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June 27, 2024
Making a Living or Making a Life: My Decision to Stop
I'm officially untangling income from my work and redefining what creating income means and looks like for me. It's not quitting or failure- it's a peaceful decision.
I'm sharing about a workshop I've been selected for that brought me to tears and involved me sharing a piece of writing I submitted that made me think: "wait, is this actually embarrassing?" but also helped me realized how I've been at this work since I was 12 years old.
Are you making a living AND/OR making a life? I want you to feel your answer.
NOTES from Bianca:
1:1 BREAKTHROUGH VISION SESSION
Sacred Seeing Membership for Creatives
https://www.instagram.com/biancaleamorra/
Check out my newest offer- REMOTE PHOTO SESSIONS for emerging artists.
Transcript
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And this is how I know I'm doing the right thing, is that I'm creating life around my truth and not trying to funnel my truth around a life.
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I'm not trying to squeeze in ounces of me around a job.
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I'm trying to maneuver a job around the whole of me.
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And that feels good.
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Help Me See is a podcast dedicated to the art of seeing.
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It's a space for the restless visionary with an insatiable desire to create the life and work you're meant for.
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My name is Bianca Lea Mora, and I'm a photographic artist, a mother, and a coach who's transformed my fear of loss into power, art, and philosophy.
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One of the scariest quotes I never want to say is, I wish I knew at the time, but I truly believe that we have the innate ability to bring our wise 2020 hindsight to our now.
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You can deeply experience your nostalgia now, while it's actually happening, with no regrets.
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All you have to do is see.
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In this show, we laugh, we cry, we get inspired, we overshare, we have life changing conversations around making meaning, self discovery, and shedding all the BS layers in order to reconnect to our own sacred vision.
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Seeing yourself is an essential key to living powerfully.
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You are the vessel, the lens that filters absolutely everything in your life.
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What are you filtering for? Whether it be conversations with fellow artists and visionaries, or my solo audio journal style introspective ramblings, each episode is meant to feel like an exhale, an unraveling of truth, a moment for you to be able to put your finger on something that you haven't been able to for far too long.
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Come exactly as you are.
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It's perfect.
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Honor your instincts.
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Let's uncover some of the most important things in our lives which all too often can slip out from our view.
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Let's commit to seeing and consciously creating what only you can in your one and only life.
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Let's dive in.
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Hello, hello and welcome to another episode of Help Me See.
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I am coming to you horizontally from my bed, my bed in my home, in the place that I live, the place that my children reside.
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I've been traveling quite a bit and when I'm traveling I really feel so I don't know.
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I guess ungrounded might be the word.
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It's hard for me to, um, Yeah, it's hard for me to feel grounded.
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And I'm rooting back into being at home whilst I can.
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I have another trip coming up in about a week and a half.
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And, um, I haven't really talked about it, and I'm very excited, and I'm nervous about it, and all of the things.
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And, it seems like now might be the perfect time.
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I'm, I'm coming to this pivot point.
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And, Let me back up.
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I was talking to one of my closest, closest, closest, closest, most beloved people, and she had asked me, you know, do you have a time limit on, like, how long you're gonna, you know, work at this or try this until you decide to put it down.
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and go with something else and try something different.
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And she was asking a lot of other questions around that topic.
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And I feel like it's when, let me preface this by saying this is a relationship that we can talk about literally anything and everything.
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always.
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But you know, like those questions, it doesn't matter who it is.
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Like, and you trust with the utmost reverence, like their intentions and all of that.
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So it has nothing to do with defensiveness from there, but you can feel when those questions like hurt and feel like, um, defensive and feel like triggered.
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And When I was answering those questions tonight, I felt very at peace.
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Very much like, yeah, there's no like getting off the train.
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There's no, there's nothing to stop because what I'm pursuing is The deepest belief of life and it's just different versions and modalities and different expressions of that.
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So, while I'm not saying that I'll always want this version of this same exact thing, I'm also saying at this point I can't.
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envision a world where I'm not continuing to create work in the way that I feel tethered to.
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That feels like success that feels like letting go of feeling like there's anything to prove, you know.
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I think choosing to live differently, choosing to make a left turn where you've always made a right turn, you know, go against what has been historically normal for you and your family and your loved ones.
