An incredible amount of challenge exists for photographers and business owners when it comes to managing their mental health. In this current series, I am opening up the conversation with fellow creatives regarding the correlation between our mental health and our businesses. Today’s guest is Taylor Fisher, a photographer and coach who is sharing the severe impact that burnout had on her life, and the changes she implemented to prioritize her health moving forward.
The Focused Photographers Podcast was created based on the idea that the most incredible tool for learning is a deep dive into any given topic from multiple perspectives. Join us every other week as we explore important topics, with host Daniel Moyer and a variety of guests offering different perspectives! Make sure you’ve hit that follow or subscribe button on your favorite podcast player to get notified each week as we air new episodes!
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REVIEW THE SHOW NOTES:
Prioritize your mental health or your burnout will prioritize it for you (4:10)
The decision to sign up for therapy (13:19)
There is no work/life balance (22:44)
Additional challenges for female photographers (27:27)
Making hay while the sun shines (34:50)
Steps for taking care of your mental health (38:27)
Your business will fill your calendar if you don’t (48:22)
Do what makes you feel empowered in your business (56:04)
What Taylor does for re-creation (1:01:17)
Connect with Taylor Fisher (1:03:50)
MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:
CONNECT WITH TAYLOR FISHER
CONNECT WITH DANIEL MOYER
Website: WWW.DANIELMOYERPHOTOGRAPHY.COM
Wedding Instagram: @DANIELMOYERPHOTO
Business Instagram: @GETFOCUSEDPHOTOGRAPHERS
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Review the Transcript:
Dan Moyer
Hey friends, I’m Dan Moyer and welcome to the focus photographers podcast where photographers gather. When I started this podcast and this whole educational platform of focus photographers, it was to focus on the missing curriculum of photography education, aside from the pricing presets and sales that we so regularly see in education in our industry. That’s why we’re talking about some real stuff. This is the second episode in a podcast series on photographers and mental health, we are all going through something or we will go through something at some point, I’ve been a wedding photographer for over 13 years, and burnout is more of a conversation now than it ever has been before. And I think that’s why this series on mental health and photographers is so important to D stigmatize the conversations we have around loneliness as a wedding Carver, or, you know, being too hard on yourself or being overwhelmed or burnout or frustrated or tired all the time. That’s why I think these episodes are important. So as you’re listening to these episodes, know that, you know, people are talking about some real things, some real issues that they have or have gone through, and they might be trigger warnings for you. These podcasts are the story of people dealing with serious stuff in their lives. And I approach these conversations with, you know, light hearted curiosity, spontaneity and levity, that my greatest hope is that these conversations will give you some sort of hope, lift you up and encourage you. But I have to remind you that I’m not a therapist, and neither is any of my guests. These episodes are not a substitute for therapy, there is zero substitute for talking with someone whose only job is to listen to you with an open heart and an open mind and help get you through whatever you’re going through. Do you know how I know I needed help when I couldn’t shake my negative thoughts. That’s it, I would just feel this cloud regularly. And without warning, it would just bring me into this negative thoughts cycle. And therapy has done wonders for me over the last two years, and might do you some good too, if you need it. So if you need someone to talk to call or text 988 If you’re in the United States, okay, so let’s get to the show. My guest today is such a wonderful human. This is her second time back on the podcast, and you have to watch out because her and I can talk for hours. She’s one of my favorite people that I’ve never met. And yet we talked so long and so regular. She’s a Colorado based wedding photographer and a coach for photographers. One of her students said it best when they said Taylor is the most authentic, genuine and wonderful person she is setting the standard for how we should treat one another run legit businesses, how to treat our clients and it’s making the world a better place because of that. So thank you friends, please welcome my good friend, Taylor Fisher.
