ME| 30 DAY BLOG CHALLENGE | HAWAII PHOTOGRAPHER

by ashleykirnerphotography

30 DAY BLOG CHALLENGE | DAY 1| ME (INTRODUCTION)

A couple things you may not know about me:

I am growing my hair out to chop it all off and give it away.  Most days my long hair drives me insane, every now and then though I worry I’ll miss it.

I am deeply sentimental.  I love the little things, not the $$ things. This shirt is the last shirt my husband wore before I watched him deploy for the first time.  I wore it through his whole first deployment like a second skin.

I hardly ever wear make up anymore, and I hate to admit this but 85% of the time I forget to put deodorant on.

I think by now you all know a few big things about me; i love love, I love Hawaii, I love my dog, and I love my husband.  I mean what do I take pictures of?  Pretty much those 4 things, but how did I get here?  How did I become this person?  I was a dark and twisty person for a lot of my life.  I’ve been in and out of therapists offices since I was 14 and I’m proud of it (I think everyone should get themselves to therapy for at least a small portion of their lives).  I am an EXTREMELY emotional person.  Some days I am sad and I couldn’t tell you why, I just am and I just need to be sad.  Some days stress consumes me to the point where I can’t breathe and other days I love everything that moves…like every molecule haha.  I feel things, and I feel them intensely.

I wont share my life story with you but put it this way I have dealt with a lot that made me question who I was, who I wanted to be, and why I wanted to be that person.  We all spend our teenage years trying to figure ourselves out, but I spent a lot of that time with lots of people telling me how I was wrong or bad.  Teenagers man…..they SUCK.

While I look back on that time and feel sad for me I am also so thankful for that time.  By the time I was 17 years old I truly learned how to not care what other people think. I mean sure we all sort of care what people think, we like to make a good first impression but sometimes people just don’t like you and there isnt a DAMN thing you can do to please them.  Some people spend their lives trying to get everyone to like them, don’t like me? Not my loss, see yea later.  And gossip….well have at it! No skin off my back.  I am at a point in my life where I truly like who I have become.  Every now and then something sneaks in there and makes me think “Maybe I should be more like that, yeah that will make things better” but 98% of the time no that wont make life better and no that’s not me.  The other 2% of those things, I try to take them and apply them in a way that is still me. You know,  I think that part of our personalities are innate, while part of them we can learn to mold and change.  Like me for example, as I shared earlier I feel strongly and passionately so sometimes that can make me a bit of a hot head…in fact that got me into a lot of drama in my teenage years.  As I grew I learned when to put that hot head into action and when to control it, when it is worth it to blow a little anger off.

My past 6.5 years in Hawaii have brought me more growth than I could have ever expected and I supposed that’s partially why I am so glued to Hawaii. I’ve grown into an adult here, I’ve changed from a confused single girl to confident married woman.  I left my family behind and had to get sh*t figured out here on my own.  The people, the land and the lifestyle out here has taught me things I don’t think I would have learned anywhere else.  My husband, well he is a whole different story and I am certain there is some challenge this month that will bring me to post about him.

So this is me.  Happy with myself, and unwilling to change for anyone but myself.