Nashville Wedding Photographers | Jen & Chris Creed

One of my favorite bands right now is Switchfoot (fronted by Jon Foreman). I have to thank Chris Scott for this because I attended a concert with him a few weeks ago that blew my mind! Best part: I like them because I am genuinely inspired by their music and not just because Chris likes them. You see, I began realizing last year that a lot of the music I listened to was just because it was what people told me I should like. And I’ve been trying to listen to my gut and figure out what music I really like for me. Anyway…Switchfoot has a song entitled Dare You to Move and I would like to share the inspiring message I got out of it if that’s ok with you guys.

The first verse paints a picture of a planet. Fully populated with what we can assume are humans(or maybe wookies). Seems normal. But something new is about to happen…You. You’ve just arrived into existence and they’ve all been waiting for you.

Now you’re here. You arrived. All wookie eyes are on you. What happens next?

 I Dare You to Move.

Wow. That’s powerful right? So incredible.

But wait there’s more!!

The next verse…

Welcome to the fallout. Welcome to resistance. The tension is here. Tension is here between who you are and who you could be… Between how it is and how it should be. I dare you to move.

You’re different. Let’s go ahead and say it… this world is full of wookies.
You’re a human that just came into a world of wookies (WTF? What am I talking about?).

Nobody likes or cares what you have to say–you’re different and the wookies don’t like it!

So, Jon Foreman is telling both sides of the story.

Part 1
You arrive. You move. You take the first step. It’s hard and it’s scary. You have absolutely no idea what going to happen.

Part 2
You will meet resistance. No one really wants to hear about this part. Change is scary and people don’t like it. If you start to do something different be prepared meet resistance.

Can you feel the tension? It’s between who you are, and who others have told you you should be. It’s between how things are, and how others say they should be. The tension is good. It means you’re on to something big. It means you’re trusting yourself and standing firm in what you know and believe.

Can you feel it?

What happens next?

I dare you to move.

Don’t let anyone drown out your voice. Trust your gut. Move.

Sharing a collection of some recent instagram photos, just some things that have caught my eye in my search for inspiration.

Have a great day everyone!

I have a confession. I LOVE reality tv. Particularly crappy “reality” tv. Pretty much every Monday evening you can find me watching The Bachelor (yes, I read the spoilers, yes, I think it’s a giant trainwreck, but I still can’t stop watching!). But one of my favorites reality/competition shows is The Voice.

I enjoy the personalities of the judges, for one. It’s a fun show to watch. But one thing I love is that this show gives people an opportunity to share their voice. Beyond sharing their voice, it gives people a chance to share their story. It gives people an opportunity to be heard, and deep down, isn’t that something we all want? Everyone has a story to share, and while this is a singing competition, I don’t think that’s why people tune in. We tune in to hear about the odds people have beat to come on this show. The disappointments they’ve already gone through. For me, the audition rounds are far more exciting than the later episodes where the teams are already set.

I was watching a few weeks ago, and throughout the episode, there were several things that stood out to me as awesome parallels to both the photo business and just life in general. So here they are

1. Practice your craft.

This is so important! There comes this point when you know how your camera works, you know your photos are technically acceptable, and that you are “good enough,” and we maybe get caught up more in the tasks of running a business than practicing the craft. We’ve all been there! In his book Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell asserts that it takes 10,000 hours to master a craft (I’m sure others have discussed similar theories, just one that I know of!). 10k hours! I know I can’t be anywhere close to that number on focused practice. And what if we practiced not only the craft of our art, but also practiced running a better business? What might happen? Even if you don’t hit that 10,000 hour mark, what might you discover along the way?

2. When you do something different, people are going to turn around.

This is a huge theme on the show. Nothing gets the judges’ chairs to turn around faster than when someone comes out and does something different. A different arrangement, and different tone to their voice, whatever. So true in life, and especially in business. And if you have a purpose behind doing something different, not just being different for different’s sake, people are especially going to take note.

3. Sure you sound just like the original, but the world already has one of those. Be yourself–an original.

It’s a common theme on this show. A singer comes out, and has practiced sounding exactly like whoever their favorite singer is. But that’s not exciting. The world already has an Adele. The world already has a Christina. So why would anyone want to listen to a second best version, when they’ve already heard the original?

You are the only one who can do what you can do. Figure out what that is, do it to the best of your ability, work hard, and things are going to happen. Are you waiting around, bouncing from workshop to workshop to convention to hear other people’s path to success?  Buying into the lie that people who are successful must have something you don’t? Why waste your time trying to be someone else, to do what someone else has already done?

“You’re unique and you’re special and you grab my attention just by being you, I’m not gonna mess with that.” -Christina Aguilera

Discover your voice, trust your voice, share your voice. No one can do what you can do. What if you took the time to look inside yourself?

“It’s the possibility of having a dream come true that makes life interesting.”-― Paulo Coelho, Alchemist

Be original. Find your voice. Go after your dreams. What’s stopping you?