Learn to See Yourself with Compassion

December 31, 2012

Thank You 2012

Here we are on the last day of 2012. It was neat to look back at my end of the year post from 2011, the year I went from offering one e-course, one time, to letting it evolve into many E-Courses and into a business. So I wanted to take some time today to look back at all that happened this year and share some of my favourite photos or images that feel like they capture that month for me.

In January:

Ran a session of Wading In
Went to the Oregon Coast for a weekend with my Family
Started training again for a 10km race in the spring (after injuring myself last year training for it).
Joined Jennifer DeVille and Deb Taylor in the She is Three Collaborative, which I adore

In February:

Went on a California getaway to my beloved Bay Area and had so much fun adventuring around the city and the east bay
Went on a gorgeous mini-retreat in Stinson Beach with the lovely Valerie and Elke May.
Started taking the class Hello Soul, Hello Business which had a big effect on shifts in my business
Ran a new session of You are Your Own Muse

In March:

Moved this site over to WordPress with a brand new design
Ran Rule-Free Photography with Live it To the Full. I had such a blast teaching this one and plan to introduce more Rule-Free goodness in 2013

In April:

Ran Swan Dive one last time
Made it to the end of my running training without injurey (yahoooo) and ran my first ever race, a 10km
Did an amazing mentoring session with Kelly Rae and Beth Nichols which prompted me to redesign my site (again).
Started on a mission to explore my own neighbourhood further and went on oh so many photowalks!

In May:

Did a Double Exposure Demo and had so much fun doing it
Ran Re-Writing your Story, a course oh so close to my heart that I’ll be bringing back in a new evolution in 2013.
Discovered the Central Valley Greenway, an amazing bike path that leads out of the city and along its way I found some forests that I love exploring and that provide this country girl a little respite from the city. Went on numerous photo bike rides there.

In June:

Took a trip to PDX to visit my family there
Did a video and photo shoot with the lovely Kelly Rae Roberts
Made it a mission to let more of my quirkiness be invited into my own work. To be myself in my business.
Went to the Your Story Retreat hosted by the Be Present Retreats and photographed the event
Did a photoshoot with the lovely Chickadee Road gals!
Taught Montage for the first time ever. It was a wildly different experience to teach video than photography and helped me grow as a teacher big time to be teaching a bit more outside my comfort zone.
Did a photoshoot with one of my favourite people to photograph, the lovely Jillian

In July:

Went to the World Domination Summit
Shot my lovely friends Jo and Tobias’ wedding
Taught the Chakra Photo Workshop
Went to my beloved folk festival
Had a photo published in the awesome This is East Van book!
Went to Tofino and Uclulet with some lovely friends.
Turned 35!

In August:

Went to Ontario to spend some cottage time with the family
Taught my first in person You are Your Own Muse workshop in Whistler.

In September:

Started on a mission to demystify self-portraiture and wrote my favourite post of this year.
Launched the Dreamy Photos E-Book.
Went to the sunshine coast on a writing weekend!

In October:

Went to the Sunshine Coast to do a pregnancy shoot with some lovely friends!
Taught Rose Coloured Glasses
Went to a retreat in Palm Springs
Serendipitously ran into the canadian musician Jane Siberry and did a photoshoot with her
Let myself be engulfed by my self-doubt gremlins (but learned a lot from it).

In November:

Went to Portland to celebrate my nephew turning 3 and my mom turning 60!
Ran one final session of Montage for 2012!

In December:

Went home to spend time with my family for the holidays
Prepared lots of good things to offer in 2013!

Happy New Year!!!

December 30, 2012

A Year of Self-Portraits

A big part of why I take self-portraits (and encourage others to) is because they help us create a visual narrative of our lives, to tell the story of our adventures and to be able to document them. In each of the moments that I take them, my hope is just to document that moment but together they create a map of the year took us (but with us in the photos, not just behind the camera).

So in thinking about this past year, I started looking at the photos I took each month and pulled out a few selfies from each month and have gathered them up here to reflect on. Its hard to pick a favourite as they are all little pieces of the puzzle of 2012. Thats the thing about taking self-portraits. To me they aren’t about vanity…or which one did I look best in. They are all just little moments of creating space and witnessing ourselves. I think what becomes a favourite for me is one where I learned something new. Like the red boot photo where I almost deleted it. Or the February Shadow photo because its so playful and its always so good to get friends in on the silliness. As well, all of the August Whistler photos mean a whole lot for me as that was the first time I brought You are Your Own Muse into a live in-person workshop and it was a beautiful weekend for me.