Dan Moyer
So, Taylor, here we are, we’re, we’ve already been talking for like, a half hour already, cuz this is what happens with us. And we’re both just like, Alright, let’s do hop in here. And let’s let’s start recording. Because we’ve been on this outside of this podcast, you and I have been talking sort of about mental health in the in the photographer space, and how there’s a lot of stuff that photographers go through, and how it can be lonely and how it can be, you know, just very difficult when you know you’re at odds with everybody’s schedule, right, we work nights and weekends, everybody else has a nine to FiVER, we want to see friends but we don’t get to and then like relationships go and then your mental health goes and then your you’ve your burnout and all this stuff. And so now we’re officially putting it to tape one of our conversations about you know, how, how we’ve both been affected by, you know, what it’s like to work as a wedding photographer and a photographer and, and talk about our journey. So I’m glad you’re here.
Taylor Fisher
Me too. And I just have to say Dan, I love your passion. Like you’re passionate about mental health and the and the stories that you choose to share, which I’m sure there’s a million others that don’t make the cut for social media, whether it’s the the intimacy, the vulnerability, the experience itself, but I just really appreciate your passion in this in this realm and that we can talk so candidly about it makes me it just makes me so happy.
Dan Moyer
There’s this I had another guest on Dave moss and he said this thing that’s been sticking with me for like the last couple of weeks and so I talked with him and he said you got to prioritize your mental health or your burnout will prioritize it for you. And it’s right like it’s rare that like like something just like cuts through that like you haven’t heard before or something and yeah, it just like hits me so why did that hit you?
Taylor Fisher
Well, because it the burnout did prioritize it for me. In 2021 I got diagnosed with UV itis and for most people don’t know what UV itis is, but I will tell you, it is essentially I went blind in my right eye and next to childbirth. Yeah, next to childbirth. It was the most excruciating ly painful thing I’ve ever gone through my UV itis. Yeah, it can be indicative of an underlying autoimmune disease. It wasn’t in the doctor who told me that I was like, I don’t have an autoimmune disease. And he was just he was not the best doctor. He was actually really unkind and very unprofessional. But he was the best in the state. And when you have UV itis, you can’t just go to an A normal eye doctor, you have to go to UVA to specialist. And so I knew in my heart of hearts that this was burnout. And it was stress because it flared up while I was recording my course for photographers, I found out. Yeah, and I had found out that morning that my grandmother had passed away. So my mom called me and said, Your grandmother passed away the funerals next week. Can you be home? And I was like, Yes, I have to shoot a wedding. First, I have to shoot a wedding today. And tomorrow, I have to record I have to finish creating, recording and publish three episodes. And so and we were just doing like, I wasn’t just doing like face to camera on my laptop. Like I had a full production with like light and my DSLR and I was getting miked up. And so that all happened within a few days. It was my first time leaving my family after COVID. I had two very small kids. I just finished nursing my youngest. And so I was like, of course, the UVI just showed up. Of course it showed up. I was at my breaking point. Mentally, I was burned out I hadn’t prioritized my mental health and my physical health. It felt like I had scratched my I thought when I pulled my contact out, Oh, I must have scratched my eye and then it turned bloodshot, and then my vision went away. And so um, yeah, my burnout. That was the first sign that things were not okay. And the pace that I was going was not okay. And that that was exactly two years ago. Oh my gosh, it might have been April 12 that that happened? Yeah, you I just got goosebumps. Because that date always sticks out to me. I’m gonna have to I’m gonna Google it because I can I can pinpoint the exact day that I went to my cousin and is actually an eye doctor. I was out of state I was I was in West Virginia for my grandmother’s funeral. And I went to my cousin and was like, I don’t know what’s happening. I think I scratched my eye. And she was like, oh, no, you’re not getting on a plane to go home and a couple of days until you see a specialist. Because the if you don’t take care of that you can go blind. And so I was like, okay, universe, God, I get it. Like the universe doesn’t need a blind photographer. I’ll figure this out. Now, can we
Dan Moyer
go back, like for a hot second to this thing where it’s like, Alright, I am. My grandmother dies. And it’s like, we have to wait to finish the stuff for our clients first, before we can process that right. And surely there are definitely times and I know, photographers out there have said, You know what, I need to have somebody else step in because I’m not in the brain space. But I feel like more often than not more photographers would be like, Okay, I’m just gonna compartmentalize that for a minute, because I’ve got this wedding today or tomorrow. And it’s like, alright, I’ll deal with that after this wedding.