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It's really vulnerable.
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It's like walking onto a football field naked.
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It's like, I'm choosing to do this because I have this deep knowing that no one else can feel but me, but I'm also very hyper aware of how this may look on the outside and all of the social constructs and norms and that, that I'm.
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Straying away from, and while that might sound like, what's, what's even the term that might sound like heroic or like bold and brave and daring and it does not really feel like that.
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I mean, at least in my experience, it doesn't feel like that.
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It feels like, um, It can feel like irresponsible.
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It can feel, um, like complete self doubt, fear, imposter syndrome, the whole thing.
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Especially when you have kids and other people to worry about that are under your care.
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But it's that following of the gut it's when you know something deep enough that you're willing to turn away from one of the chief, uh, needs of a human, which is belonging.
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as you've known and lived it thus far in your life.
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That's when you know it's right.
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I really believe that.
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And I think at this point in life, like a pivot, a pivot in how I'm approaching generating income versus how I'm thinking about the way I live my life really strips down everything to the nuts and bolts.
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The things that are non negotiable, like, the work that I want to create, the freedom that I want in my life, the time and space I know that I need, versus the negotiables, where I'm Choosing to spend time away for work that feels good or doesn't feel good or, where I am flexible and versatile with the work that I'm willing to engage in and not willing to engage in, et cetera.
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Jumping ahead, this workshop that I'm going to in a week and a half is one that I, you almost didn't apply to because I was just like, there's just no way.
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There's no way.
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And I was feeling so deflated and I felt like I'd spent so much time recently applying for things and spending more time than I wanted to doing that.
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But this was different.
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This was In offering from a photographer that I've been following since college.
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I absolutely adore and revere his work.
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His name is Alex Soth.
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And he is hosting a super small workshop, um, in his home.
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And there were applicants.
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from like all over the world.
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And I was one, I am one of 11 or 12 I think people from all over.
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And when I got the email that I was selected, my reaction, I was driving up from Nashville.
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This was months ago.
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I was driving up from Nashville with, uh, my friend that I was at that, uh, podcasters conference with.
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And I say that as if you remember, but if you listened to all the episodes, you would remember.
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Um, and I got it as I was going to a restroom at a gas station.
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And I came out.
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Shaking and crying.
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And my friend thought someone died.
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And for the next like 20 minutes in the car, it was us looking at each other in complete disbelief.
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And it was hilarious because she was like, I'm so confused.
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Why Are you so shocked? And this is someone that we are very much like in sync.
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We get, we get each other like, and it's like the first time where we're looking at each other.
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Like, I'm like, how are you not? Like, do you even understand? Like, and she's like, yeah, I understand.
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But why did you think that you didn't have a chance? And I'm like, well, why? Why? Do you, are you over, like, why are you overestimating my chance, like, um, when I applied for this, it was a kerfuffle, my, I had, for the first time ever, my hard drive crashed.
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Still haven't.
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Taking it in to get it repaired, but I had to select a certain number of images and then write a statement, not like an artist statement, but write about, what got me into art and what, how do I balance make my art and making a living? And.
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I gathered up images and I started like going through old pick time galleries and I was just very quickly selecting like a handful of highlights from each one and downloading it and then figured I'd go back and then make my selects from there.
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But I was already starting to notice like weird synchronicities.
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Like I was, I was picking like this exact same number of highlights from each gallery, which was so weird because I was doing it so fast and furious.
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And if you're at all into angel numbers, you know, I was like, Oh my gosh, this is weird.
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And Um, so then when it was time to write, I just locked in and stream of consciousness wrote, uh, and then that was the easy part writing.
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It was like super fast.
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But then I started like reading it and rereading it.
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And I was like, Oh man, you know, when you're, you know, you're being honest, but you're like, but is this embarrassing? Like, I know this is honest, and that's the point, right? And there's really nothing to change here, but is this embarrassing? Um, so I finally was like, Oh, just fuck it.
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Just send it.
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And I hit submit.
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And then I looked at the time, and it was 1 11, and I was like, Huh.
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That's real weird.
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So many synchronicities going on here.
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Um, you know what? I think I'm gonna read you the entry.
