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Your Journey

whatever you do or dream you can begin it boldness has genius and power and magic in it now last time I was here we talked about the journey and where you were in life and where you wanted to go so I wish we had lots of time that we could talk about what you've been doing on dh and what you've accomplished because I know a lot of you like melissa I know you just saw me for the first time a creative life correct that was the first time you ever found me and since then were b f f's and we see each other but I mean for some of you how many of you just saw me the first time it creative life because some of you have recognized for so most of you actually just you and I are old were thie oh jeez right original gangsters so so I know that there are a ton of people out there maybe on one of the breaks are on the question times we can hear about what people are doing because the one thing about creative live that was really remarkable to me was hearing about how many people and how when I get e...

mails or post on facebook where people who say you completely changed my life for you completely changed my business it's overwhelming to me to imagine that talking about babies and sweating shooting you know and sewing in the most chaotic sessions in the world could change somebody is life but I believe it has to do with that method we were talking about about showing you how I do what I do and for some people it's like a car crash doing photographing kid it's it's like a year old boom and all the sudden you're trying to deal with the cast where when somebody's when you see me struggle and you see how I solve the problems it's not the problems it's how we solve the problems that I think really makes it makes sense to you because you'll say oh kids do that to me too but she did this and that worked and you're going to really see that this time I overwhelmed myself with sessions I I asked them to book me just a boatload of sessions for the next couple days because I want to show you the method and what I hope people that I'm gonna probably reiterate this a lot I don't want people to think I'm like this you know just cookie cutter get him in get him out kind of a shooter my sessions in the studio I have more time what I'm trying to show you is that eighteen months this is how I would this is the most important thing in an eighteen month old session is this the most important thing in a four year old session is this I want to show you those things so that we can you can see no the most likely thing to happen at certain age is and how I solve those problems because everything else is gravy anything else if you get a perfect I mean we all know the eighteen months old are the hardest in the world I know how bad it's going to be and so my go I hope that child is bad because you guys know that my favorite thing in the whole world is a bad session because then when I show you how to fix it I feel like I did my job when I have a perfect child come in they just sit there and they're adorable I feel like I failed the audience because the audience is going to naturally say oh that's because that kid was so cute or so good or so hyped up with benadryl or something I don't know but you know it's one of those things that I want that chaos because the most important thing I can show you is how things go wrong and how it would solve them and so that's kind of what I'm hoping for now as faras this step it's interesting because we're kind of taking little baby steps we covered the bellies to babies program so you got everything I know about babies and now we're gonna cover the children we're gonna go all the way through high school seniors um I don't have a cz much time as I would like to do a full senior presentation but I'm hoping to at least touch base on it because to me teens does mean high school seniors I know you just had sallis and kata here too and he did a great senior program so I don't I don't think you need the full marketing you know and everything but I'm sure gonna pack in as much as I can so I feel like I'm taking creative live audience on this little journey and and if this goes well maybe they'll have me back and we'll do the family one next and then we'll manage business and then we'll do things like that but it's kind of fun because I feel like with the time that we've allowed in between the sessions it's given you guys enough time to implement them and then you know now you're better now hopefully people are back for more and I'm ready to give more as well so I'm excited about that most of you remember the perfect day conversation I think this is where you got that that theory of time last time we asked about the perfect day and I want I'll bring you back to that because this show is never about making money I'm going to teach you how to make money and I want you to make a lot of money but it's never about my job has never been about making money in fact that's the hardest part for me is the reality is I have to teach people tto have that success the truth is weii just want to do what we love and it's finding that balance that you know that the choice and you know accountability in there that makes it work so everybody should go back to your perfect day if you and your mind could think of the thing that you would be doing on the perfect day that's what we're working here for because it's not about money it's about time and you have to have time with people that you love and in order to do that you have to have money so it's our job to figure out how much money do you need to have the time you need with people that you love sending the second one to college is hard because I feel like that's why that trip is so important is I feel like to me that's the last big thing that I do before I let them go now the second one is a little easier to let go I'm not gonna lie first was really dramatic the second I'm like yeah go ahead go teo its time but even still I know my time is up with him he will go and do his own thing and so you know now I've got two little ones left and their thirteen and fourteen it's not going to be for five years and they're going to be gone too so so whether you have children and a puppy you know kitty are harley davidson I don't care if it's the thing you love to spend time with that's what my goal is here and I always want to bring you back to that because that's where that's what we're working for this was in the last show and I told you I try not to do this but this is so important to me I said earlier unless you're dead it's really not that bad but this has so much impact because this is actually this was done this was this was interviews of people who were going to pass away and these are their biggest regrets and it's so sad because the truth is these air all all of our biggest regrets when you read this all of us can relate to this and so it's kind of funny if if if people that are dying are telling you that this is their their greatest regret and we all can look at it and know that we're out there that these are the things to me that we should be focusing on most and uh and we should be making those changes because you only get one life you get you know one opportunity to do this and you should do it well we should try to do it very very well I wouldn't be me if I didn't show my bedroom uh this is actually my office but