Taylor Fisher
Yeah, it was chaos, right? I mean, it will. And I think a lot of photographers have that fear of, what if something happens to somebody that I love, and I’m on my way to a wedding and like that happened. And again, it was it was no surprise that my body manifested and with with autoimmune diseases, it attacked like, it’s essentially your body’s just attacking something inside of you. And for me, it was my right eye. And so, yeah, I thought my mom called me on. I think it was a Friday. No, it was a Saturday morning, and I had a wedding that afternoon. And I said, Okay, I will. And you’re absolutely right. And I had to compartmentalize it. I knew my grandmother, like she had had Alzheimer’s for almost 15 years. I think she had, yeah, she lived a long time. So it wasn’t totally out of left field. But I did not get to process in that moment. I kind of moved into where most people move into like, Okay, I gotta buy tickets. I gotta pack I gotta wrap up work. I got to do this. And this and but also on that note, Mike and I it was 2018. We found out Yeah, yeah. So Mike’s Mike’s my, my husband, we shoot together. We he had to take our dog to the vet right before a wedding and called me and I was like, Hey, how’s How’s copper doing? And he started crying. And I was like, what happened? And he said, he’s got cancer, and he’s not going to live much longer. He was our golden retriever. And like, we literally were he was coming back to the house and we were leaving for a wedding. We had just found out our dog had cancer. He was not going to live much longer and so even people who like I mean it was just it was so hard to have to compartmentalize grief. And I’m sure we’ll get into this but in our in our industry, there is no days off. You don’t call off. You don’t get to say hey, I’m not going to be in today. And not only can you not call off, you don’t get to showcase that part of you when you show up at these events whether it’s you know, a wedding and engagement shoot. Oh my gosh, I can’t believe I left this out. So oh My gosh, 2016 Mike was having stomach pains. And he was like, I don’t know what this is, I think I have a stomach bug. And so I said, One One afternoon, I said, we’re just gonna go to the doctor and see what happens. So the doctor was left. And he said, Go, right. And I was like, Where are we going, right? That’s the ER, hospital. And he was like, he said, I’m either constipated or something’s really wrong. And I really hope it’s not constipation, but I really hope it’s not something wrong. And we get to the ER, and he has a pen, he has appendicitis. And the doctor came in and said, All right, buddy, you’re getting your app. And you’re, you’re getting your appointment today. And we were just in shock. And Mike was like, what do we do? And I said, I have an engagement shoot. And normally, I could cancel that. But they were driving three hours. And this was like the last 20 minutes of their drive. So I called my my in laws, and I’m just I’m sobbing. And I said, you have to get here. Well, they live two and a half hours away. So they started driving, my couple shows up. And I said I need to be transparent with you. Mike’s in the hospital, he’s going in for an appendectomy, I’m going to be leaving as soon as this is over. And they start the bride started sobbing because she had just found out that morning that her father had cancer. And I was like, why are we here? And there was right, but there was this pressure for them to show up. They didn’t want to cancel on me. I didn’t want to cancel on them at the last possible second after a three hour drive. And so we were just all crying together and like laughing like laugh crying. We were like, This is so weird. Why didn’t somebody just make the call? Luckily, I got back to the hospital before my got out of surgery. But that was our first surgery together as a couple. And I still have guilt associated around that. But that’s just one piece of it, right? I mean, God forbid, there’s a car accident, or when when my kids had COVID, I still had to go to a wedding. I mean, luckily, Mike was able to stay with them. But for a mom to not be able to be with her sick kids. Sometimes it’s a break. And sometimes it’s like, I just really want to be with my kids right now and nurture them. But I can’t and I can’t call off. So right. I’m sure that’s like setting a really exciting tone for this goal. But it’s just the reality of this line of work.