Did you have a favourite self-portrait you took this year? One that meant the most?

So here’s my year in review, one year in the story of this adventure called life.

January

February

March

April

May

June

July

August

September

October

November

December

P.S. Did you see there is a brand new self-portrait E-Course called Be Your Own Beloved running this February? More on the new E-Course here!

December 29, 2012

Swooning Over ~ Hipstamatic

When I got an iPhone, the first app I downloaded was Hipstamatic. I had been swooning over the photos folks were taking with it and couldn’t wait to try it. For the first while I used nothing else, but then Instagram took over and I hadn’t really opened the Hipstamatic app since then.

Until yesterday when the lovely Rachael Ashe posted this photo on Instagram and I was totally breath taken and had to try it out. I’ve always loved the Tintype images though I’ve never had one taken (you can still get them done at places like Rayko Photo Centre in the SF Bay Area). I’m kind of amazed how well they made this lens look like it, especially the tones Rachael got in her photo. Of course, nothing replaces the real thing. Yet I feel like there is something really special about the Tintype Lens and Film by Hipstamatic that I haven’t see in any other filter before, as it really makes your eyes pop, which is divine for portraits or selfies. I don’t tend to take many portraits with my iPhone but I’m likely to make any friends I see in the next week pose for a photo!

Playing with this app also reminded me of when I first started into the land of self-portraiture, but before I took the self-portait adventuring outside. At first, the bathroom was the perfect place to give it a try to aim the camera at myself. I also still love it as you can use the mirror to help see your screen if you’re like me and have an old school iPhone that doesn’t have a camera on both sides (or if you are using a point and shoot you can look in the mirror to see what the viewfinder is showing and help compose your selfie!

Here are a few more, all taken with some variation of the Tintype lens and different Hipstamatic film filters, oh and they also have a new multi-exposures option (and you know how much I love double exposures). Hipstamtic, you are doing mighty good job of wooing me back to you!

December 28, 2012

The Body Stories

Have you come across the gorgeous new E-Book curated by Sas Petherick called The Body Stories? Its totally free and oh so beautiful and I’m honoured to be sharing some of my story as a contribution to this book. Its gorgeously designed and full of powerful stories of finding our way to wholeness in our bodies. I’m taking it slowly reading this book, sitting with and savouring each story.

Sas also has a gorgeous new website. Her work is so in alignment with the core values of my work and I’m so excited about the offerings she is bringing to the world and honoured to share some truths I’ve never said publically in this E-Book.

So go get it!

December 27, 2012

Adventures in Grain-Free Baking

Lately I’ve been adventuring into the land of being grain-free. Its been a surprisingly easy and delicious way to nourish myself.

I’ve been gluten-free since my teens (things are so much more delicious and accessible in the gluten-free world than they were back then) but there are plenty of other things that don’t make my belly (and energy level) too happy, so lately I got inspired by all of the gorgeous recipes a dear friend was posting on Pinterest and got inspired to experiment with going grain-free.

For the holidays I wanted to try out some of the gorgeous cookie recipes I’ve been collecting on Pinterest.

My favourite recipe has been this one I found over at Oh Hopscotch.

With a few alterations, I’ve made these super delicious grain-free/diary-free/egg-free cookies that go divinely with a cuppa tea.

4 cups almond flour

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

3/4 cup raisins

1/4 cup crushed walnuts

11 tbsp earth balance buttery spread

1/2 cup honey

1-1/2 tbsp vanilla extract

2 tbsp full fat canned coconut milk

Head on over to Oh Hopscotch for the full recipe and instructions! My mom makes lots of wonderful cookies for the family at Christmas so I’m glad I made these as despite not having any refined sugar in them, they were buttery and delicious and definitely felt like a treat. Next on my list to try is this one by the lovely Hannah Marcotti. I don’t think I’ll be turning into a food blogger anytime soon, but wanted to shake things up to share a little gluten-free/grain-free goodness with you!

I hope the holidays have been good to you.