We often cause ourselves suffering, by wanting only to live in a world of valleys, a world without struggle and difficulty, a world that is flat, plain, consistent. We resist the truth of difference and diversity. We resist acknowledging that our constants exist within a framework where everything is always changing. We resist change. When we are able to face the reality of highs and lows embracing both as necessary for our full development and self-actualization, we can feel that interior well-being that is the foundation of inner peace.
---bell hooks
About three years ago, I wrote about having the feeling that I was standing on the edge of a cliff. That I was about to be pushed off, or I would jump off, but the point was, everything was about to change. At the time I wrote that, I was 21, living with my parents, had been rejected by every graduate photography program I applied for, and had no idea what, exactly, my next move would be. I just kept taking photos every day, reading various photography blogs, spending money I didn't really have on lenses and photo books, browsing paintings and photo exhibitions at the Art Institute of Chicago and wondering if I had made the right decisions.
Soon after I wrote that, I was accepted into the graduate digital arts program at the Maryland Institute College of Art. I moved to Baltimore, a city where I knew exactly one person. I had one of the most frustrating, scary, thrilling and ultimately rewarding years I've experienced thus far. It was a year where I focused exclusively on photography and art; where I was surrounded by an almost palpable creative energy every day. After that year, I moved back to D.C. (well, a suburb of D.C. really) and began a life, that, on paper looked great.
But in reality, it was killing my spirit. And a lot of things happened in those two years that I wish I could take back, that I wish I could do over, that I wish I could have prevented from happening.
I spent a lot of time feeling down.
Low.
Heavy.
And then, on New Year's Eve 2009, whilst drinking mulled apple cider and simmering black-eyed peas in my slow cooker, that standing-on-the-edge-of-a-cliff feeling returned. And I realized two very important things:
a) I simply was not happy, and
b) It was up to me to change that.
I realized that I needed to become a lot more intentional with everything in my life---my photography, with my writing and editing duties for the Liberator Magazine, my health (physical and emotional), connecting with my family, cultivating my friendships...just everything.
And I have. I've made some good friends this year. I allowed myself to have fun, to enjoy life. I moved from the suburbs to D.C. proper. I was accepted into a fellowship program that has already been such a rewarding and dynamic experience, despite the speed bumps and glitches I've encountered. I'm working on a Big! Exciting! Collaborative! Project! with two other extremely talented photographers. (I'll reveal the details soon.) I've been blogging about photography for the Baltimore Sun's Charm City Current collective since May. One of my prints was accepted into a juried art exhibition at the Los Angeles Center of Digital Art. I've joined art membership programs here in D.C. I've applied for more photography shows in D.C. and New York.
And that feeling is back. That feeling of standing at the edge of a cliff.
That feeling of infinite possibilities (peace to Amel Larriuex) is there again, humming in the back of my mind.
My life isn't perfect right now, by any means. I have my ups and downs and in-betweens. But I also feel like I'm closer to living my life according to my own terms. I really am closer to embracing change, embracing chaos, and, hopefully, incorporating these shifts, and that feeling humming in the back of my mind into my work.
