Let me be completely honest:

I love photography. I love the magic that happens when two people who are in love step in front of my camera, and I have the opportunity to showcase that love, to make it more captivating and immediate and real than the couple has ever imagined their love could look.I love that there are some amazing things happening with our business right now. Two of our photographs — one shot by Danny, one by me — finished in the top ten of one category in the huge Shoot & Share Photo Contest last month. We’ve had a wave of exciting publications recently . . . and some even more exciting things in the works. And we’ve gotten to work with some truly wonderful couples already this year and photographed some stunning weddings and portrait sessions we’ve been really proud of.

But to tell you the truth, this winter has been a challenging one for us, both personally and in our business. What you see on our blog and our Facebook page are the shiny, pretty parts of our life and our business that we’re only too happy to share. Or, to use an appropriately photography-related illustration, we display the many perfectly edited, finished photos, while the few out of focus, haphazardly-composed shots don’t get shared for public consumption. The vast majority of our life and business, like our photographs, is something we’re comfortable sharing with the world. Here and there though, there are little frustrations, struggles, challenges, disappointments, failures — and they sting enough that we really don’t care to publicize them. Who wants to offer their shortcomings up to the world when we would rather just move on from them privately?

There are two reasons that I do want to share them, though: Because I know our same disappointments and failures are shared by many other people who will feel less alone when they read that someone else has the same problems. And because I need to be reminded that our same disappointments and failures are shared by many other people, and I will feel less alone.

So here goes.

• I’ve felt rather disconnected from a lot of people in my life recently. “Too busy.” I haven’t been as good a friend as I need to be, or as I want to be.
• Danny and I haven’t loved each other as well as we should this winter, either. We’ve been too dialed in to business, other people, or other pursuits to really notice what the other person needed. It hurt more to admit that to each other than to admit it here.
• We — and by we I mostly mean I — haven’t accomplished as many of my goals as I would like to so far this year. Truthfully, painfully, that is more because I haven’t tried than because I haven’t succeeded.
• We checked out the Parade of Homes last weekend, and it made me once again acutely aware of how un-put together our house still feels, four years after we got married. It might sound silly, but seeing well appointed houses makes me think I’m utterly failing at making our house feel like a welcoming, beautiful home.
• I talk about wanting to go for a run or go to the gym a lot more frequently than I actually do either thing. The same goes for eating healthy.

Frustrations and shortcomings are something that I need to learn to leave behind. I need to analyze them for a short time to learn where I went wrong, what mistakes I shouldn’t repeat — but then I need to wash my hands of them instead of remaining covered in the dust of disappointment.

Or, to use another appropriately photography-related illustration, I need to study why I don’t love a specific photograph, then figure out exactly how to improve it next time. Then go improve it the next time.

~ Laura