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Why not? Why not? Okay, I said, Hello, my name is Bianca.
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I was born in New Jersey and grew up mostly in Florida.
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My art making began abruptly after my first ever panic attack at around 12 years old when I first discovered death.
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Nothing bad had even happened, never experienced loss, just all of a sudden got my brain caught in a loop of nothingness as I tried to fall asleep one night.
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I just stared at the blackness of the ceiling and kept thinking nothing.
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Nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing.
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My favorite music, my favorite color, my parents, my baby sister, my dog.
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Eventually nothing would matter.
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I couldn't compute it, but I also couldn't look away.
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I couldn't unfeel it.
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I started making what I now see as a creepy little shrine.
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I would buy disposable cameras and take pictures of everyone and everything I loved and would buy wooden boxes and objects from Michael's craft store and collage paste the pictures all over.
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I needed to know that there was something physical to exist to show what I cared about for whoever was left if I couldn't.
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I had a really hard time expressing the intensity of what I felt always.
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I remember just hanging out with my mom or dad and feeling this lump in my throat rise, wanting to tell them I love you, but I just couldn't get it out.
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Almost as if saying it would somehow come out instead as I'm so afraid of you or I dying.
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So I would make stuff instead and hope that they read she must really love me and not want me to die because she made me this picture box between the lines.
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I'm cringing and giggling as I type.
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Then in high school, I was in a photography class.
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It was my favorite class, but it never occurred to me to be a serious possibility to pursue.
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I was in all advanced placement classes at the top of my class and had scholarship options to state, to state schools for good, for God knows what.
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I had no idea and felt cursed by my ability to do well in math.
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Laughter.
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I then came across Jim Goldberg's work, specifically Rich and Poor, in class one day and my brain absolutely fucking broke in the most glorious way.
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It was one of those before and after moments, never the same.
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Instantly, not an option to not do that.
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Photography became something else.
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It opened something in me that felt like freedom, peace, possibility, connection, basically everything that mattered.
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I took a hard left into a private art school and signed up for more debt than I could ever understand before I was even able to buy a beer and loved every minute of it.
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I immediately was drawn to multimedia practices.
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I did an independent study on death and combined photographic, video, audio works into an installation show.
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I followed that multimedia instinct and did my thesis on my family during an ugly divorce utilizing photography, home videos, and film stills as a way to explore the past, look for answers, and make the meaning that would help me feel okay and say things I couldn't say.
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I had always continued personal work alongside my full time jobs in the photo world, but it quickly became the center stage life force when the birth of my son and layoff, while still bleeding from childbirth, and the death of my deeply beloved dog all happened within a couple of weeks.
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Another Jim Goldberg moment of sorts.
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Couldn't unsee it or unfeel what happened and what I decided it all meant.
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Photography is a way to get to myself, sometimes the only way.
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It's processing, it's an active meditation, it's a visual representation of consciousness.
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The work I do now is a mix of intimate portraiture, family work, and creating education and programs and spaces that open up the possibility of redefining what visual language can be for a person.
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How it helps us live and bring our nostalgia to our now.
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Whether I'm creating the images or not, I want to broaden the conversation of seeing.
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What does it mean to see instead of look? How is this available to everyone? And what do we do with it? And what are we saying without needing to say anything? What life do you get to live by showing up for your vision? I'm forever perplexed by how photographs are everything to me and yet they are not the point at all.
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It's everything inside and around it.
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The ability to see the self through seeing what you're seeing within your photographs.
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The nothingness that scared the shit out of me at 12 years old has become the focal point of my life.
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I'm obsessed with creating within nothingness and showing how the nothingness is everything.
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Currently balancing making a living with this work means a lot of travel, which is tough with two small kids.
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It's crucial to me to keep this work sacred, so I protect my energy for the work by working for pay in another skill set if another person's vision is involved.
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I do this by freelance art direction for e commerce brands a week at a time, once a month or so, to bring in money.
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My client photography work is sporadic, but I'm okay with it.
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Working with clients that are a deeply right fit has been a huge part of keeping the work sacred.
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Work and pay feels like feast and famine.
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I feel like the work that is most important to me has me in a void.
