I didn’t expect this when I decided to become a photographer

Photo by Christie Caiola

It has been occurring to me lately

that I had no idea the impact my career path would have when I first started this adventure

The impact it has had on all the women that have stepped into my studio has been so profound and quite frankly humbling.

But that’s not exactly what I’m talking about.

The reason I can stand up here and speak so highly of this experience, singing a song of confidence and what it’s like to have your own damaging internal voice challenged…

Is because I have the same damaging internal voice. I spent a lot of my childhood picked on for my appearance, like many of you. I grew up through the ideal body type looking nothing like mine. At just 18, I started my career in an industry where models were told not to eat at lunch and the more emaciated they were, the more excited a photographer was to work with them. My view of myself is so skewed, it still has me choosing pants 3 sizes larger than I am when I’m shopping because I have no earthly clue what I actually look like in real life. 

So, the impact that has shocked me the most is the one it has had on ME. My own internal voice. I’ve stepped in front of this camera for my own self portraits and left changed every single time. The lasting effect it has had on me to see myself like this has built a self assuredness in me. I am able to see myself differently and silence that voice that tears me down every single chance it gets. Without the voices of all the people who have ever tried to tell me what to think of myself and without the brands that have ever tried to sell me a lie. 

This is why I scream it from the rooftops. It’s why I am so confident in the impact from these sessions. I have watched woman after woman come in and live an experience I’ve had the opportunity to live myself. 

Imagine a world of women empowered. A world of women who have challenged their mind and dared to see themselves differently. 

It’s a world I want to live in, and it’s humbling that I get to help build it.