Reframing a Missed Opportunity

I've been sort of pondering lately why I like photography so much.  I've decided that there are several reasons why I've developed such a passion for it and spend so much time doing it now.

• It allows me to capture beauty and share it with others.
• It's a creative outlet.
• I seem to have a natural aptitude for it and doing things we're good at is very satisfying.  (This is also why I love working with spreadsheets.  I know most people groan when they hear that, but I can do some pretty amazing things with Excel and make really useful tools for others, plus it's often like solving logic puzzles which is fun.  Yes, I was one of those weird kids that loved math word problems).
• I've found that I've become much more observant of the beauty around me when I'm wondering what would make a nice shot.

Yesterday was a crazy busy day, as evidenced by the fact that I didn't manage to get a blog post written.  There is always so much packed into the end of the school year for the kiddos.  Today is their last day, so things should start calming back down.  I think our last activity for the school year was attending my daughter's awards ceremony today.  Last year at the end of 6th grade she was on the principal's honor role and got a science student of the year award.  This year she got four awards:  principal's honor role, career achievement (for being on the principal's honor role for all of middle school thus far), band student of the year, and overall student of the year.  I'm very proud of her because she really works hard at school, but hope she isn't disappointed if she doesn't get all those awards again next year.  She already puts more pressure on herself than I think is totally healthy.

I was pretty disappointed in how busy everything was yesterday, because I missed at least one really cool photo opportunity.  I was driving to the bus stop to go to work and the sunrise was absolutely phenomenal.  There were some clouds left over from our thunderstorms overnight and the sun was a huge orange disc on the horizon peaking through the clouds.  I wanted to take a picture so badly, but knew I would miss my ride if I stopped.  Plus I don't keep my good camera in my car which I leave at the bus stop.  (It sure is a bummer when your job interferes with your hobby...and someone really needs to invent a universal sarcasm font.)  So I'm hoping that the sunrise will look similar on Saturday morning when I plan to be there, camera in hand, to get a shot.

In my effort to manage my stress, I have been trying to stop focusing on what I'm missing out on, and instead focus on the positive.  So while I was disappointed that I couldn't stop and take that picture, I reminded myself how lucky I was see such a beautiful sight.  Today I worked from home in order to attend my daughter's awards ceremony, and when I glanced out the window I noticed how pretty my neighbor's irises looked with the morning sun shining on them.  So I did manage to get a nice shot of that this morning, which I wouldn't have been able to do in the office.

While I fully recognize that missing the opportunity to take a picture of the sunrise shouldn't cause me a great deal of stress, it really had been doing so in the past.  It started me down a mental rabbit hole of wanting to stop working in order to spend more time with my family; missing my dad since he would have liked the picture; and ultimately wondering what the point of life was anyway.  Ridiculous, I know, but that's where I was going mentally.  So while it may not seem like a big deal, I'm pretty pleased with how I've been able to re-frame my thinking and manage my reactions and stress about this.

Hopefully tomorrow I'll have a beautiful sunrise shot to share!