Rediscovering Myself

When I first went in-house after college, my biggest fear was losing my style. I remember long conversations with classmates about how working for a brand meant giving yourself over to their aesthetic. You trained your eye to see the way they wanted you to see. You became part of the machine. The risk, people warned, was that once you were molded into a company’s vision, it would be almost impossible to break free and make it as a freelancer.

That warning stayed with me. But at the time, I couldn’t afford to be precious about my creative integrity. I had student debt to pay off, a mother to prove wrong as she doubted my career choice from the beginning and an ache for independence. I wanted my own apartment, my own life. So when the offer came for an in-house photography role in Ohio, I took it.

At first, it felt like everything I had worked for. I wasn’t scrambling for clients. I wasn’t limited by equipment. I had access to athletes, even Olympians, and I felt ahead of my peers in terms of accomplishments. For a while, I convinced myself that was enough. But slowly, the cracks showed.

Ideas I poured myself into were watered down by too many hands. The concepts I pitched, the lighting I obsessed over, the stories I wanted to tell where all diluted until nothing felt like mine. The work paid the bills, but it no longer felt like a career I could claim as a legacy. My photos weren’t chosen because someone loved my style. They were chosen because I was on salary.

Outside of work, I wasn’t creating. And when I did, it was half-hearted. I didn’t have a network of photographers in Ohio to share ideas with, and the isolation was heavy. Even my edits felt like failures. By the end of my second year, I knew I couldn’t keep going.

So I sold everything in my apartment, packed my bags, and left. The plan was simple: spend a month at home with my family, then head to Texas for a fresh start. But being home set off an unexpected chain of events. Old friends pulled me into their projects, which led me to an APA event, then I found myself at a rodeo.

The first few attempts were discouraging. One organizer snapped at me on the phone, tired of photographers clamoring to shoot. Another never called me back. But finally, a small rodeo said yes, and I showed up with my camera.

That day changed everything.

I felt out of place at first. I wasn’t a cowgirl. I didn’t ride horses. My only connection to ranch life came from distant cousins. But the more I photographed, the more I felt something wake up in me. It was like I was sitting back in the stands at my very first rodeo, I watched a bronc rider burst out of the chute. He made the eight-second ride look as easy as slicing butter. And just like that, I was hooked.

I started to find my style again and reshaping it, strengthening it, editing with new tools that helped me see in ways I hadn’t before. The in-house world had nearly stripped me of my creative identity, but it also left me with skills I wouldn’t have learned otherwise. And now, in this new space, those skills fused with a vision I could finally call my own.

Back in Georgia, what was supposed to be just one month at home stretched into something more. I stayed an extra two weeks just to photograph that first Georgia rodeo. Then I told myself I’d find a new state, a new job. But every time I tried to leave, something pulled me back like a friend’s invitation, another APA event, another rodeo just around the corner. One more week became one more month, and now, over a year later, my Instagram bio still says, “Taking a pitstop down south… let’s collab.”

I’m still here in Georgia, chasing the little pockets of western lifestyle I find and waiting to see where this road takes me; maybe Texas, maybe Pennsylvania, maybe somewhere I haven’t yet imagined. The freelance world is an adventure to navigate, but I’ve found I love it so much more. I have the time to truly collaborate with brands I align with, to make new friends, and to open the door to new perspectives and experiences.

Now, I’m not just photographing the western lifestyle, I’m living it. I’ve started riding horses and learning to run barrels. If my younger self could see me now or even the version of me on my first day at that in-house job she’d probably laugh and say, “There’s no way.” But here I am, proving her wrong.

What I chase with my camera now is that feeling I had in the stands experiencing something for the first time. Nostalgia, wonder, discovery those are the emotions that shape my work. Photography, to me, is about preserving those moments so others can relive them, too.