Working for Yourself | 3 Months

We’re on month 3 of working on this business full-time, and last night as I was waiting to fall asleep, I realized something. In fact, I rolled over, poked Walt (who was halfway into slumber, so I am a terrible person), and said, “Guess what?”

“Mmmfff?” he replied.

“I don’t think I’ve cried in a while.”

“Hooray…”

Because I used to be so stressed out, so tired, so overwhelmed, that I would cry often. All that responsibility. All of the sleep I was missing… It does not make for a good balance. I honestly don’t think I’ve cried out of stress or misery in three months. (I might have shed some tears re-watching the Romola Garai “Emma,” however. Oh, and the Dan Stevens “Sense and Sensibility” mini-series. Mhm.)

Every day I do wake up and say a small blessing in the form of a sigh that this is what I do.

But working for yourself is not a cake filled with rainbows and smiles that we can all eat and be happy, all the time. And it’s not even that there are unhappy moments.

It’s just that there are a lot of lonely moments. I do talk to other people all day, electronically — Twitter and email, Facebook and Google hangouts — but that doesn’t take the place of true human interaction. I find myself going out to stores just to talk to salespeople. I find myself buying more things (which makes me feel more materialistic than I would like) just to put some flavor in my day. Things like calcium supplements, dental floss, a dress I’d been coveting for months that finally went on sale, and oddly enough, makeup products. And it’s not that I’m bored by my every day life, it’s that my outings break up the day a bit. Otherwise, I could probably stay inside and look at photos for twelve-hour stretches, and that doesn’t seem to be very healthy.

In my last post about this subject, I talked about a few of my little “dreams” of how I thought I’d work at home. They included waking up early, getting my workout done first thing, and answering emails while eating breakfast, and so on. I’ve come to the realization that I do better working out after I’ve been awake for a little while (doing anything on an empty stomach, be it exercising or even running a short errand, makes me feel sick, and I’ve always been this way), so I’m adjusting my “dream” schedule to include workouts in the afternoons.

The one thing that I have done is built a standing desk! I have been very tired of sitting all day and used this IKEA hack to turn my sitting desk into a standing desk for less than $30. It’s not quite finished — I’m still re-setting up my desktop and I’m waiting to get a gel mat for my feet, but I promise to do an extensive post about my standing desk in the near future! Today was my first day actually using it and despite the fact that it’s a few inches too tall (to be rectified with the gel mat, I hope), it was really nice to stand and not feel like I was slowly sinking into my chair all day!

More things that I’ve been doing are 1) gearing up for the fall season — which is looking to be quite busy, and 2) looking ahead to the next booking season. I’ve been weighing my advertising options and I hope that I’ve ramped up my customer service so that my clients really feel that I take care of them and love them. Honestly, every single couple I’ve worked with so far this year have been dream couples. I am very lucky that my couples are all so very easy-going, happy, and their vision of what they want their photos to look like coincide very well with what I deliver (and the way I like to shoot! very important).

2013 is already looking to be an amazing year so I hope the ball keeps on rolling :)

Photo is from Isabelle and Jonathan’s wedding — full post next week!