Notes on Confidence

It took me over 20 years to chase my dreams of being a portrait photographer.

A big reason for that was lack of confidence. Confidence in myself. Confidence that it was the right decision. Confidence that I had what it took. Confidence that I had what it took to produce profesisonal portraits of other people… after all you should see some of my early work. But overall it took me time to learn to go after what I wanted. To have the confidence to stand up and say- yes, I want this.

It was probably ten years ago that I started talking about stopping photography all together. The equipment I had purchased was pretty much gathering dust in a corner. I had little to no clients to speak of for several reasons… but one being it helps if you have confidence to tell people you are a photographer.

As I have mentioned in other blog posts one of those turning points was meeting another photographer by the name of Sue Bryce. Sue not only spoke about providing value with photography, making a difference with it and the technicalities of the trade- but she spoke about her confidence. I remember her telling a story of walking along the beach repeating to herself saying that she was a portrait photographer. This stuck with me because for a long time I struggled to talk to people, let alone inform them I was a portrait photographer.

I have learned several things regarding confidence and would like to share the following three stories.

Courage and then Confidence

The first is that confidence is more of a destination, a way of being. It is not something we are always going to have 100% of the time. For instance while I may have developed a confidence about photography if you sat me next to Mark Seliger or Annie Leibovitz (2 famous photographers) I am pretty sure my confidence would go out the window.

In the fall of 2020 I had the opportunity to travel to Coco Rocha’s model camp in New York as the guest photographer. At the time I had only photographed a handful of models in Utah and had never met, let alone watched a model work that was near the caliber of Coco. I also knew that going to this model camp it was likely I would be one of the older people there, and likely much bigger than everyone else. Both proved to be true.

I chose to go, despite my hesitations for a couple of different reasons. The main one being that one does not first ‘have’ confidence. First one must have courage to do the hard thing and then they may gain confidence from the experience that they carry on to the next.

While I did not have the confidence to photograph someone like Coco I knew I could have the courage to show up. And while I hate to admit that most of the pictures are blurry- I showed up. I had experiences I will never forget and experiences that continue to impact me, and give me confidence to this day.

The Edge of Your Comfort Zone

There is a saying that says something like life begins at the edge of your comfort zone. Maybe I have that quote incorrect but I think for most it is terror begins at the edge of your comfort zone. Okay, maybe not terror. But there is a reason that most of us stay in our comfort zones. It is, as the name denotes comfortable and as humans we tend to avoid discomfort. But here is the thing. What if you pictured your comfort zone as a dark center where you are most comfortable and then a gradient as you go out, further away from the center? What if, instead of taking a huge big flying leap out of your comfort zone, you just started with a step? Would you look at it differently? Would your life be different?

As a photographer in Utah I have been told that we have the highest number of photographers per capita. Warms your heart right up to know there is a bunch of competition… right? But most of the photographers in Utah don’t charge that much and I used to be one of them (but my work wasn’t any good then either).

As I was learning more about photography and my business I was learning about charging more. All the things come when you consider a price change. Who am I to charge that much? Am I worth it? Do I provide enough value? What if people cannot pay me?

While there are many discussions we can get into with the above story at the time I was charging people I don’t remember how much per photo…. something like $25. It generally worked better for me than most around me because people bought what they liked and ended up spending more with me than they would another average photographer. But I was still undercharging.

The challenge with increasing my skill as a photographer was to also increase how much I was charging. It sounded completely crazy to me to go from charging what I was to how much some other photographers were charging, like $250 per image (and more). I was not comfortable with it. My feelings as a business owner and skills as a photographer had not caught up.

Instead of throwing the idea in the trash I decided to take a small step outside my comfort zone. Sue Bryce provided a range of acceptable prices in a class she taught and I put myself square at the bottom of that range. Then as my comfort grew and my skills as a photographer improved little by little I increased my prices.

Maybe I could have quickly increased my prices and been successful, maybe not. But the point here is that if you ever feel hesitant about taking that first step outside your comfort zone… maybe look for ways to make it a smaller step.

Borrow Confidence

One of my goals for people I photograph is that hopefully they walk out of the studio with a bit more life confidence than when they came in. Having your picture taken, especially in a professional studio setting can be a difficult situation for many. And having a successful experience can help build confidence, not only in you as a person- but in other ways in life.

Most of my childhood I had comments on my boy legs. No, I was not blessed with little twig legs like most girls my age. I did not like this as ended up wearing pants or long skirts most of the time to try and hide them. One time my grandma was painting a picture of me rock climbing and someone asked if that was her grandson. Mortifying.

Fast forward to a few years ago when I started doing self portraits. I decided to do a picture with my legs in it. When I first started self portraits, I frequently avoided full body shots. I ended up dancing to Imagine Dragons and have this fabulous picture of me jumping… with my legs in it.

This picture helped give me some confidence about my legs. It helped give me evidence that my legs were fine… they were still jumping after I had fallen over moments before trying another pose (ha ha). This confidence has transferred back into the way I dress, even how I see myself.

I have also had other clients tell me that the confidence from their session has transferred to other ways of their life. I have encouraged coaching clients to consider their experiences of confidence if they are ever nervous about something. Almost to psyche themselves up to try their goal. I find that most of the time we can do what we set out to do. We just need any kind of a boost to take the first step and if you can borrow confidence from a previous experience- do it.

I know from experience confidence can seem a bit elusive, perhaps a never ending journey. But the by having the courage, to take that small step, and borrow confidence when I need it… has helped me move further along in my business and life than it would have otherwise.