Gotta Walk that Talk
Being the lead photographer for Flawsome Boudoir I wanted to make sure I had perspectives on both sides of the camera. I wanted to experience a boudoir or self-empowerment session myself. So, over the last few years I have had a variety of professional, and impromptu sessions that have all impacted me!
Since I was young I have had a hard time loving my body, as someone who is 6’2 clothing didn’t fit me like it did the other girls. I let clothing companies and society tell me there was something wrong with my body because I “didn’t fit” in. I had low self esteem throughout high school and into college.
I signed up for my first session because I wanted to push myself out of my comfort zone, so I found a male photographer (As much as I may not have times of loving my body, I am not a shy person so being nude in front of a woman was not a big issue for me). This was a slightly different session in that I did a Vintage Pin Up Session! So, there were no nudes that were taken, but it still was pushing me outside my comfort zone.
I fell IN LOVE with my images! I fell in love with myself! In the studio before even seeing my images I felt confident and more alive than I had in a while. From that session I placed one of the images next to my bed. About a year later I signed up for a Kink and Erotic Conference. I wanted to learn where my line was on what I am willing to photograph in the kink community.
At that conference I went up a whole new level of self acceptance and love! This conference was one of the first times I really felt that I was surrounded with a community of people like me! I felt no shame in my acceptance of sexuality for myself and others. While at this conference I also had a session of my own. This session was very different from my first session, I was fully nude, so it was more of an erotic and self exposure kind of session.
Being so unapologetically me, and naked and then allowing someone to photograph me in that vulnerable state was life changing! Once again I grew into who I was. I started accepting my body and sexuality more openly. This session changed who I was in SO many ways. The first thingI noticed was my confidence. I held myself a little higher, I was also starting to be myself as a sexual being instead of hiding behind who I was. I LOVED my images too, againI hung one of these next to my bed!
I fell IN LOVE with my images! I fell in love with myself! In the studio before even seeing my images I felt confident and more alive than I had in a while. From that session I placed one of the images next to my bed. About a year later I signed up for a Kink and Erotic Conference. I wanted to learn where my line was on what I am willing to photograph in the kink community.
At that conference I went up a whole new level of self acceptance and love! This conference was one of the first times I really felt that I was surrounded with a community of people like me! I felt no shame in my acceptance of sexuality for myself and others. While at this conference I also had a session of my own. This session was very different from my first session, I was fully nude, so it was more of an erotic and self exposure kind of session.
Being so unapologetically me, and naked and then allowing someone to photograph me in that vulnerable state was life changing! Once again I grew into who I was. I started accepting my body and sexuality more openly. This session changed who I was in SO many ways. The first thing I noticed was my confidence. I held myself a little higher, I was also starting to be myself as a sexual being instead of hiding behind who I was. I LOVED my images too, again I hung one of these next to my bed!
After the Erotica and Kink conference I attended one more conference where I also had another session! This was with Denise Birdsong who is known for her ability to help clients tap into their emotions for additional depth in the images. After the confidence I gained from the Erotica session I was able to walk into this session with a different perspective in myself. I was nervous because I was going to need to tap into my emotions more than I did with my previous sessions but once again I walked out with a new sense of self appreciation. This was the session that really taught me to love and respect my own emotions. ALL emotions are beautiful, and we get to share those with the world, but we never really get to see those on ourselves.
The last (so far) boudoir experience I have had was outdoors. A friend who is also a photographer flew out to Oregon, where we traveled around the state and took images of each other to help build our portfolios and have images to share on our sites. This one expanded my limits but put me outdoors where I definitely felt more vulnerable. Some of the locations we were in, someone could have walked up at any point, and at one point a group of hikers even did (luckily, we were dressed at this point). This was liberating and freeing, to be outside where anyone could see at any time, and I was in the nude! Although, I did poste nude unfortunately the ones I have my web site company doesn’t support, so for now I will share a clothed outdoor one I still loved!
Every session brought me closer to me, to where I felt more like myself and comfortable in my own skin. I can’t wait for more sessions down the road but for now, I am happy with myself and where I am in myself growth journey. Do I love myself every day? Absolutely not, but I do love myself more days than I don’t. Everyone has bad days, the goal is to learn how to pick yourself back up, after you’ve been knocked down and keep on going. All we can do is be our best!