I wrote the following post last summer – just as my family and I made the decision to move from Austin, Texas back to our home – so that I could chase my dream of being a photographer. I was thinking of this post yesterday – over an amazing lunch filled with great food and even better conversation with my new friend Gina – and I wanted to share it again today.

Because it’s just as true now as it was last July.  Because I needed the reminder, that I am doing exactly what I set out to do. Making it happen. Making changes. Taking chances. And although I’m by no means racing down this course, the simple fact that I am on it at all makes my heart swell.

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“Courage is a tricky thing, really. Being brave. Doing what you know is right even as a sea of voices is telling you otherwise. I am not good at courage; living life out loud. Being brazen. Individual. Me.
All that changes.

Right now.

Some say it took courage to move my family 1100 miles for a job. But it didn’t. Not even a little, actually. That choice was easy. Money, career, big house and fast cars, designer clothes, blister-causing red-bottomed shoes, prestige, clout. All the trinkets of a trivial life that society tells each of us we must strive for. Pine for. Lust after. Taking steps to get all that was simple. Moving to Texas to fulfill a once sought-after, haughtily fought for, perfect career didn’t take courage at all. Moving home? Leaving it all to pursue a life where I can spend all my time creating pretty things? Art? That is going to take some courage.

I’m scared. Terrified, really, but I am doing it anyway. Moving home, taking action, playing the lead role in my life. Even in the presence of fear. Regardless of it. Because of it. Because one of the marks of a gift is having the courage to fulfill it. I am moving my family back to Minneapolis. So that my kids will have a life outside of their parents. So that my husband will have his chance to find a career, a passion, and pursue it.

So that I can pursue photography.
So that I can be a photographer.
Every.
Single.
Day.

If life really is about the choices we make, I want to choose wisely. I want to choose what’s important to me, and be guided by it. I want to think big and make things happen. I want to surround myself with people who believe I can, and more than that who, instead of asking, “why?” are quick to say, “why not?” People I don’t need to impress in order to stand amongst them and hold my head up high. Friends. Family. You.

This decision, to uproot my life, leave a cushy job for my old one, making less money, working more hours, and sitting behind a desk all day so that I can focus all my extra energy on photography, was surprisingly easy. Making it was like choosing to breathe. Natural. Intrinsic. Still, I’m scared. Terrified. But in the most amazing way.

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When I wrote this post, in July, it’s purpose was to reassure me that I was doing the right thing. I wrote it so that I would be a little less scared. A visual, written reminder that I was making the right choice. Self re-assurance. Confidence – in blog post form.

The purpose in re-posting it is to remind myself, that yes, I was terrified, but I lept anyway. I stood on the face of a cliff, and jumped. Eyes shut tightly in an effort to brace myself against the impact.  A crushing, bone-breaking jerk back to reality that never came. So eventually I opened my eyes, to find myself free. Of fear. Of worry. Of doubt.

The best part of dreaming is that you don’t have to have your feet on the ground – a dream gives you the freedom to fly.  But only if you have the courage to chase it.
So chase away, friends.

twenty years from now
you’ll be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do
than by the ones you did do.
So throw off the bowlines.
Sail away from the safe harbor.
Catch the trade winds in your sails.
Explore. Dream. Discover.

~Mark Twain