photography has betrayed me.

Photography has betrayed me.

It’s given me an out under the facade of going in.

It’s become an emotional to do list too long to ever conquer.

Just as I brain dump my ideas and to do tasks onto a paper in an effort for relief and fake accountability, I take pictures when I’m seeing something that feels too much, thinking- I’ll feel this later.

My friend asked me the other day in response to my photographic frustration- “can’t that moment be enough? The thisness of that moment and why you photographed it?”- can’t it be whole on it’s own without feeling like there’s a further emotional processing that needs to happen?

It was such a wonderful question that felt like buoyant possibility.
Something that might pull me out of the depths of this spiral I’ve convinced myself I’m beholden to.

It hasn’t always been like this.

In fact, my first ever course- the one that is the most essential in my heart is actually about the burrowing into a moment through the act of photographing. Emotional excavation, deep seeing, and harnessing that vision for living life NOW- is the core of the work. (this course Manifest Your Memories, is currently being updated and converted to substack instead of on a separate platform- more to come soon.)

But a split second after my friend asked that question, I can’t deny that familiar gut feeling of knowing quickly answered back.

Right now things feel different. Naming it helps.
If it’s a clear channel, a light, energized, pure feeling- yes. It feels like that moment is enough.

It’s the complicated feelings.
The rush of contradictions that overwhelm me into feeling like I need to sit in this longer than this moment will allow.

"I’ll come back later. I’ll sit with this photograph, this feeling- later."

[repeat that x 132,398,543,021,868,710 times and now we have a bit of a problem.]

But of course this isn’t photography’s fault-
it’s my own subconscious emotional acrobatics.

It is too damn easy to go through motions.
Resistance and avoidance in the mask of productivity- and even, deep creativity.

It takes radical honesty to acknowledge this is happening.

It’s so easy to say- “but I’m already doing it! look! photographs! PROOF!”

no.

i actually reject the notion that photographs are inherently proof of presence.

Especially in 2024.

I think photographs, even in the most unintentional, misaligned way, are incredible mirrors for us- for our subconscious.

They show us ourselves. If we look long enough, they speak to us.

They tell us truths that our vanity & ego cannot deny.

They show us what matters and what doesn’t. They show us where we are spending our days, our lives…

but the photograph itself isn’t proof of emotional state.
It isn’t proof of how deeply we were in a moment.

That is an internal range, experience, & responsibility unique to every moment.

It feels like I’ve vacated the premises as of recently.

A purposeful choosing to not enter a moment as I’m photographing.

A desire to stay on the surface because I do not have the energy to go below.

I’ve gotten so good at this- but there’s only so long we can avoid ourselves.

The photographic act is swarming with overwhelming magnitude,
delicate futility, and alllllllllllllllll your personal shit.

My newfound mastery of staying in practice while avoiding the self has made me want to switch mediums. To back myself into the corner of unknown territory.

A craving for unknown waters where I can’t outwit myself.

“Now what? Make your move.”

A space where the fresh start opens way for the unavoidable kind of presence and discovery.

But I know that is always available to me and a camera in hand is the quintessential magnifying glass.

It feels like my hyper focus on the sacred nature of this craft has allowed- even encouraged- the lightness and pure joy sneak out the back door.

I’ve weighed it down, nearly strangling it with procrastinating intentionality.

How did I get here?

Of course a mix of the standard fixings of a life-especially that of a mom raising two little boys. But underneath the low hanging fruit time excuses- those of which magically disappear when I really want them to (hint for all of us) I’m left with something I always knew. (shocker.)

Less.
Lighter.
Looser.
Love.

Sit with one.

One photograph.

It barely even matters which one- and it will tell you everything you need to know.

I did a workshop with Alec Soth earlier in the year (still feels completely unreal to say that sentence) and during that workshop I had a conversation with Vince Leo during a 1:1 crit session.

I brought many pictures with me of my personal family work.
I didn’t really know what I wanted from that critique time.
I never like the idea of critiques in general.
Not because I’m scared of them (I mean don’t get me wrong- I am extremely tender and I would not go unfazed) but mostly because of how trivial and damaging most of them can be. (i’ve heard stories that make my blood boil with a rage that will smolder inside me my whole life.)

But that was not this experience.
This experience was gentle and curious and loving.

After looking at the smorgasbord of images I brought because I am a maximalist in photo language (give me a jim goldberg collage any day) - he paused for an extended period of time and told me,

"sit with one image."