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Like I'm floating in the horrifying blackness of my 12 year old self's room that night.
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I iterate and iterate and work and create alone in my basement and I never feel fully expressed.
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The craziest itch I cannot scratch.
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I feel like I'm not effectively communicating what I need to get out of myself and it drives me mad.
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So to see an offering that is specifically for deepening and disseminating the work that I felt so alone in for so long feels like a dream.
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Regardless of being chosen.
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Thank you.
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Thank you.
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Thank you for your incredibly inspiring, powerful work that I followed for so long.
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Thank you for the generosity of spirit and wisdom and care you put into the world with offerings such as this.
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Thank you.
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And then alongside the images I submitted, it says, tell us about the images.
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And I just said, The images I submitted are a mix of client and personal work.
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Each image selected is an honoring of a moment where my mind goes blissfully blank.
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And I just feel this everything.
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So when I take a beat and I reflect on that, and I reflect on where I am in life right now, I'm oddly comforted.,
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Yes, I've been doing this full time now for three years or so, and, aspiring to create a living off of being in this work, Full time all the time.
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But really, I've been doing this since I was 12 years old.
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Probably even before learning it from watching my dad with his camcorder.
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It is the most sincere thing about me, is this yearning, and letting go of it needing to be the thing that sustains me and my family financially feels better.
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It feels lighter.
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It feels like, although I might not have as much time doing the work, the time that I am doing the work will have so much more energy because I won't be coming to it as I claw myself from the depths of the ocean of all of the pressure and the stress that has been weighing on me for so long.
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So I in no way feel like I'm giving up.
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If anything, everything is exactly as it has been.
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I'm just looking to add part time flexible work around the offerings that I've already created, the ones that I'm already so deeply passionate about.
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And this is how I know I'm doing the right thing, is that I'm creating life around my truth and not trying to funnel my truth around a life.
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I'm not trying to squeeze in ounces of me around a job.
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I'm trying to maneuver a job around the whole of me.
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And that feels good.
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You know, I read some, a quote the other day, and it was like, Oh, Pretend you're in the ground.
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Pretend it's all over, like you died or whatever.
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Close your eyes, take a deep breath and then open them.
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And now live the rest of your life as you should, the right way and the way that you actually want to.
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And while it seems kind of morbid, it's so important.
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It's so important.
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What are you doing? What are you doing with your one and only life? Is there something that you really want to do that you're not doing? And if there is, it will have come to you in that moment, and probably sit in your stomach or on your chest.
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so much.
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I'm not sitting here preaching saying, do it.
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I'm doing it.
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Not at all.
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I'm coming out of the trenches here.
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This it's, it's been really, really, really, really difficult and also so affirming and transformative and, I've deepened so much into myself more in the last three years than in almost my whole life.
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Everything I offer, whether it's taking photos of you, helping you navigate your photo practice, helping you rethink it, doing an NLP breakthrough session, where we look at.
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Subconscious beliefs, patternings, old experiences, and consider how we want to be consciously living our lives.
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All of it comes from the same place.
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I really want to feel connected with myself.
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And the people around me.
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I really want to feel like I'm in my truth.
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And I really want you to feel like that too.
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Even if the vehicle for that happening is simply me airing my shit out on this podcast.
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And you're like, oh damn, me too.
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You know? I feel, I truly feel like whenever we feel closer to ourselves, we can be in the world in such a more powerful place, a beautiful place.
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And there are so many ways to get to yourself, to reconnect with yourself.
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And, For me, shocker, I will always return to your photo habit.
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What did you take pictures of today? Why? Why not look at the pictures you took and pretend that you didn't take them yourself, pretend it's someone else.
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What do you think about that person that took those photos in their life? And their heart.
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And what they value.
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Your photographs are a way to get to yourself.
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And to be in your life.
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Not on the surface of it.
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Thank you for being with me tonight.
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I'm about to end this recording.
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Go to bed.
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And then wake up in the morning to upload it.
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If you are wanting to chat, if you are looking for support, but don't really know where to start, but just know that you feel seen and connected in this space.
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Feel free to send me a DM or an email.
