Photographers,

Welcome to the heart of busy season! For a lot of us, we are halfway into our season and starting to feel the heat. The long work weekends, the to-do lists, the edits and edits and edits, the e-mails and messages, the sessions and scheduling, questions and inquires, they all seem to float in at exactly the same second this time of year. A few conversations lately have spiked inspiration for this blog post, so I thought I would share a little insight on how to push onward with excitement and confidence!

Here are my top four thoughts to help you (and serve as reminders for myself!) to carry on and be the fabulous photographer that you know you can be:

Do you: There are a lot of us out there photographing weddings, and a lot of weddings to go around! With all of the amazing photographers posting incredible elopements on mountain tops and the ones who have mastered the edits we strive for, it is easy on one hand to feel super impressed and inspired, and on the other to feel inadequate. With the feeling of inadequacy comes self doubt and we begin to question ourselves. Don’t do it. It is important to learn, grow and evolve as photographers, but don’t ever question your ability and remember to celebrate who you are and how far you’ve come. Keep that chin up, do you! While you are inspired by others, others are inspired by you.

Keep the spunk: Attitude, attitude, attitude. Your attitude affects how you approach any situation; any workday, going to the gym, cleaning, etc. I recently checked my calendar after a friend asked the next weekend I am free, and I was a little baffled to say, “November 7th!” Instead of counting the things you may be missing out on that Saturday night, think of what you GET to do! You get to photograph somebody’s wedding day, you get to call that your job. You get a front row seat to their best day ever. You get to make them feel beautiful in front of the camera, eat a delicious meal (and probably cake!), sway to great songs and photograph their grandparents winning the anniversary dance. What we get to do is truly one of a kind and special. Approach each day excited, prepared and ready to take on a beautiful wedding day! They chose you, you get to do this! And afterwards, you get to go out if you want to! It may be a long day, but meet up with friends, grab a drink and enjoy. You’ll be glad you did!

Stay fresh: One of the things that has come up in conversation is inspiration, how to stay inspired and approach each wedding day with fresh eyes. It’s easy to feel like we might be repeating the same pose too much or we are going through the motions. Don’t get down on yourself, and as Lisa Loeb would say, everybody feels this way sometimes! If I find myself in a slump, I go to Pinterest and simply pin things I like, both wedding inspiration and non-wedding inspiration. It defines and refines my taste and reminds me what I gravitate towards. It’s funny, really, that I need to be reminded what I like. But again, with so much inspiration out there, it’s easy to get lost and want to adopt someone else’s likes. I take out my iPhone, put it in square mode, and photograph something. Again, sometimes surprising myself and defining what I am inspired by. I’ll post it to Instagram on occasion, and search hashtags to find similar inspiration. Things I am inspired by lately: The lake, the sky, prints, indigo + white, dresses that move, backpacks (I’m getting weird), floral everything, always.

Sunday: Personal life and business life will blur, it’s the nature of the job and one of the greatest and trickiest things about it. But, sometimes you need that separation. Sometimes you need to put the computer away, put the phone down, close your office door and reset. I use my Sunday’s for that. Without taking Sunday off, I would be working 7 days a week and while I love my job, I also love my personal life, family, friends, boyfriend and other hobbies! On Sunday’s I nap, go canoeing, find a patio to eat lunch, dream of vacations, head to the lake, golf, go for a walk, doodle while watching TV, shop, fill my vase with flowers, update my map pins, play cribbage, drink Crispin’s, basically, I do whatever I want! It’s my free day and a full day. It’s my reset and with it, I feel ready for a new week to start! (Who wants to start a #onasunday hashtag with me?!)

You are halfway through the 2015 season, darling! That is crazy! Enjoy every wedding day completely, enjoy every day off completely, and emotionally and physically, give yourself a break because you deserve it.