Well I have moved from blogging to vlogging and now back again – mostly because if you follow my insta stories- most of the content on the vlogs is on there and I don’t want to repeat myself, too much anyway! So I just had an insane trip. Before I left I needed some new shots and no matter how much I love my team, I felt like we repeated ourselves a bit – and looking at it from a distance, we didn’t really. What was repeating was really my experience, it was kind of the same old thing and lost a bit of magic for me. So what was exciting now? As a creative person, its to push myself a bit to being uncomfortable and out of control, like on the edge and in unknown territory. If I think of myself a few weeks ago before I left and lining up the shoots in both Ibiza and Paris, it almost felt unbelievable, like really? How is that going to happen? My mind kept trying to play it out like – ok we will do this that and the other, but the truth kept waking me up ! like – you DO NOT KNOW how this is going to play out ! stop limiting it by your preconceived thoughts that are based on what you have experienced in the past and let the magic of the unknown guide and direct you ! SURRENDER was the name of this trip, and oh I received so much more than my mind could have imagined.
Ibiza
if you have been following my adventures, you know this is a place I am in love with, I wanted to shoot somewhere typical and iconic of the island , not the beach – although that is one of my favorite spots there, I felt I had the beach here in Laguna so what would it be?
I worked with the beautiful @zara_chapman last year when I was there, so knew I had the model I wanted down, her advise of a few different photographers got narrowed down to @jordicervenak. The shoot was planned for Wednesday and it did call for rain that day , but that was the only day we could all make it happen. so now where to shoot? My first day and I always walk the Old Town and there is a street called Virgin Street, one of the edgier places in town, by night everything opens up with bars and funky little shops and a drag queen parade a couple times a week. By day those same places are closed up and there are cool alleyways, funky colored doors and bougainvillea. For some reason the entrance was decorated with beautiful flowers from a previous event – This was the place. When I told Jordi where I wanted to shoot he was like “cool, I live there.” He knew the neighborhood and shot there many times – I should say he knew every corner, door and passageway IN the neighborhood, and took me to the different places he thought I would like. talk about SAVING MONEY – TIME and not MAKING EXPensive mistakes by not knowing!!!! Yes, surrendering here allowed the Universe to step in and align me with people that matched my needs beyond what I thought or knew my needs to be. MAGIC
Then, Paris! I wanted to take my Mom for her birthday and surprised her with having my son there as well. talk about a rich experience, it is still sinking in how grateful I am for it, a tad stressed as well, felt like I was a host, guess I was, but really wanted them both to experience this incredible beautiful city.
On my instagram account before I left, @marc_lamey liked several of my pictures, which lead me to looking at his account to see who he was. Looking at his profile I found out he was a photographer in Paris! I sent him a direct message and told him I was going to be there and did he want to shoot – he said yes.
Fast forward to his message saying he could only shoot Friday ( I was leaving that day at 2pm) that yes he could get a model and that the best time to shoot was sunrise…..ok huh? after being with my family and traveling for 2 weeks, I was not thrilled to be getting up before dawn, lugging my 50LBs worth of luggage so I could go directly to CDG from there and part of me was like – oh you don’t have to do it, you did Ibiza – BUT WAIT!!!!! Thankfully my louder voice was saying – ARE YOU KIDDING! you are going to miss this opportunity because you are tired???!!!!! YOU CAN SLEEP ON THE PLANE ! (back story on this statement – traveling with Lance Brown and he always says this, its so true!)
I had told Marc I wanted to shoot somewhere really Paris, like the Seine, or Louvre. He told me to meet him at a cafe at 7am….ok. Met him super cool guy, beautiful Masha is the model, we are drinking coffee at the cafe and he says we must go because of the light. it is dark outside. ok lets go – across the street a half a block over and are you *ucking kidding me????????????????? BLOWN AWAY. THE Eiffel Tower in alll her glory, so magnificent
Not only could I not make this up, I could not have dreamed it up to turn out better.
That is the reason for the title of this post. And what a learning experience – surrender- to cease resistance, what am I resisting? That I think know it all which is just such a ridiculous thought anyway – I know how much I don’t know, but so sure how much I think I know – how cool to just be like – hey I don’t know – how cool to have an intention and then let go, let go, let go, as that monkey mind starts to plan and control, just say hey you hold up a min. And how to do it when I am in the middle of my life and I am thinking I know what I’m going to do – how bout I don’t know what I’m going to do – I have an intention for the day that isn’t physical, my intention is to think thoughts I haven’t thought, to allow experiences, people and events into my life that I haven’t considered before. I could go on, but rather just put it into practice.
HMMMMM. I’ll keep you posted on how it goes…….
always big love and thanks for all the love I feel from you, hope you feel it from me
INSTAGRAM/KATHARINESTORYBOUTIQUE
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