Üleõlavaade << 2013 >> looking back

For the past 3 months or so I’ve been trying to figure something out. I was rather confused after a very busy spring and summer, finishing the summer’s projects through the autumn and trying to find a peace of mind. This being the main reason for not blogging. I didn’t know what to say or in which language.

Language choice in this blog has been a question for me for at least a year. (Or more. For example I didn’t change the menus into Estonian from the very beginning.) I’ve written a couple of drafts in english, but never posted. This scares me out of my pants (or skin)! (See how helpless I am.) So from now on I’m officially going to look stupid. A tough choice. But if you bother to read further you’ll notice that being brave is one of my New Year’s resolutions together with reaching out, meaning being more open, communicating my thoughts and feelings e.t.c.

The English voice has always been in my head when blogging. I had to silence it in order to write in Estonian or translate my thoughts back into Estonian sometimes. Unfortunately the voice knows very little about English grammar and syntax. So be it. I’m tired fighting it. Main argument against English was being real and talking to my potential clients – Estonians – rather than to god knows who. Doing this I constantly felt cut off and kind of lonely. Most blogs I follow and people who’s work I admire speak English irrespective of their mother tongue. Even my web stats backs up this change: more than one third of my page views come from other countries, most of them probably understanding Estonian, though.

I’m old enough to know that all those questions: what, why, how and for who keep coming back from time to time. They mark change. Knowing the pattern makes you less anxious, but rarely helps to get any answers. So you just wait until it settles. Today, ironically, it finally felt right. So, in order to be even more cliché, her are my New Year’s resolutions:

– Be brave, reach out.

– Blog more, Facebook less.

– Cook more, eat less.

– Shoot personal projects.

– Keep fit, but don’t waste your energy.

This said, it’s time to analyze the year gone by. For those curious and fluent in Estonian, here is the overview of 2012 with some hopes and expectations. Had to scroll it over myself as well to recall and compare.

2012 was a year for lots of firsts: first wedding, first newborn session, first months of being entrepreneur e.t.c. Expectations for 2013 were actually higher than I dared to say in my blog post – energy level was high and everything looked promising. 2012 was a year hard to beat. Therefore maybe I’m not so overwhelmingly happy with the year 2013. It was a year of stabilization.

My main hope was to establish the photography business and to shoot a couple of weddings. Those goals I achieved. Second half-year got so busy that I recall buying a memory card for every new shoot, because I had no time to download and backup the files. This led me to some other workflow related issues: slow computer (had to buy a new one), trouble to meet the deadlines, silence in blog e.t.c.

Another aspect I recall is a large variety of photography jobs I took, some of what I had no previous experience with (corporate portraits, fashion). It meant uncertainty and learning new things as you go. It was a necessary step in order to gain experience, but this also led to hesitation and lack of energy towards the end of the year. The lesson I take with me to the upcoming year is to choose my jobs more carefully, be even more self-conscious and specialize. There is no particular goal, financial or other, that I aim to achieve. I’d rather be kinder, less cynical and true to myself. Let’s see where that takes me…

Most important gift of the bygone year for me is knowing myself a little better and knowing that photography still makes me happy. It’s a nice, solid feeling to go on with.

Happy New Year my dear friends! Thank you for stopping by! Now that I’m healed and not yet overloaded with new projects, there will be more posts soon.