Dan Moyer
But that is that like that is the universal like thing that so many of us are dealing with that. You know, it’s yes, it’s very, very difficult. And it’s super hard that it’s partly the fact that we have this difficulty where, you know, if something really bad happens, we have to still go to our job because it’s contracted a year out or whatever. But it’s also very difficult, because on top of that, we still have to put on the face that everything is okay, right, that we can’t like dump into the middle. That’s that’s like we don’t there’s this human part of us that’s denied when we head into it, because we don’t want to be the one who affects this, this couple’s perfect day, right? Like, we don’t want to be the one that dumps into the middle and throws off the, you know, their their groove. You know, I’m saying,
Taylor Fisher
right, yeah, so one of the things that I got a therapist in 2021 after all my stuff. So finally like, Okay, I need a therapist, I need somebody to process this.
Dan Moyer
Wait, what before you go into that? What was the catalyst for you? Because I think, I don’t think most of us are just like, Oh, I’m gonna go to therapy. I think there’s something that’s like, what was that for you?
Taylor Fisher
Yeah, that’s a great question, Dan. The catalyst was I did not want to go on antidepressants. I’ve, I feel strongly about them for myself or other people, you do what works for you. For myself, I did not want to go down that route. I also have two kids. And so I was seeing triggers, moment to moment. It wasn’t like once a day, I lost my cool. It was all day long every day I was being triggered. And so I finally thought, Okay, well, my options are going on antidepressants and numb out because that’s how my body responded to them just totally numb out. Or I can try some alternatives before I you know, flirt with that. And so I found a therapist, and I just adore her and I set the tone with telling her I really want to have a therapist who understands this creative dilemma like working in this industry. I said, you don’t have to be a photographer to understand it. And I saw I kind of laid the foundation and she said okay, so what I’m hearing is there you are in a line of work where there is zero room for error, much like a surgeon or a doctor, there is zero room for error. And oh my gosh, how did she say it? She said there’s zero room for error. And you have to show up in fairytale land at 100% and deny all your basic needs. Yeah. And at this point in my career, I had been pregnant through two To wedding seasons, and so I’m sure at least one of your listeners, if not more, is going to be a pregnant woman who’s like, how do I handle this? And that was really stressful because oh my gosh, the amount of pain that I was in and, and still having to show up and there were times where I just wanted to sit for two minutes and prop my feet up. And then they’re like, hey, ceremonies happening. Where’s where’s the photographer?
Dan Moyer
But yeah, all the thing I know, I’m like, I can’t feel
Taylor Fisher
my feet. I can’t feel my legs. If somebody wheeled me in, and so, but then there was that fear. Like, as a first time mom, I don’t know, when I’m gonna go into labor. I don’t know if it’s going to be moments before the ceremony. I don’t know if it’s going to be the night before. I don’t know if it’s going to be after wedding season. And you you can’t plan for that. Like we tried to we got very lucky. Both of our boys were born in December, but not everybody has that luxury of saying, Okay, I want to be pregnant now. And now we can’t wait. And so there was that dilemma of how many? How many couples like is it the whole last trimester? We tell them? Hey, this is a possibility. And so we were planning for every possible scenario. But then there was the question of like, if I do go into labor, do I leave in Mike’s days? Or do we both leave? Does he potentially miss the birth of our son? Like, how does this look and so weird conversations that people who are not in this world don’t have to have and don’t understand? Because it was it was very uncomfortable to tell a couple. Hey, we just found out we’re pregnant. Yay. We might not be able to be at your wedding. We just need to let you know that. And so most of our couples thankfully, we have really amazing people we work with they were all understanding but who knows gametime decision, I started going into labor like on the dance floor. Who knows how people are going to respond. But so yeah, there’s Yeah, it was it was a weird chapter before I wouldn’t hashtag boundaries.
