A Decade in a Flash: 10 Years of Photography, Becoming & Belonging

This post was supposed to be written a year ago.

I had just celebrated ten years of photography with an event at Meliora Studios - surrounded by people, laughter, music, light, and a version of myself that had survived more than she ever expected to.

And still, I couldn’t write it.

Not because it didn’t matter.
But because it mattered too much.

Some moments need distance before they can be named.

The Day That Was Never Just a Party

The event wasn’t about numbers, achievements, or milestones on paper.

It was about arrival.

Standing inside a studio I helped build, with my work on the walls, my hands in the frame, my body present - not hiding behind the camera - felt like closing a long, unfinished sentence.

There was cake. Candles. Red backdrops. Gold balloons spelling a number that once felt impossible.

But beneath the celebration, there was something quieter happening:
recognition.

I didn’t imagine this decade. I lived it.

Ten Years Changed Everything (Especially Me)

When I started, photography was about proving myself.
Learning fast. Saying yes. Being available. Being “good enough.”

Ten years later, photography became something else entirely.

It became:

• a language

• a mirror

• a way to hold space for people when words fail

• a way to understand myself through others

I learned that confidence isn’t loud.
That identity is allowed to shift.
That self-expression doesn’t need permission.

And that success means very little if it costs your sense of self.

Built With People, Not Alone

This decade was never a solo act.

It was built with clients who trusted me at vulnerable moments.
With friends who believed when I doubted.
With collaborators, models, creatives, and kind souls who showed up - sometimes without knowing how much they were saving me.

Seeing everyone together in that room was overwhelming in the best way.

It reminded me that community is not a bonus.
It’s the foundation.

What I’m Letting Go Of

This anniversary didn’t make me want more.

It made me want truer.

I’m letting go of:

• working from pressure instead of alignment

• measuring my worth through productivity

• explaining my depth to people who skim

• shrinking my vision to make it easier to digest

Photography deserves my presence.
And I deserve a career that doesn’t ask me to disappear inside it.

What Comes Next

I don’t have a five-year plan.

What I have is intention.

To create with honesty.
To photograph people as they are - and as they’re becoming.
To build experiences, not just sessions.
To protect the magic by choosing carefully where my energy goes.

If the first decade was about survival and skill,
the next one is about meaning.

A Decade, In a Flash

I couldn’t write this when it happened.

I can now.

Because sometimes celebration comes first -
and understanding follows later.

And this decade deserves to be remembered
not for how fast it passed,
But for how deeply it shaped me.