It would not be fair to the readers to deny admitting the truth. I was walking on clouds peppered with nervousness. I felt I had to over deliver. She deserved that much.

Thankfully, the day of the shoot, my professionalism took over and my nerves vanished. I had a set of photos I wanted to take and a very specific time to take them. And I got to work quickly.

The Photos

I really focused on my goal. Capturing her optimism and focus. So, clearly, the eyes were going to be front and center. In hindsight, I could have been a bit more tightly focused and better zoomed in the photos, but that was a while back… can’t use todays’ standards on yesterday’s achievements.

As expected, she was amazing. I had a lot of fun. She really worked hard to make the photos come out great. It was relaxing. Honestly, if most of my clients were like her, I’d probably have a few studios opened by now. A few difficult clients soured my opinion of my early photography career… but I digress.

Given how her work ethics nicely translated over to her modeling, it was a breeze to incorporate shots from both projects into one. It had a certain magical flow. She suggested a lot of great ideas and we just got in sync as if we had been doing this for years.

These moments are exactly why I love photography and creating the art I do. The synergy is electrifying. Uplifting. It’s no longer about the individual pieces but the result of the whole. Of course, being the super critical guy I am of my work, I see all the errors I made after the shoot is done. However, such is the nature of being me.

When the time was up, it was with great reluctance that I ended the shoot. We had agreed on a certain amount of time and I knew she would want to get on with her day. No matter how much fun we were having.

Our schedules never really synced up to create another such shoot. My first time releasing a few select images on social media was very well received. In fact, one of my better received sets of that era. I was told by a few followers that the photos present a very honest look at a smart driven beautiful person.

I had succeeded at conveying the thoughts I had in mind… and that felt super awesome!

In case anyone is curious, after such penned words, I’m obviously nervous about showing you the photos… thankfully, the lessons of this shoot helps me keep going with sharing and building my own online body of work.

Part of me thinks that if I could redo these photos, they would look so much better today. While that is true, the moment is very hard to recreate. I’d be focused on a different aspect of her personality to showcase. She’s really driven, smart, and funny too. I’d probably focus more on her humor and athleticism today than her ambition.

Reason being… one of her drives was to reclaim her health. Not that she looked unhealthy back then. But, all that working while going to school and not working out did take a bit of a toll. Now, with schooling behind her, she has regained herself. If ever I had to recommend a beginner yogi to someone who gets the passion… it would be her. She’s not that guru who is so good you can’t relate to them. She’s that person who takes what the gurus tell you to do… and make it happen as an everyday normal person.

I will make a point of sharing an image or two from her social media about her yogi life… at the end of this post.

She’s still ever so ambitious. Her dreams keep getting bigger. Her drive and passion for living keeps expanding and glowing all the more.

Life has it that we rarely see each other anymore. But her constant support for my art is always felt and appreciated. (thanks internet and social media)

Epic Lessons

My friend is so very focused. She’s so resilient. Life has thrown her many unexpected and wild curves. I am not sure how I would have handled them if I had to handle them when she did. I do know this, her experiences have helped me face a number of challenges and not give up.

Humans are capable of doing way more than they think they can. Especially when they put aside the noise inside their head. Had I not silenced the negative voices in my head, I’d never would have had this great photo session and friendship. I am toying exploring one of the many lessons she taught me on one of my other blogs that talks about romance. Our interaction helped me improve my selectivity in the dating arena. Helped me become braver about expressing myself with women (not that I had much trouble, but like this blog, for long time followers, it takes me a while to really open up depth).

As a result, I’ve made a lot of wonderful friends through my photography. I’ve approached more people than I probably would have. I’ve gotten more comfortable approaching strangers and asking for what I’d like. I’ve been less concerned about how people might judge my question than before.

No. It was not an overnight thing. It was all part of the long journey of life. Meeting this queen was a pivotal point in my journey. Her royalty helped me reassess assumptions that were not working well for me.