Category Archives: Be Your Own Beloved

June 18, 2015

Mirroring in Your Photos

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I’m always on the lookout for new apps (and I bet you are too) and ways to get creative with my selfies and other photos after I take them.

Recently I downloaded the app Piclay which is available for both iPhone & Android phones. I got it because it has a great double exposure option (and I’m more than a bit obsessed with double exposures) but what ended up unexpectedly sparking my creative flow was the mirror option.

Piclay has 4 ways to use it: Double Exposure, Mirror, Collage and Single Photo. The double exposure feature is simple in just the right way. You pick two layers and it combines them then you can play around with different filters just the same way as you can with the other options in the app. I like it because to be honest, more and more with the Diana App I find myself choosing the ‘Unfiltered’ option without all the filters they have. So for me, having that basic layer without a filter is wonderful, as are their filters too.

But the mirror feature was the one I really wanted to gush about. I’ve had other ‘kaliedescope’ apps before where they took a photo and mirrored it in a variety of ways but you often didn’t have much creative control over the way it looked or they weren’t that easeful to use. This one totally is. Much like with their double exposures they make it really user friendly and uncomplicated. With the mirror photo option you choose your photo and can decide how you want it framed and then you choose between 4 different mirror options you can see the options below and how they would look on the same photo.

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Fun, right? I’m kind of obsessed with it. I initially started using the mirror photo option for the image in the next block of photos, the one on the top right. I wanted to find a photo where I could look back at myself as though I was looking myself in the eye in the photo and this app allowed me to do that!

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Of course it’s not only selfies that are fun to experiment with in the Mirror option of Piclay. Flowers of course, but you could truly try any image on your photo stream and just see what happens!

For those of you who have taken the Double Exposure Love class with me (and if you haven’t, its now available as a self-paced class) these kind of images rock for layers for our double exposures and add a kind of surreal and magical element to them. Of course, like the top left image in the next photos, you can also take your double exposure (or your outtakes) and add some extra magic to them!

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Have you downloaded the app already? I hope so. So far I’m doing all this with the free version but it seems like they also have a paid version too! I’d LOVE to see your photos so if you share them, don’t hesitate to use the #beyourownbeloved hashtag so I can see them and cheer you on! And the #piclay hashtag too as the folks from the App seem to really appreciate seeing what you create with their app!

May 26, 2015

Limitless Love

Tonight the golden light drew me out of my house, camera in hand to stroll a few blocks around the neighbourhood and I found my way to stand and soak in that light. I always bring my camera but there is no pressure to try to get ‘the shot’ anymore. I just let intuition guide me towards the story that needs to be told that night through the camera.

This night, in an alley I love to pause in the quiet and take photos in, I lifted up my camera to take a photo, arm’s length style.

Then another, and another. The clicking rhythmic, pulsing.

Until a voice, an old one, rose up in my thoughts and said “Isn’t that enough?”

It didn’t stop there. “If people were watching they’d think you were your own personal paparazzi, wouldn’t they?”

Before I even had a second to realize that old inner dialogue was happening another voice in me rose up. This one, my own personal inner mama-bear.

It fiercely said this:

No.

There is no limit.

You can take as many as you need to. For as long as you need to.

Every day for the rest of your life, if that’s what it takes.

You can take as many photos as it takes to heal.

There is no limit.

I found myself shocked at the words I just heard in my own head, fierce and true. I got choked up at this play between my inner critic and my inner protector.

My inner critic trying, as it usually does, to keep me playing small, even or perhaps especially in healing my relationship to worthiness, to enoughness, to how I see myself.

My inner protector the opposite. Claiming expansiveness.

That my inner protector, like a mama (or auntie) to a child saying “I love you to the moon and back”. It felt like that tonight. That the room I am willing to give myself in this time to heal and find my way back through the layers of learning I still have to do about worthiness, of being lovable, of letting myself be loved by myself and by others, of seeing myself and my body with deep abiding love.

There is no limit to my love that voice said and I will let you keep finding your way back to it.

We may have different tools to find our way to that love. Somehow, 9 years ago I found my way to the camera and realized it was the tool that would lead me home. Yours might be on the yoga mat. Or through pen to paper. Whatever brings you that respite, let there be no limit to when you’re ‘supposed to have it all figured out’. Let in expansiveness, limitless to our self-love, of how many times you might need to meet yourself in child’s pose or put that pen to paper. Let it not be a task, but a doorway to that love, one you look forward to meeting with.

Or maybe the camera could be a tool for you too?

That voice, that inner protector. Hearing it today choked me up because in so many ways, this is what I’ve been working so hard to hear. Sometimes it’s hard for me to explain the work we do in the Be Your Own Beloved class, the work that I do every night on these photo walks year after year…is about taking our own photo, but it’s about so much more.

