Business & Family Storytelling Photography Kingston

Today, I woke up and put on my running clothes. I packed lunches, hurried children into coats and shoes, and met with a friend over coffee all in my spandex capris and bright turquoise trainers. I needed to get in a training run today, but I knew I wouldn’t have time until after the school run and a short meeting. If I put my running clothes on first thing, then when I finally had the time to do the run, it would be much harder for me to find a reason not to do it.

I’m a serial procrastinator. I always have a list of things I want to do, but I would much rather take that free moment I find and use it to relax with my coffee and pastry than to get up the motivation and materials to tackle that list.

At around noon each day, I look at my list and think I’ll try to write my sister a message or I’ll do some work on the yearly photo album tonight after the kids are in bed. And then the kids are in bed, and I make a cup of sleepytime tea and watch a Netflix original instead. I can barely have a conversation with my husband let alone write a message to my sister or make decisions about a photo book. So I procrastinate. And this happens every day.

A friend of mine recently encouraged me to sign up to run a 10K, and now we’re planning a few more races this year including a 10-mile run and maybe even a half marathon. If I want to run 10 miles in June and not collapse in a hedge afterwards (I did this once, but that’s a story for another time), I have to make sure I get the training done.

And that’s when I looked at my daily schedule and said, right, if it’s going to happen, I can’t fall into my trap of thinking “I’ll fit it in here.” I knew I had to do the prep work to make it as easy as possible to do and as hard as possible to put off. Hence, first thing in the morning I put on my running clothes even though I know I won’t actually run for another 3 or 4 hours.

Back in December, I ran my first story-telling photography workshop. I taught eight mothers who are just as busy as I am how stay in the moment and still capture those photos that trigger the warm memories of Christmas, like how we dance in the kitchen while we cook, or watching our kids open the presents that were on their lists. And one of the mums mentioned that her take-away was “planning the moments you want to capture”.

And wouldn’t that be great if we could set ourselves up for success for more of those things that we really want to get done? What if we could wake up and put on our running clothes for other things on our list? If getting great story-telling photos of your family is one of those things on your list, then I have an easy way for you to prepare to do it. Send me an email, give me a call. We can meet for a coffee and chat about the ideas now so that you are ready when the time comes for the session later in the year. Or maybe you want to take my workshop and learn more about how to plan to capture your moments. Again, it just takes a quick call or email, and I’ll put you on the list to get the invite for the next one (which will be coming up in May). No need to have dates on the calendar or make a deposit, just send the email and have a coffee with me. Then we’ll be all set once the time comes to tell your story!