Dan Moyer
Yeah. When? Before I learned hashtag boundaries. Oh, god, there’s yeah, there’s this catalyst. I think for all of us that it’s like if you decide to go to therapy, right, like therapy, I think works wonders for a lot of people I liken it to like, right, well, you’re, you’re you got a leaky pipe, it’s like, well, you just call a plumber, right? Oh, your like, car breaks down, like you just call a mechanic. Right? You don’t feel bad about that. You don’t feel weird about it. We get there’s this weird thing that happens, where it’s like, oh, you know, my emotions kind of aren’t working. It’s like, Well, who do you call about that? You call therapists like, well, we’re gonna call therapists are calling therapists. Right? Like, oh, they don’t need that. It’s like, why is that? Like, why do we feel like our stuff, our house, our car is worth more than like, just having somebody do a little tune up, right? And I keep going to the same guy. I’ve been going to him for two years. And he is sober for 30 years, he was incarcerated when he was younger, sober for 30 years, like just just somebody who committed to like, the the new, this new lifestyle committed to like being sober, committed to, you know, bettering his life and then just stuck to it. And it’s someone who I can admire, but like, there’s days where like, I’m like, do I really need to continue going here? And it’s like, yeah, you do. Because, like, I want this guy to see me on my good days at one on like, peak Dan, and I’m doing great. And then he knows my history when, you know, a breakdown happens when when I really need like, Hey, man, like, this is what triggered me this is what really upset me, this is what happened with my kids and like, and I’m like, right on this edge of just like screaming, and I turn around and screen to my child in the car. Like, something happened. Three, you know, before that, where I shouldn’t have gotten to that point, how do I get there how to write it’s like, his whole job is just to sit there and listen to me and, and help me and like, and sometimes just listen without saying anything, right? Yeah. I don’t know. That was like the big thing. And the biggest trigger or the biggest reason why I knew I needed to go was because I couldn’t just stop the negative thoughts have always been like, oh, oh, yeah, it’s all there. Like, it’s just, especially when kids came into it. And, and there’s all this stuff that has been packed away. And I realized, like, I couldn’t stop the negative thoughts. And then, and then I would get upset about that. I couldn’t stop them. And then I’d take a deep breath and like, trust off them. And it would just be this whole, like, negative shit spiral part of my language. And it’s like, I couldn’t get out of it. Right. And that’s what I knew. I was like, Alright, I need to see somebody.
Taylor Fisher
That’s a really great point, Dan, because I’ve got like a whole shelf dedicated to Brene. Brown. Oh, I felt that way too. So it was it was yeah, having kids and I would say kids were probably the major catalysts because ain’t nobody in your life can show you all the things you don’t love about yourself. Then a child whose like button, push it button, push it like what are you going to do about it? Yes. And so, so yeah, I was having those thoughts too. And I wasn’t suicidal. But I was having these mom thoughts of Yeah, they’ll be fine without me. They would be okay. If I was not here for them. Now I’m in too much debt. But once those thoughts came in, I was like, Ooh, that feels that feels unhealthy. The and again like, I wasn’t contemplating taking my own life, I wasn’t, you know, but there was something in me going, they’ll be fine without me. And that scared me. And so yeah, that that was definitely a jumping point for me. Do you mind me asking do you do talk therapy? Is that is that your is that your your therapist niche?