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I have offerings around photo practice specifically, I have freebies, I have a membership, and I have coaching, bespoke coaching packages where we can go back and forth and talk about all the things in life and all of The horrendous, beautiful, chaotic, peaceful goodness that comes with all of it.
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Check out the show notes for a few links to learn more about some of these offerings and um, That's all I have for you today.
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Thank you for being here, thank you for listening and I will catch you next time.
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This has been an Awkward Sage Production.
00:00:01,1.368683772162E-11 --> 00:00:12,185.001
And this is how I know I'm doing the right thing, is that I'm creating life around my truth and not trying to funnel my truth around a life.
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I'm not trying to squeeze in ounces of me around a job.
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I'm trying to maneuver a job around the whole of me.
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And that feels good.
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Help Me See is a podcast dedicated to the art of seeing.
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It's a space for the restless visionary with an insatiable desire to create the life and work you're meant for.
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My name is Bianca Lea Mora, and I'm a photographic artist, a mother, and a coach who's transformed my fear of loss into power, art, and philosophy.
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One of the scariest quotes I never want to say is, I wish I knew at the time, but I truly believe that we have the innate ability to bring our wise 2020 hindsight to our now.
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You can deeply experience your nostalgia now, while it's actually happening, with no regrets.
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All you have to do is see.
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In this show, we laugh, we cry, we get inspired, we overshare, we have life changing conversations around making meaning, self discovery, and shedding all the BS layers in order to reconnect to our own sacred vision.
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Seeing yourself is an essential key to living powerfully.
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You are the vessel, the lens that filters absolutely everything in your life.
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What are you filtering for? Whether it be conversations with fellow artists and visionaries, or my solo audio journal style introspective ramblings, each episode is meant to feel like an exhale, an unraveling of truth, a moment for you to be able to put your finger on something that you haven't been able to for far too long.
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Come exactly as you are.
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It's perfect.
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Honor your instincts.
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Let's uncover some of the most important things in our lives which all too often can slip out from our view.
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Let's commit to seeing and consciously creating what only you can in your one and only life.
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Let's dive in.
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Hello, hello and welcome to another episode of Help Me See.
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I am coming to you horizontally from my bed, my bed in my home, in the place that I live, the place that my children reside.
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I've been traveling quite a bit and when I'm traveling I really feel so I don't know.
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I guess ungrounded might be the word.
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It's hard for me to, um, Yeah, it's hard for me to feel grounded.
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And I'm rooting back into being at home whilst I can.
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I have another trip coming up in about a week and a half.
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And, um, I haven't really talked about it, and I'm very excited, and I'm nervous about it, and all of the things.
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And, it seems like now might be the perfect time.
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I'm, I'm coming to this pivot point.
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And, Let me back up.
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I was talking to one of my closest, closest, closest, closest, most beloved people, and she had asked me, you know, do you have a time limit on, like, how long you're gonna, you know, work at this or try this until you decide to put it down.
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and go with something else and try something different.
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And she was asking a lot of other questions around that topic.
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And I feel like it's when, let me preface this by saying this is a relationship that we can talk about literally anything and everything.
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always.
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But you know, like those questions, it doesn't matter who it is.
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Like, and you trust with the utmost reverence, like their intentions and all of that.
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So it has nothing to do with defensiveness from there, but you can feel when those questions like hurt and feel like, um, defensive and feel like triggered.
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And When I was answering those questions tonight, I felt very at peace.
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Very much like, yeah, there's no like getting off the train.
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There's no, there's nothing to stop because what I'm pursuing is The deepest belief of life and it's just different versions and modalities and different expressions of that.
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So, while I'm not saying that I'll always want this version of this same exact thing, I'm also saying at this point I can't.
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envision a world where I'm not continuing to create work in the way that I feel tethered to.
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That feels like success that feels like letting go of feeling like there's anything to prove, you know.
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I think choosing to live differently, choosing to make a left turn where you've always made a right turn, you know, go against what has been historically normal for you and your family and your loved ones.
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It's really vulnerable.
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It's like walking onto a football field naked.
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It's like, I'm choosing to do this because I have this deep knowing that no one else can feel but me, but I'm also very hyper aware of how this may look on the outside and all of the social constructs and norms and that, that I'm.
