Hey all! So excited to start a new series, “Dear Jenna!” Every week I get countless emails in my inbox from aspiring photographers and incredible entrepreneurs, dreamers, and doers, so I wanted to start a series where I can answer the questions (not just for the sender) but for everyone! Not only will it hopefully save time on my end (and get me out of that inbox for hours everyday) but it can help shed some light on how I run my business, what I believe, and what’s working for me!

To kick this off, let’s start with one of my most favorite questions ever:

Hey there, first and foremost: you aren’t alone. Social media sucks us all in and on those days we let it, it can spit us out (feeling unworthy, not enough, and basically crappy.) Here’s what I have learned: in order to really believe in yourself and have confidence, you need to consume carefully. When you start to feel those bitter feelings, those “I’ll never be as good as her” feelings, those “her success is my failure” feelings we’ve got to do a check. What I’ve realized is this: social media is just a tiny little picture of people’s lives, I know, I know, people talk about this all the time in the mushy way, but let’s look at it as it really is: a highlight reel. An here we are living deep in the bloopers of dream chasing but our thumbs somehow dig us into these doubt-filled joy sucking holes as it scrolls and scrolls.

It’s really easy to post our best photos of ourselves. The ones that are edited, the ones we look skinny in, the ones where we are made up, styled. In fact, those are the ones we, as humans, like to hide behind… but it’s not real, here’s why. If you work from home, this might sound like you: I haven’t wore make up in a week (I don’t even know where my pencil bag with make up is.) I don’t own a hair dryer and by Friday my hair is 99% dry shampoo and on the verge of dreadlocks. I boycott bras (and real pants, too) and I fall prey to feeling not enough. I see you beautiful people out there with the lipstick, the perfect outfits, the styled hair and suddenly my bare reality feels like it’s lacking, like I’m not beautiful. But here’s the thing, I am, you are too. My everyday doesn’t look perfect but I get some awesome work done. Those imperfect things don’t define me, the way I am serving the world does.

So what do I do? Create THEN consume. Say what? Don’t start consuming the minute you wake up. I used to wake up and start the scroll game: check Facebook, check Instagram, read emails before I even left my bed or brushed my teeth. Do you know how bad that is on your self worth early in the morning (when the drool is still on your cheek and your pillow imprints are on your face?) Don’t hop on and read all the blogs, see all the Instagram photos, and live on Facebook, create first (maybe even with your wifi turned off) to give you clarity, then consume. When you reverse the order, you will start to see that you can create things that are genuinely inspired by you, your life, your calling – not by what everyone else is putting out there. It’s cool to be inspired but when inspiration turns into imitation, we, as creatives, start to lose ourselves. As I’ve built up confidence these past few years, I’ve really learned to be “okay” with going against the grain, the flow, and in carving my own path. This confidence only came when I started to really disconnect from social media and reconnect with my life, the moments, the things around me.

Let’s be honest: comparison is the thief of joy and if we let ourselves spend our days comparing our bloopers to those highlight reels we are seeing, we will busy ourselves in our insecurities, in our imperfections, in the exact things that set us apart from one another. Create, then consume, my friends. Follow only people who raise you up, lift you, and prove that their successes are merely a reflection of what you are capable of. When you carefully consume, filter what it is you are seeing, and focus on the creation and not the imitation is when we are free of the worry of critics and when we can fully and freely write to our people, the ones who show up for us, the ones who believe in us. Don’t let social media suck you in, your bloopers are worthy to be lived and celebrated fully because they are a part of your success story!

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