everybody knows that the word believe is really important to me it's always been a part of who I am you can see it's big in my office above uh uh that's not a bed that's actually my desk just so you know I work better this way because I spent a lot of time in hotel rooms so when I built that the running joke is of course I do my best work in bed so all shows were created in this room but I put that sign up there because I need to see that every day and in fact eventually over time I actually uh I had it tattooed on my wrist so that I would never no matter what I do brushing my teeth no matter what I see this all day long and it reminds me that I do need to believe life is a choice it's your life choose consciously choose wisely choose honestly and choose happiness and that's really where we're going now I do have one concern I found out wait I'm sorry else get to that uh this was really cool this is one of those that after I had a show this was after creative life I did a tour show and I and I hope I'm not in but I won't even tell you her name but I had one of my students come up to me and she was having a hard time in life and she was having issues on all kinds of levels and that's great conversation with her and I basically told her that she could do anything she wants she just has to believe and she said and I said something like and I'm gonna hold you accountable for that and she said how are you gonna do that I said I don't know but I'm going what I'm telling you you have to do this and I know that you can do this and you have to do this well she sent me this incredible letter and she said that after I said that she took it hard she went home she bought she saw this low l believe sign she bought it and then she made this little a little cube and it's a picture of her with her children and myself she's got her daughter and myself and this was at the show she's taking this picture and she made this block and on it it says I'm gonna hold you to it so this sits on her desk and every day she sees my face telling her that she has to do it and that she's going to do it and last time I saw her she had made just incredible I didn't even recognize her she's lost so much weight she was doing so well in business and she had done so many incredible things so it was such an honor I mean these are the kind of things that as a speaker you know it's hard to believe that somebody has your face aah total strangers so to speak has your face on their desk and they believe what you're saying and so this is something that to me is very very important but I do have one issue because I was on the plane yesterday and I found out that justin bieber just gotta believe tattoo on his arm and I'm kind of ticked off because he stole that from me and so I'm kind of added the beeb right now so he kind of tipped me off because now people are gonna say oh you know they're gonna think I copied justin and who wants so so other than justin bieber you know I'm still glad that I have this on my wrist all right let's go ahead and get some business now um why tots to teens well obviously there's a lot of reasons for us it's a follow up to the baby program when I invented the what we call the baby diploma baby is our baby plan we taught you that last time baby a diploma is the baby graduated siri's now what had happened is that in the baby program we had really created an incredible business with clients who came in and that first year we really capitalized on that that first year of milestones but I realized after a while that at the end of that year we were kind of just sending those kids out into the world saying hey you know thanks for your business I hope you come back we just didn't have something to really solidify that relationship and so it didn't take me very long minute from a marketing standpoint to say okay I need to have something a follow up program and so this was invented by for our studio years ago and to me I thought okay well what are the its milestones and we felt like eighteen months because that's that holy terror age and then of course two three four and five those are the years we feel we market to be very honest with you what I teach marketing for children uh we teach marketing through the age of eight and that typically is the end milestones which can be like holy communion things like that um and that's really where the marketing ends I have been at this for twenty four years when I moved to colorado some of my original clients where my baby plan clients and what I found is I would see them every year year after year after year until they're about five and then all of a sudden they just disappear I would very rarely see them maybe an occasional family portrait every couple of years and if you're a parent you know why that is when they're little that's there's stars and diamonds but by the time they had eight or nine there in sports they're in piano there in dance you're travelling you've got three kids not one and you know life gets really busy then they hit that eight or nine age and then all of sudden they get those like weird teeth and like you know crazy you know everything's kind of going crazy in their body and and honestly no offense but they're not as cute as they were when they were little so way has photographers know that from a children's standpoint there is that that golden time through about eight years old that is really our time to really work with those plans and it's not that they don't love you anymore they just get busy and what I found is other than the occasional family pictures every couple years virtually because they're a total part of my life then it's like they disappeared I forget and they forget and then all of a sudden they become high school seniors and then I'm getting these beautiful children coming in and I'm looking at them thinking I know you and then I realized that that was a little fairy I shot you know when she was four and I saw every year and it's that it was probably one of the greatest impact moments you know three four years ago was when I started having the first original baby plan clients coming bacchus high school seniors and I will tell you I had so many emotional moments when these kids would walk in and it would kind of I would realize holy cow I just spent a whole life with this child and I you know I I raised them so to speak I photographically raises him and it was just incredible I remember the very first client was a couple years ago was one of my original baby plan clients that brought her first baby in at a whole meltdown in a back room that they have no idea because I couldn't believe I had gone an entire generation I was about to start the second generation on doing that I felt really old I'm not sure if that was maybe the breakdown is I just felt really oh uh it was just incredible to realize how powerful those relationships are and if we do our jobs right those people will come back and they will bring their children and it becomes you know it becomes a very exciting process with the baby plan follow up there's never ending supply of clients I mean babies are being born every day that's why I promote them so much it doesn't matter what community you live in there's a baby being born right now and we can find unlike other types of photography that market is always there and always available and it's all about creating those relationships and helping them grow