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Straying away from, and while that might sound like, what's, what's even the term that might sound like heroic or like bold and brave and daring and it does not really feel like that.
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I mean, at least in my experience, it doesn't feel like that.
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It feels like, um, It can feel like irresponsible.
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It can feel, um, like complete self doubt, fear, imposter syndrome, the whole thing.
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Especially when you have kids and other people to worry about that are under your care.
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But it's that following of the gut it's when you know something deep enough that you're willing to turn away from one of the chief, uh, needs of a human, which is belonging.
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as you've known and lived it thus far in your life.
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That's when you know it's right.
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I really believe that.
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And I think at this point in life, like a pivot, a pivot in how I'm approaching generating income versus how I'm thinking about the way I live my life really strips down everything to the nuts and bolts.
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The things that are non negotiable, like, the work that I want to create, the freedom that I want in my life, the time and space I know that I need, versus the negotiables, where I'm Choosing to spend time away for work that feels good or doesn't feel good or, where I am flexible and versatile with the work that I'm willing to engage in and not willing to engage in, et cetera.
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Jumping ahead, this workshop that I'm going to in a week and a half is one that I, you almost didn't apply to because I was just like, there's just no way.
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There's no way.
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And I was feeling so deflated and I felt like I'd spent so much time recently applying for things and spending more time than I wanted to doing that.
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But this was different.
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This was In offering from a photographer that I've been following since college.
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I absolutely adore and revere his work.
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His name is Alex Soth.
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And he is hosting a super small workshop, um, in his home.
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And there were applicants.
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from like all over the world.
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And I was one, I am one of 11 or 12 I think people from all over.
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And when I got the email that I was selected, my reaction, I was driving up from Nashville.
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This was months ago.
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I was driving up from Nashville with, uh, my friend that I was at that, uh, podcasters conference with.
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And I say that as if you remember, but if you listened to all the episodes, you would remember.
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Um, and I got it as I was going to a restroom at a gas station.
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And I came out.
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Shaking and crying.
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And my friend thought someone died.
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And for the next like 20 minutes in the car, it was us looking at each other in complete disbelief.
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And it was hilarious because she was like, I'm so confused.
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Why Are you so shocked? And this is someone that we are very much like in sync.
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We get, we get each other like, and it's like the first time where we're looking at each other.
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Like, I'm like, how are you not? Like, do you even understand? Like, and she's like, yeah, I understand.
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But why did you think that you didn't have a chance? And I'm like, well, why? Why? Do you, are you over, like, why are you overestimating my chance, like, um, when I applied for this, it was a kerfuffle, my, I had, for the first time ever, my hard drive crashed.
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Still haven't.
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Taking it in to get it repaired, but I had to select a certain number of images and then write a statement, not like an artist statement, but write about, what got me into art and what, how do I balance make my art and making a living? And.
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I gathered up images and I started like going through old pick time galleries and I was just very quickly selecting like a handful of highlights from each one and downloading it and then figured I'd go back and then make my selects from there.
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But I was already starting to notice like weird synchronicities.
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Like I was, I was picking like this exact same number of highlights from each gallery, which was so weird because I was doing it so fast and furious.
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And if you're at all into angel numbers, you know, I was like, Oh my gosh, this is weird.
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And Um, so then when it was time to write, I just locked in and stream of consciousness wrote, uh, and then that was the easy part writing.
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It was like super fast.
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But then I started like reading it and rereading it.
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And I was like, Oh man, you know, when you're, you know, you're being honest, but you're like, but is this embarrassing? Like, I know this is honest, and that's the point, right? And there's really nothing to change here, but is this embarrassing? Um, so I finally was like, Oh, just fuck it.
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Just send it.
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And I hit submit.
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And then I looked at the time, and it was 1 11, and I was like, Huh.
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That's real weird.
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So many synchronicities going on here.
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Um, you know what? I think I'm gonna read you the entry.
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Why not? Why not? Okay, I said, Hello, my name is Bianca.
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I was born in New Jersey and grew up mostly in Florida.
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My art making began abruptly after my first ever panic attack at around 12 years old when I first discovered death.
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Nothing bad had even happened, never experienced loss, just all of a sudden got my brain caught in a loop of nothingness as I tried to fall asleep one night.