Dan Moyer
Oh, no. Is that? I don’t know, explain what’s talk therapy? Well,
Taylor Fisher
so I, my therapist is talk therapy, we do it. We she specializes in internal family systems ifs. And But yesterday, actually, I talked to a therapist who’s an EMDR trauma therapist. And we can talk a little more about this. But I’ve been doing a lot of inner child work, which has been so fascinating. And when I talked to him yesterday, he said, I want you to envision EMDR, which EMDR is a very specialized type of therapy. But he said, I want you to visualize that you broke a bone. And can you handle it on your own? Sure. But if you have a doctor who can set it, it’s going to heal properly and faster. He said, So now, imagine your brain? Can you heal it on your own? Yes. But with EMDR I’m going to be the one who sets it so that you can actually heal properly and faster. And so I really love like, yeah, like, while we’re talking about analogies in the cars in the house, and you know, it’s it’s really interesting, because yeah, whenever he mentioned that, I was like, oh, okay, that takes a lot of the pressure off. Like, you’re just helping me get there faster, and you’re kind of facilitating this whole thing. So yeah, there is this stigma around therapy. But luckily, our generation is doing a fantastic job of keeping keeping therapists in business and kind of, like shaking things up, which I love. I love I think they should be next to teachers, the highest paid people in the world. Yeah,
Dan Moyer
it’s interesting. There’s definitely like, my mom’s generation. And, and before that, like, I know, without saying too much that like, to, like therapy was weaponized. For for people. Oh, oh, you know, if you don’t stop that, I’m gonna take you therapy, or whatever. And that was, I know, several people, not in my generation. And I don’t know, for instance, way, but I know, things that were said to my, you know, my family and my aunts and uncles, and like, just different generations, especially, you know, men of a different generation, where the stereotype was, oh, it’s dad who’s going to be in, he was at the bar, and he goes, You know, he’s works the hard day, and he goes and drinks his sorrows away. That’s pretty real for some of my family. Right? Like, go get go get your dad from from the lounge, right? Not my dad, thankfully. But you know, grandfathers and things and, and the talk of the idea of like, doing work on yourself, I think is, is a fairly progressive and new concept, right? Like, there’s more discussion about burnout and finding this work life balance over the last like, couple years, and especially in photography circles that I think I’ve ever seen before out. When I first started out, like the first five years, I don’t think anybody talks about burnout. I don’t remember the education. World being that being something that was people were putting education out about, or videos or doing courses on, or even having podcasts about it, you know,
Taylor Fisher
right? Oh, yeah, absolutely. And I actually have, I have my own podcast, and I have an episode coming out next week. And it’s the 10 was fempire.
Dan Moyer
Shout it out.
Taylor Fisher
Valley girl, but they’re the title is like 10 entrepreneurial beliefs that I wholeheartedly disagree with. And one of them is that there is this work life balance, there’s no balance, there’s no balance. It’s so enter never achieve it or can Yeah, no. And, too. Yeah, it’s like, it’s so interconnected. And but there is this false idea of If This Then That. And that’s not always the case, sometimes with with work, it just dominates your whole life. And I’m at a point now where I’m like, I want 50% Less weddings, because I want to mentally be healthy enough to go into somebody’s wedding day and not have all this stuff leftover from the day before. I really don’t want to shoot double headers anymore. I mean, there’s like, there’s ways to not, it doesn’t have to be balanced. I work according to my family, you know, like I work with air quotes 12 days a year. And which it’s so funny, because even my husband who’s been doing this with me for 400 Weddings is like, if working 12 days a year, supports your lifestyle for the other 350 days a year. It’s worth it right. And I’m like, Yeah, I mean, like, I love this work. I love it. And you and I both know and even Mike knows, it’s not just 12 days, right? But if but if it’s really quality work, like or work if you’re working with really quality QA pulls in clients who love you. The mental health kind of falls into place like you work with people who support that and early in my career and I think for a lot of photographers early in your career, that’s not always the case, you get some really challenging situations you get thrown into some, maybe even unfortunate situations. But even working with high quality clients like you, you and I have