It’s about turning the camera on ourselves and yes, knowing that inner critic is probably going to rise up. But we don’t stop there. We cultivate our own voice, choosing to not listen to our inner critic when it tries to make us stop and put away the camera in shame. We take another photo. We reclaim that voice and our personal power back. It’s a conscious choice to choose self-compassion over self-critique again and again until it our critic isn’t our go-to response.

Just like tonight, it’s not about our inner critics never rising up again. We can’t control that.

But it’s about building that self-compassion up so that when it does, we have the words to find our way back to ourselves. Sometimes, the words we didn’t even know we needed to hear.

I hope you hear those words today too, from my inner protector to yours.

There is no limit.

Take as many selfies, write as many poems, spill as many journal entries, meet yourself on the yoga mat as many times as you need to…there is no timeline you need to ‘achieve’ as we find our way to healing how we feel about our bodies, ourselves.

There is no timeline, no one path, no one roadmap.

You can take as long as you need to.

Let your love be limitless.

May 22, 2015

A Free E-Book!

Back in April I decided to share a selfie tip each day over on Instagram and the Be Your Own Beloved Facebook Page. Some were technical, some mindful, all full of love and inviting in self-compassion. Of course, I didn’t want to give away all the tips I share as a part of the Be Your Own Beloved class content but instead provide you with a supplement to it!

They are such juicy tips though, so I didn’t want to just leave them in my Instagram archives where they’d be hard for you to find. So I decided to make you an E-Book with every single tip I shared. 30 pages of fun tips for you to try out on your Selfie Journey.

It’s my gift to you when you join the Be Your Own Beloved Mailing List (and of course, it’s always okay to unsubscribe if it’s not a fit for you) and I’ll send you over a link to your copy of the E-Book.

I so hope it’s helpful to you on those days you could use some selfie inspiration or a supportive boost as you turn your camera on yourself. If you take some selfies inspired by the tips, please don’t hesitate to use the #beyourownbeloved hashtag (which you’re always welcome to use) so I can find it and cheer you on!

If you’d like to have support on your journey to see yourself through a lens of compassion, come join me for the Be Your Own Beloved class, a 30 day journey to create a habit of seeing yourself through kinder eyes. Not only does it include daily prompts, it also includes a beautifully supportive community, a video resource centre with inspiring and helpful videos and tutorials and support from me throughout your journey.

Be Your Own Beloved starts June 1st and you can grab your spot here!

I know it’s hard to make the choice to see yourself through a lens of compassion (cause I’ve been there at that precipice of having to choose self-love over self-hate) but it is truly such a gift we can offer ourselves to simply begin the journey, to say yes.

April 28, 2015

Beyond Arms Reach

Beyond arm’s reach there is so much more awaiting us than taking a face selfie at that angle we’ve perfected.

Beyond arm’s reach are our hands, free to move their own way, not held in position by holding the camera.

Beyond arms reach is that which we don’t know: the ways we could heal old stories, the potential for taking a of ourselves we really love.

Beyond arm’s reach is outside of the norm of what a selfie is perceived at, with a different perspective (potentially a kind one) awaiting us.

Beyond arm’s reach is that we can’t clutch onto, hold tightly to in fear. It’s letting go and trusting yourself as you open the door to seeing yourself with kind eyes (and trust that indeed, you will).

Beyond arm’s reach is that place beyond that wall we’ve been hitting with selfies, where we get bored or aren’t sure how to see something different day after day.

Beyond arm’s reach is outside of our comfort zone, where change happens.

Beyond arm’s reach is truly a whole other world of selfies we can take, when we step away from that small range of perspectives that our arm’s can reach to.

So how do we go beyond arm’s reach? It’s all about putting down our camera or phone on a bench or the ground or a tripod and stepping into the frame. Or perhaps putting it on a shelf just beyond arm’s reach and taking an arms length style selfie without having to hold onto the camera.

For me and often for participants in the Be Your Own Beloved class, this is the place where we step outside the threshold of our comfort zone of arm’s length selfies and into the empowering world of seeing yourself with a deeper kindness through your camera letting go of the limitation of only being able to see ourselves from that one perspective. For me, its where a deeper level of body image and self-love healing truly began.

Want to try it? I dare you!

Indeed, you need to find your timer, right? iPhone users, you should have a timer built into the camera on your phone, but it only takes one photo at a time. I recommend the Gorillacam app as a tool to take LOTS of photos (it allows you to take bursts of 5/15/30 photos at a time) and Android users you have a built in timer that is great and all other cameras likely have a burst mode with your timer included in your phone. Look around the outside of your camera for a symbol that looks like a clock or check your menu for the self-timer!

Go beyond arm’s reach! There is even a brand new Be Your Own Beloved class focused specifically on the potential of going beyond arm’s length and exploring how it can help us see our body with compassion…starting November 1st. Come join us and explore going beyong arm’s reach!

