where perceived value doesn’t mean anything. There will be a moment where marketing strategies and workshops are worthless. Your portfolio won’t matter. If your website went down you would not give a care. All the photographers you love and follow will be small people with blogs full of only words and pictures that you can barely make out. That expensive lens will be cheap. Your camera will be a paperweight. And you’ll learn that photography isn’t a job or a way to get the bills paid.
Because at one point in your career, you may be asked to make someone immortal
Nothing else in your world will matter. Everything else will be dim and overrated. Because you will realize that photography isn’t always glamorous. Life isn’t always fabulous. But people still deserve to be photographed, to be preserved, and all of us are beautiful even if we’re lying in a hospital bed with an IV and not having the latest vogue poses tried out on us. Don’t care about the money or lack thereof. Don’t worry about the adjustment to your schedule. There is more to this art than the bottom line. And life is about giving of yourself, not holding out your hand expecting.
You might be like me, holding back tears when you park your car, holding your camera with trembling hands praying that you remember settings that used to be second nature. Trying to make conversation hoping with all of your rapidly beating heart that you aren’t that awkward shy teenager that you used to be for so long.
And if you’re like me, you’ll know that every second of heartache for the person in front of your camera is so dimmed compared to the physical pain they’re experiencing. And your heart will break for them every time that arm moves on the clock. You will feel as though you can’t do anything to help them, but remember this: no matter when their end will be, you have the chance to save their memory so that they live on for years to come. Your love and humility will live on for years to come.
Embrace it. No matter how scared or how nervous you may be.
All my love
Rebekah Elena