talked about, they’re still you’re a one man show one woman show like you go to a wedding. And if you get assaulted verbally, sexually, physically, it’s you. There’s no HR department, you can’t, like you said you alluded to earlier, I don’t want to be the person who ruins their wedding day and say that I was assaulted by their mom for not like I’ve been verbally assaulted by mothers of the bride, mothers of the groom. Siblings. I’ve been, you know, like, there’s just so many different elements of this fairy tale day that we have to show up to that. You don’t get to just you don’t get to. I mean, you can of course, but then you have like, one thing that I really struggled with early on in my business that I don’t anymore, but one bad review. One historic person who
Dan Moyer
in ruins ruins everything. You have everything hundreds of other reviews, I feel that
Taylor Fisher
Yeah, yep. Even for you mentally, but for so I have some really good friends who are husband and wife photography team here. They set up a boundary with a couple, they didn’t even book them. This couple hadn’t booked them. And they said, Hey, we feel like you might be better fit with somebody else. We’re not sure that we’re the people for you. That couple Now granted, I wasn’t on the call, I don’t know what happened. That couple rallied everybody in their social circle to go review them on Google. They didn’t even work with them. They weren’t booked, there was no commitment. And they took down their Google one pissed off couple that they weren’t even working with. And so there is this fear of like, okay, if I stand up for myself, if I go tell this mother of the bride, that she cannot speak to me that way, that I am not the cause of her stress today, I risk losing this entire business that I have built. Or if you’re sexually assaulted, and you call the police. Like, there you go, like you ruin this one. Ruin. Again, air quotes, you ruin somebody’s wedding day by standing up for yourself. What are the repercussions of that? Well, you never work again. You know, it’s so hard. You can’t just go find another job. I mean, you can
Dan Moyer
this is one of those situations where I feel like it’s so hard even for women, right? Because like, I’m a six foot three 200 pound man, I am so privileged in the fact that like, I don’t know what it feels like. Like, there’s one of the one of things that I talk with my wife about all the time. It’s like, they’re she’s out for a walk or something with the kids or whatever, you know, she walks past the constructions that are some she’s looking back over a shoulder. I don’t know what that feels like, when she’s like when I’m at a wedding. I never feel unsafe. Right. Like, people don’t mess with me. But it’s, it’s because of the place that I am. It’s because I’m a white man. It’s because you know, I’m tall and foreboding. I’ve you know, not really for voting. Actually, that’s a terrible word to describe me. I love that word, though. It what’s what’s that? What’s the name of like the thing like Alexander the Great like there’s something called something I think I would just voting Nabil Dan the agreeable, that’s what I would like, you know, my associate, Lauren, she works with me all the time, but like, I’ll see like groomsmen, you know, make make moves on her or like, you know, pull her onto the dance floor or whatever. And she’s pretty go with the flow. But like, we have an understanding that, you know, if something gets too far come to me or, or like just make it happen, make a scene about it, and I will always support her. But again, it’s like, there’s even like basic things like I think but you know, pre show, we were talking about how you had to nurse. You know, when you were having your boys like you’re on wedding days, you had to you know, if if you’re on your hair cycle, if you have your period, like you have to still take care of that and find Trump time to go to the bathroom and like all that stuff, right? It’s yeah, when else does that happen? What other jobs there was like, oh, you know, I can’t go to the bathroom now. Because this
Taylor Fisher
well, and like the number of times, Dan, that I go home and I’m like, I don’t think I paid in 12 hours because like I cuz I wasn’t drinking for 12 hours, like I had no water. And it’s interesting that you mentioned that about your wife because Mike and I just had this conversation. We were in Moab Utah, which is one of our favorite places. And I just really wanted to meditate by the river. So I walked over to the river and I sat down. And I was like, I can’t because I can’t hear anything. I can’t hear if somebody’s coming up on me. I’m not I’m not going to meditate. Like I’ve always wanted to meditate in nature. And I think that’s something that maybe men can do. But with women, I’m like, who’s gonna murder me like, close by who’s gonna solve me who could