Wednesday 10 October 2012

Definitions of success

 

Some people need to “be somebody” or have people recognise their talents. I have never been one of these people. I know I have lots of secret talents, and I don’t need other people to give me accolades or money for them.

I read a blog post by Brooke Snow the other day that really resonated with me. I couldn’t stop thinking about it all day and night. I used to read Brookes blog as she is an amazing photographer and I have wanted to take one of her classes. But recently she has given up most of her photography work, as she wants more time for herself and her family.

The article was written by Sarah J. Bray in the Going Pro magazine.  I downloaded the magazine to have a better read. Now me and Sarah are in others ways very different. But her words on her definition of success,  made me stop and think.

Sarah says, “My definition of success is that I enjoy an abundance of space in my life. Space in my time. Space in my finances. Space in my relationships. I don’t want to feel squeezed and pressured. Anything that makes me feel that way is not success for me.”

That has always been my mission in life. That is were I am at at this moment with my photography business. I am lucky in that I do need need to work, financially. Yes, I am sure I could find many things I could want to buy. But I feel I do not need these things really. I think once you have the finances to buy pretty much anything you want. You quickly realise, you don’t really want it anyway.  What I can’t buy is peace of mind and time. I have always tried to work in my life with these two things upper most in my mind.

If I’m not happy, my whole family knows about it. They like a happy, at peace Mum. I get stressed very easily, because I have such high expectations of myself, and I always strive for perfection. 

So, at the moment there is no website for me, pushing myself out there in the Web. No Facebook page for my photography business. I just sit back and wait, for my work to do the talking. No marketing strategies, or networking. That’s really not my style and would eat into my precious time. My time is currently spent, how I want to spend it. Just perfect.

And if and when the day comes when the phone doesn’t ring about a potential photography shoot. No problem, I’ll just have more time to do other things.

Its just lovely to share my photography with people who maybe wouldn’t have had the chance of a photo shoot in my style. I have kept my prices very low. Each shoot  I try and keep personal to the families. I still can’t bring myself to charge for my time, it’s something I still want to give away for free. Which always shocks people.

Maybe, one day I will have a need for financial gain and will have to change my strategy. But seeing's I have no debts and nothing I wish to buy. I am happy  with my definition of success.

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PS

I am finding getting back into this blogging lark on my old laptop hard going. I will have to try out Trevor's previous comment on my last blog. I used to use blogger to write my posts. But I found it too complicated and layered. It took up too much of my TIME. Whilst doing a blogging course with Shimelle Laine, I discovered Livewriter and loved it. It’s so super easy. Maybe I will have to look into going back to writing blogs in Blogger. The main problem being it doesn’t recognise me. I didn’t used to have an email account. So I used what is now a defunct one of my husbands. My blog never recognises me and I have to impersonate him. ( not a good look ) I have tried everything to be just myself, but it just gives me grief. I’ll have to give it another go on my super fast iMac. Because this cute, pink Sony laptop now does my brain in.

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