I immediately started crying.
Like, severely need a tissue crying.

He’s right.
So right.

When do I feel immense clarity?
My monthly Nostalgia, Now photographic journaling has me look at all photographs from a month of my life but only pick like 3-5 of the hundreds I took.
Then I burrow into those images via the prompts and journaling.

Thats when the dots are connected.

Thats when the connections feel integrated instead of purely subconscious or briefly (1/250th of a second) seen.

But I only do that ritual once a month and its mostly only with the more casual cell phone photos of my life.

Vince’s wise words are still with me and I have largely still avoided them. Probably because the few times I did it I cried and felt too overwhelmed.

But what’s on the other side of sitting with a picture I made for 10 fucking minutes?

Why do I act like I don’t have the time?
Why must I look away?

If my monthly practice of honing in on 3-5 pictures for years has served me so deeply in staying tethered to my truth, what would a more regular ritual of sitting with one do?

Yesterday I started a new ritual for exactly this-

One Picture.

With this I choose one of my photographs and sit with it for an uncomfortable amount of time and then let myself write whatever vomits out of me.

prose, poetry, free writing, nonsensical, redundant- whatever.

it felt like exhaling a breath I knew I was holding.

Have you ever played that game in the car where you hold your breath until you pass the cemetery?

that.

but less of a game.

Here comes a cemetery…
Here comes a picture…

It’s here. ok, deep inhale.
It’s here. sit with it.

Holding breath until it passes.
Holding feelings until I let myself see it.

I got this- it’s not so hard.
I get the gist. I know why I took it, I see it, I feel it.

This is getting hard, I need air.
This image is starting to feel fleshy. I’m starting to see 4 million other moments of my life in this picture.

Okay this hurts.
Words demand their birth in response to listening to this image.

It’s passed-I can let out this stale air and breathe again. I didn’t even have to hold it in.
The feeling stops looming. It can rest in it’s felt acknowledgement.
Avoidance prolonged the haunting.

I think a lot of the issue is in the limbo.
Incomplete expressions.
Incomplete processing.
Incomplete feeling.

Incomplete life.

Of course there are never neat and tidy, perfect completions in almost anything- but we know when we feel satiated and when we do not.

I never want to stop taking pictures.
BUT/AND, I don’t want to be beholden to an outdated version of my own truth.

Does putting my finger on this cure the discontent that’s been eating at me?
I’m not sure.

But I am sure that my commitment keeps me curious.

The tools are the most minor details when you have something that you must create in order to breathe.

Just as we can’t run away from problems, I can’t run towards another medium to make me feel alive again in the practice.

The images in this post are some that awakened me. (and may have damaged my camera [IRONICALLY-_-])

The snow was bellowing.
My partner reluctantly got dressed to be the good snow man making dad that he is.
My boys in their wonder and my dog just wishing everyone would come inside on the couch so he could relax.

I resigned myself to the kitchen to do the mom role of hot chocolate maker for when they came in- but if i’m honest it was more so a big “efffff that frigid weather” than a desire to be pinterest mama.

But the snow was falling so aggressively it demanded my attention.
It demanded my presence.
It wouldn’t be denied.

I stopped what I was doing and grabbed my camera and followed the undeniable pull to see more.
I didn’t know wtf I was doing with the flash and the slow ass recycle speed was driving me FUCKING CRAZY. I really hate that. I’m too rapid fire for that but I also love the unpredictability.

despite the discomfort, frustration, and impossible weather conditions- i had to.

It’s been a while since I felt like I had to- regardless of energy and circumstance.

Not had to in the form of obligation,
but had to as in other realm impassioned, self imposed compulsion.


It’s like freshly falling in love
and deeply being in love
and monotonously being inside of love.

The spinning, spinning out of control whirlwind.
The safe, content, cozy place to land.
The profound, enduring commitment mixed with mundane ignorance of “knowing all there is to know.”

In my eyes, the point of this medium is to be here now.

I am human and I am tired and I am admittedly slightly jaded and frustrated.

Photography hasn’t betrayed me.
I betrayed myself.
& deep down, I knew I was.
& it’s okay.

It’s never the tool.
It’s never the thing.
It’s never the problem.

It’s the refusal to look something in the eye.
It’s looking away.
It’s looking everywhere but here [for more than 1/250th of a second.]

What are you looking away from?

What are you pretending not to see?