April 12, 2015

The Selfie Vulnerability Hangover

Yesterday I had a vulnerability hangover after posting a selfie.

Have you ever heard that term: Vulnerability Hangover? It’s a term coined by Brene Brown that she describes as: “the feeling that sweeps over us after we feel the need to connect… and we share something deeply meaningful. Minutes, hours, or days later, we begin to feel regret sweep over us like a warm wave of nausea.”

I had never pondered the overlap between that term and the feeling I sometimes had after posting a selfie but in that moment, it was clear…I was having a vulnerability hangover.

Sharing our selfies is vulnerable to many of us, especially when we’re going outside of our comfort zones, isn’t it.

So here’s what happened:

I had just gone on a long run from my home to Granville Island along this beautiful seawall we have here in Vancouver. When I got there, I saw a wide open dock and decided to go stretch there as I cooled down from my run.

I’ve been working hard to shrink my body shame (rather than my body size) and have found myself able to comfortably rock running tights, which I was indeed wearing on this day.

After stretching I propped my phone up and used the Gorillcam Timer App to take a bunch of photos on the dock. This one caught my eye. We may have different reasons to choose our photos, sometimes because it feels like the one that is most in our comfort zone and other times because it is outside of our comfort zone…and we are ready to go there.

This was the case with the one you see above. I was able to step outside my old stories and look at her, the woman in the photo, as though she were a dear friend. I’m starting to be able to see this same way in the mirror when looking at my body too. I saw this photo and loved her curvature, the shape of her body against the wide open sky. So I went for it and shared it (and am including a few more here just to, you know, make it even more vulnerable to post this)!

I felt 100% good about it in that moment.

But about 5 minutes later that wave of nausea hit. Fiercely.

It came in the form of that voice, that inner critic that I’m grateful had taken a hike when I posted it.

“Did you just post a photo of your butt on Instagram?”

“Why in the world did you do that. Aren’t you embarrassed?”

“What if people think that is your belly not your butt?”

“Seriously? Why that one?”

And on and on.

Sigh. I thought I had posted this with love and that I wasn’t going to have to deal with my critic this time, but once again there it was.

Even though I had posted it feeling good about it, that sharing felt deeply vulnerable and the voice of my inner critic took the form of wondering what other people might be thinking. Deep down I knew that if they saw the photo with critique despite the fact I posted it with love, that was their story coming up and not mine.

What mattered was that I posted it with self-compassion.

And if I felt it in that moment I posted it, I could find my way back to it.

It so happened that just then, I looked back at the photo and a wonderful woman had written “Love those beautiful curves”. Thank goodness for her…and thank you @wildspiritearth on Instagram. Having you mirror back that same reason why I posted it, the same kindness that in that initial moment of pressing the button to share it, that I had myself. It meant so much.

Yet sometimes there isn’t someone mirroring back kindness towards us. Or we may judge ourselves by how many comments we get or how many people like it and let that speak of the value of the photo rather than our own feeling about it. That nausea or panic might feel so overwhelming that we decide to delete it. I confess I’ve done that before. We get so caught up in all the stories of what other people are thinking after we take and share a photo.

People tell me they think they are doing this selfie-love thing wrong because they are having this reaction but really…this is the work of learning to see ourselves with kindness in our camera.

It is building that resilience in all the stages of the photo: taking it, looking at it, sharing it and even the ‘vulnerability hangovers’ that happen after we’ve shared it. Our resilience is needed in all of it.

It’s building that new story that we get to decide how we see ourselves and returning to that each and every time we have those doubts.

It’s not always easy. While over the years I’ve been building that resilience and I have these moments far less often (which OMG is such a relief). But they still happen. Especially as we keep pushing further and further outside our comfort zones.

So Brene Brown’s term ‘vulnerability hangover’ came into my head in that moment of anxiety yesterday when that negative voice came up I was able to say in my head:

“Hey wait…I don’t usually post photos of myself from behind and this is new territory for me. But I saw my curvature with love in that photo and that is the new story I want to live in, not the old ones that not only don’t serve me but are also deeply unkind”

I repeated it to myself especially the words as though it was a mantra until it started to feel like it was soaking in and calming me.

It helped. And knowing it was in fact a ‘vulnerability hangover’ in reaction to that moment of sharing something outside my comfort zone. I think the more we find those terms or ways to wake ourselves up in these moments the easier it is to be resilient in them!

Sometimes it’s hard to pull ourselves out of all things we’re imagining other people thinking about our photo, but there’s only one truth we have control of…our own.

I had chosen to see myself through a lens of love when I posted it, and that is the truth I want to believe in.

How about you? Have you had a selfie vulnerability hangover (I bet most of us have). How did you get past it?