Keepin' It Real

Lauren Funk
Nov 7, 2016
2 min read

Today I made my boyfriend follow me around and take pictures for the blog. He wasn't exactly happy about it, I'm sure he would have rather been relaxing and watching TV. But being the supportive boyfriend that he is he took over my phone and snapped a ton of pics. And for the most part I didn't like them. Something wasn't right with the setting, the angle wasn't perfect, the lighting was off, etc. I started to get annoyed and Zach got frustrated and bored. No one was having fun.

Then Zach decided to fool around and pretending to be a professional photographer. "Where's the wind?" "Work it girl, work it!" His ability to be so light hearted is one of the many reasons why I love him. And I started to laugh. Those pictures, where I was smiling, were the nicest ones. They showed my personality.

I am no model. And I am perfectly okay with that. The point of this blog is to post my real experiences and my honest advice.

I became so focused on taking the perfect picture that I stopped having fun. I am sitting here, writing this, because it is something that brings me happiness. I would not try to write something that is fake or dishonest, so why would I take photos that are totally contrived? Yeah, I am going to work to find the perfect lighting and capture a nice vignette, and yeah, I will probably use a filter. But I am not going to be something that I am not. I think, all too often, we spend time worrying about what other people will think about what we are doing, rather than just enjoying the moment. Since everything goes on Snapchat and Instagram we are all very conscious of how we look and appear. It takes some effort to realize that just being yourself is beautiful and way more fun.

So I am just going to be true to myself. I am going to try an take the best photos possible with my iPhone {maybe a nice camera will be under my Christmas tree this year :)}. And maybe I will get a few glamor shots, but for the most part it will probably be just me in the moment.