The End of the World as We Know it

You may have heard by now that tonight midnight marks the end of the world according to the Mayan calendar. These predictions fail to move me, being the kind of girl more ready to shrug off catastrophe than prepare for the worst.  But then my friend Stacey called with this scandalous thought: what if starting tomorrow we could start over? What if we all decided once and for all to take responsibility for ourselves and each other with love being our guiding light? What if the end was a brave new beginning?

I was intoxicated and also intrigued.

It's a love apocalypse, Stacey said. A chance to let go of all the things that don't serve you. A chance to choose the world you create.

Hours later there was an impromptu photo shoot with my kids and good friends from the neighborhood.  The kids immediately understood, and I began to appreciate in a new way the power of intentions. They were so glad to be photographed. Even more I could see each one saw the necessity of choosing a new way.  In a world where killing was becoming all too commonplace, radical love is the only way.

What will you let go of as the world ends tonight at midnight? What you embrace for the sake of a better world?  Leave us your own declarations in photo form in the comments. Or better yet, join Stacey and I at midnight wherever you are. Let's do this thing together.

for more information visit loveapocalypse.org or leave your own brave images in the Flickr group or tag your Instagram photos with #LoveApocalypse.

The Thanks You Give in Your Heart

An unexpected announcement.  A hug. A kiss. A split second you will forget completely, I promise you, save for the audacity of the click, that one step forward into the fray where all the magic unfurls right before your eyes.

Don't bother looking for beauty today. Everything qualifies. Don't bother asking for permission. Everyone already knows that this is what you do.  So do not disappoint. Search for the unusual moment. Watch for the edges of happiness. Document even the silliness, the awkwardness. Even this belongs.

This is your family. These are your people. The emotion you feel for them today will be nothing but a memory, and even this will fade. You do not know what your next year holds. You cannot assume all will be even the smallest bit the same. All you truly have is this moment, this one episode of magic held captive in your frame. 

So take it. Dive into the madness today, friends. Put yourself in the middle and shoot until you find your bliss. Your document will be one part history, one part testament to the thanks you gave in your heart. That you found each other, when there could have been so many misses. When so much of life could have left you apart, amiss, astray.

Happy Thanksgiving, sisters on this side of the pond and beyond. We give thanks for you today.

Your Ordinary Beauty

Most people don't think of themselves as beautiful.  We don't think of ourselves at all, really.  We just get up, splash water on our faces, dress, pull our hair back, throw our clothes on--whether the uniform of mindless choice is yoga pants or your everyday sari.  There's no thought in it; we simply prepare for our day and show up as best we can...blind to our beauty, unconscious of how extraordinary it is to play our everyday roles.

If she came to your kitchen, to your office, she would marvel at how you do your work so seamlessly.  Your rhythm, your routine would fascinate.  She would think the simple things you do are amazing, and if you gave her a camera, she'd point and shoot at all of it, wondering at the miracle that you have so many machines to help you do your every day work.  You'd blush and say "It's nothing," except that it isn't.  How many nights do you put your head to the pillow and wonder how the world keeps spinning, the load you carry is so much to bear?

If you went to her kitchen, to her office, you would be breathless at how she does her work with no tools, no resources, except the skill in her able hands and her hard won knowledge.  You'd see how she holds the babies right after they're born and puts them to the mother's breast.  You'd remember your own mother and your own births and your own infants, and how the doula did everything you needed when everyone else didn't have a clue.  You'd try to express your admiration, but she'd shake her head, the same way you shake yours.  

It's nothing.  It's just what I do.

All over the world, women are giving children baths, helping their sisters and mothers, doing their work--much of it mundane and yet still so much so far beyond ordinary.  We are doing it in our ordinary ways, unaware of our beauty.  Not seeing really how our pain and our joy shines, in every single dedicated second.

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Show us your extraordinary beauty today.  Your uniform, your chores.  The simple, expected thing that you do everyday that has hidden in its history a certain kind of magic, a not-yet-celebrated charm.  Self-portraits of all kinds--whether it be of your coffee maker or your yoga pants--completely and totally welcome.

We are Beautiful

We are beautiful women who have no idea we are beautiful. We stand in front of the mirror and tear ourselves apart, going over every seeming imperfection, every flaw, every bit of evidence that we are not as we were once so long ago.

This is insanity.

In five years, we will salivate for this skin. In ten years, we will have nothing but respect for this ass. In twenty, we won't care about any of it--scanning our pictures instead for signs in our eyes that we were present and willing to be honest and real and incredibly brave, no matter what the state of our abs.

We are aging, every one of us, everyday, all the time. This body will not stay.  It will morph and change. It will get weaker, and yes, it will die.  And until that moment, this body will house the very essence of us.  This body will play host to all our hopes and fears, our most true and alive moments.  This body will hold every second of our existence on this planet, and it will remember down to the cells everything that made us laugh and cry.

Today, get out your big camera, your phone or your point and shoot and honor your body.  Your perfection (or lack thereof) is not the point.  What matters is that you turn your gaze on what is holding you together right now.  What matters is that you love and cherish the essence of who you are before it's too late.

Back to the Basics

Two months ago I lost my Nikon D90.  Too many flights across too many countries and somehow it was gone--stolen? forgotten? I'm still not sure.  All I know is that eighteen hours later as I gathered up my things in the plane, my camera bag was nowhere to be found.  Three thousand dollars worth of lenses, body and gear disappeared into thin air.

Knowing it would be quite a long time before I'd hold a replacement camera in my hands, I did the only thing left for a photographer to do.  I picked up my phone, wiped the tiny camera lens off on the back of my jeans and filled the frame with something I loved.  Point, click, shoot.  No comparison to choosing f-stops, changing lenses or messing around with the ISO, but photography just the same.  

My phone took on new meaning, and I started to actually enjoy what I could do with basically only one tool left in my toolbox: composition.  It took me back to the very beginning, when the only thing I focused on was what to put in the frame.  I felt energized at how simple the whole process was.  And I started shooting even more than I had with my D90.  The camera--I mean, phone--was on me every single day anyway.  Anything and everything I ever wanted to shoot was fair game.

I still don't know when (or exactly how) my next "real" camera will come to me, but I'm starting not to care. This little phone in my back pocket is revitalizing my love of our craft, and I honestly don't think after this, my photography will ever be quite the same.

Do you use your phone to shoot?  Share your favorite on the fly images in the comments below.  And if you're not sure where to start with this new emerging genre, check out Stephanie's The Art of IPhoneography.  You'll be inspired to get out and make a whole new world of images.