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I just stared at the blackness of the ceiling and kept thinking nothing.
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Nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing.
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My favorite music, my favorite color, my parents, my baby sister, my dog.
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Eventually nothing would matter.
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I couldn't compute it, but I also couldn't look away.
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I couldn't unfeel it.
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I started making what I now see as a creepy little shrine.
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I would buy disposable cameras and take pictures of everyone and everything I loved and would buy wooden boxes and objects from Michael's craft store and collage paste the pictures all over.
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I needed to know that there was something physical to exist to show what I cared about for whoever was left if I couldn't.
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I had a really hard time expressing the intensity of what I felt always.
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I remember just hanging out with my mom or dad and feeling this lump in my throat rise, wanting to tell them I love you, but I just couldn't get it out.
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Almost as if saying it would somehow come out instead as I'm so afraid of you or I dying.
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So I would make stuff instead and hope that they read she must really love me and not want me to die because she made me this picture box between the lines.
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I'm cringing and giggling as I type.
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Then in high school, I was in a photography class.
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It was my favorite class, but it never occurred to me to be a serious possibility to pursue.
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I was in all advanced placement classes at the top of my class and had scholarship options to state, to state schools for good, for God knows what.
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I had no idea and felt cursed by my ability to do well in math.
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Laughter.
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I then came across Jim Goldberg's work, specifically Rich and Poor, in class one day and my brain absolutely fucking broke in the most glorious way.
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It was one of those before and after moments, never the same.
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Instantly, not an option to not do that.
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Photography became something else.
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It opened something in me that felt like freedom, peace, possibility, connection, basically everything that mattered.
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I took a hard left into a private art school and signed up for more debt than I could ever understand before I was even able to buy a beer and loved every minute of it.
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I immediately was drawn to multimedia practices.
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I did an independent study on death and combined photographic, video, audio works into an installation show.
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I followed that multimedia instinct and did my thesis on my family during an ugly divorce utilizing photography, home videos, and film stills as a way to explore the past, look for answers, and make the meaning that would help me feel okay and say things I couldn't say.
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I had always continued personal work alongside my full time jobs in the photo world, but it quickly became the center stage life force when the birth of my son and layoff, while still bleeding from childbirth, and the death of my deeply beloved dog all happened within a couple of weeks.
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Another Jim Goldberg moment of sorts.
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Couldn't unsee it or unfeel what happened and what I decided it all meant.
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Photography is a way to get to myself, sometimes the only way.
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It's processing, it's an active meditation, it's a visual representation of consciousness.
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The work I do now is a mix of intimate portraiture, family work, and creating education and programs and spaces that open up the possibility of redefining what visual language can be for a person.
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How it helps us live and bring our nostalgia to our now.
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Whether I'm creating the images or not, I want to broaden the conversation of seeing.
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What does it mean to see instead of look? How is this available to everyone? And what do we do with it? And what are we saying without needing to say anything? What life do you get to live by showing up for your vision? I'm forever perplexed by how photographs are everything to me and yet they are not the point at all.
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It's everything inside and around it.
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The ability to see the self through seeing what you're seeing within your photographs.
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The nothingness that scared the shit out of me at 12 years old has become the focal point of my life.
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I'm obsessed with creating within nothingness and showing how the nothingness is everything.
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Currently balancing making a living with this work means a lot of travel, which is tough with two small kids.
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It's crucial to me to keep this work sacred, so I protect my energy for the work by working for pay in another skill set if another person's vision is involved.
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I do this by freelance art direction for e commerce brands a week at a time, once a month or so, to bring in money.
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My client photography work is sporadic, but I'm okay with it.
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Working with clients that are a deeply right fit has been a huge part of keeping the work sacred.
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Work and pay feels like feast and famine.
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I feel like the work that is most important to me has me in a void.
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Like I'm floating in the horrifying blackness of my 12 year old self's room that night.
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I iterate and iterate and work and create alone in my basement and I never feel fully expressed.
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The craziest itch I cannot scratch.
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I feel like I'm not effectively communicating what I need to get out of myself and it drives me mad.
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So to see an offering that is specifically for deepening and disseminating the work that I felt so alone in for so long feels like a dream.
