Seattle Family Photographer | Tilly Goble | Thoughts on Authenticity
I sit here in a comfortable rocking chair on my rooftop deck overlooking downtown Seattle. The blossoms of tiger lilies peek over the railing adding orange flare to the tops of the buildings. I can hear my son a few floors below me laughing hysterically as he plays with our family dog, Abby. The wind is blowing softly causing stray hairs from my ponytail to tickle my face, and birds are chirping in the tree behind me probably wondering when I’m going to put out our daily bread crumbs.
I’m very lucky.
Today this is my office. I have it really good.
I can’t help but think about the blog I penned yesterday. Being authentic in a world of social media is more and more challenging. Allowing other people to know your weaknesses is more and more treacherous.
Lyrics play in my mind:
“Take me to church, I’ll worship like a dog at the shrine of your lies.
I’ll tell you my sins and you can sharpen your knife.
Offer me that deathless death,
Good God, let me give you my life.” – Hozier
I believe without a doubt there is a knife that sharpens with each sin you tell another person, with each and every imperfection you display for your world to see.
And if there isn’t a knife being sharpened with each weakness, why else would being authentic be so frightening?
As a teenager, I couldn’t have even begun to wrap my brain around the concept of authenticity. With age, comes the gift of time to get to know myself as well as cut away the strings that tied me down to worrying about what other people thought of me. With that same age, I now bear more freedom to just be. To be joyful. Be sorrowful. Be vulnerable. To be myself.
I had the pleasure of meeting the mother and brother of one of my clients last weekend and as a result, I witnessed a side of her I had not seen before. The vulnerable, unabashed playfulness with her brother, a smile and comfort that every daughter feels around her mother. I wish for the whole world to have people, have places that they feel freedom to just be.
As a photographer, in order to capture truly authentic emotion, genuine interaction and connection, I strive to create a safe place that makes raw, human nature shine. When I am successful at my craft, I am filled with such immense joy. So here I sit, on my rooftop deck, looking at the most incredible view, and surrounded by scrumptious vegetables I nurtured to fruition (though admittedly, some have already died due to my shortcomings and lack of a green thumb.) And I am fulfilled.
I wish for you, for me, and for us all, a place of playfulness and authenticity. A place where the only person who matters includes the imperfections of the perfect, beautiful, authentic you.
If you did not get a chance to read my last blog I urge you to. Check it out here.