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Regardless of being chosen.
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Thank you.
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Thank you.
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Thank you for your incredibly inspiring, powerful work that I followed for so long.
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Thank you for the generosity of spirit and wisdom and care you put into the world with offerings such as this.
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Thank you.
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And then alongside the images I submitted, it says, tell us about the images.
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And I just said, The images I submitted are a mix of client and personal work.
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Each image selected is an honoring of a moment where my mind goes blissfully blank.
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And I just feel this everything.
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So when I take a beat and I reflect on that, and I reflect on where I am in life right now, I'm oddly comforted.,
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Yes, I've been doing this full time now for three years or so, and, aspiring to create a living off of being in this work, Full time all the time.
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But really, I've been doing this since I was 12 years old.
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Probably even before learning it from watching my dad with his camcorder.
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It is the most sincere thing about me, is this yearning, and letting go of it needing to be the thing that sustains me and my family financially feels better.
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It feels lighter.
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It feels like, although I might not have as much time doing the work, the time that I am doing the work will have so much more energy because I won't be coming to it as I claw myself from the depths of the ocean of all of the pressure and the stress that has been weighing on me for so long.
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So I in no way feel like I'm giving up.
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If anything, everything is exactly as it has been.
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I'm just looking to add part time flexible work around the offerings that I've already created, the ones that I'm already so deeply passionate about.
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And this is how I know I'm doing the right thing, is that I'm creating life around my truth and not trying to funnel my truth around a life.
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I'm not trying to squeeze in ounces of me around a job.
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I'm trying to maneuver a job around the whole of me.
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And that feels good.
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You know, I read some, a quote the other day, and it was like, Oh, Pretend you're in the ground.
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Pretend it's all over, like you died or whatever.
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Close your eyes, take a deep breath and then open them.
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And now live the rest of your life as you should, the right way and the way that you actually want to.
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And while it seems kind of morbid, it's so important.
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It's so important.
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What are you doing? What are you doing with your one and only life? Is there something that you really want to do that you're not doing? And if there is, it will have come to you in that moment, and probably sit in your stomach or on your chest.
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so much.
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I'm not sitting here preaching saying, do it.
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I'm doing it.
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Not at all.
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I'm coming out of the trenches here.
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This it's, it's been really, really, really, really difficult and also so affirming and transformative and, I've deepened so much into myself more in the last three years than in almost my whole life.
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Everything I offer, whether it's taking photos of you, helping you navigate your photo practice, helping you rethink it, doing an NLP breakthrough session, where we look at.
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Subconscious beliefs, patternings, old experiences, and consider how we want to be consciously living our lives.
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All of it comes from the same place.
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I really want to feel connected with myself.
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And the people around me.
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I really want to feel like I'm in my truth.
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And I really want you to feel like that too.
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Even if the vehicle for that happening is simply me airing my shit out on this podcast.
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And you're like, oh damn, me too.
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You know? I feel, I truly feel like whenever we feel closer to ourselves, we can be in the world in such a more powerful place, a beautiful place.
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And there are so many ways to get to yourself, to reconnect with yourself.
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And, For me, shocker, I will always return to your photo habit.
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What did you take pictures of today? Why? Why not look at the pictures you took and pretend that you didn't take them yourself, pretend it's someone else.
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What do you think about that person that took those photos in their life? And their heart.
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And what they value.
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Your photographs are a way to get to yourself.
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And to be in your life.
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Not on the surface of it.
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Thank you for being with me tonight.
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I'm about to end this recording.
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Go to bed.
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And then wake up in the morning to upload it.
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If you are wanting to chat, if you are looking for support, but don't really know where to start, but just know that you feel seen and connected in this space.
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Feel free to send me a DM or an email.
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I have offerings around photo practice specifically, I have freebies, I have a membership, and I have coaching, bespoke coaching packages where we can go back and forth and talk about all the things in life and all of The horrendous, beautiful, chaotic, peaceful goodness that comes with all of it.
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Check out the show notes for a few links to learn more about some of these offerings and um, That's all I have for you today.
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Thank you for being here, thank you for listening and I will catch you next time.
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This has been an Awkward Sage Production.
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