whack me upside the head and throw me in this river? No one would find me. And like, you know, Dateline, I don’t watch Dateline, but my father in law does. So when we’re there, it’s on and I’m like, oh, like, time we watch it. I buy 80 cans of me He’s so interesting because as women, like I talked to Mike about that, and he was like, What, What world do you live in? And I was like the world where I was raised as a woman like, this has been my normal college campuses, being at weddings, hiking in nature by myself trying to sit and meditate at a park. Like, this is just the world that I live in. And so it’s unfortunate that it’s normalized. But yeah, like at a wedding. I mean, I’m very grateful that usually in my small town, I know a lot of the vendors and so if Mike’s not there, I can go to the DJ and say, Hey, can you just like keep an eye out for like, Uncle Joe over there? Who’s really making me uncomfortable? Pansy. Mr. Joe? Yeah. Hanzi Uncle Joe. And but, but going back to what you said, Yeah, I mean, becoming a mom was really challenging. It was wonderful. But I all the fears that I had going into being a working mom running my own business as a photographer, all kind of came true, like I was, I was in a closet pumping, instead of eating dinner. And luckily, if Mike was with me, he would bring my food to me in that closet, if he wasn’t, and you know, as well as I do, if you’re not sitting somewhere that the staff can see you, they’re not bringing you food, like they don’t know that you exist. And so I would be like, opening the doors, like, please bring me here. I know. If you’re if your wife nurse, then you know, like, we eat like 85 meals a day, like nursing takes so much energy, you burn like 1000 calories a day extra when you’re nursing. And so to do that, on a wedding day with no water, no food, I was just like, What am I doing to my body? And it’s been really interesting, because moving into this healing journey that I’ve been on for two years, I just started working out again. And it’s because I was like, Oh my gosh, this is this what it feels like to have like 10% extra energy. Yeah, to like to put into working out and not into putting out fires or, you know, just surviving or nap
Dan Moyer
10% Extra mental energy to work out. Yeah.
Taylor Fisher
It’s been really cool to start working out again, because for the last 11 years that had been in business, I had zero I was depleted. I had zero extra energy to put into working out and my mental health and what it means to me to work out. And so it’s just been interesting. It’s been an interesting journey and like, yeah, nursing, going to the bathroom drinking water. I now carry a Camelback and I look like I’m running like an ultra marathon because I’m letting down my Camelback. I got my harness with my cameras. And I’m just like sucking on a Camelback all day, which I get made fun of but then, you know, people will see me and they’re like, Oh my God, why didn’t I think about like I we live in a desert we live we live in a high desert. We live at 8000 feet. If I’m lucky, I’m shooting at 8000 feet. But sometimes we’re shooting at 10 10,000 feet 11,000 feet. And so there’s already that natural dehydration. And then we have the sun and so it can be 95 100 degrees and we’re out working. And so I’m like how did I go that long? Without water? That’s just like, I’m not a camel. There’s all this
Dan Moyer
stuff that we’re talking about just feels like it just piles up. Right? Like, and especially the longer you do it, right? Like you’ve been at this for what? 10 years?
Taylor Fisher
11 Yeah, this is my 11th Season full time. Yeah,
Dan Moyer
same. Okay, so I’m in that I’m in that space just a little bit longer, but like, but like the longer so my journey was in the beginning. You’re like, Alright, I’m a wedding photographer. I’m hustling. I’m doing all the things. I don’t care if I like I’ve missed these things. Like, you know, I’ve said this a million times on this podcast, but like year two or year three. I remember being booked solid every single weekend from April through July. I miss all July 4 I missed was it Labor Day
Taylor Fisher
is in there a memorial day labor day. Yeah,
Dan Moyer
all that stuff, right? I’m missing that and missing friends, birthday parties and missing spring picnics. Awesome. And in the beginning, it’s like you think there’s like nobility in that? Like, I’m just like, I’m working and living the dream, right? Like, I’m just gonna get the thing. And then the further away you get you’re like, No, like I, I want to see my wife, especially, you know, definitely harping on adding kids into the mix. But like, I miss my friends I miss, like the adventures that I would have. And it’s like, why is it because now I’m you know, three years from being 40 that like, like, I’m not saying I regret that stuff. But I just have a different perspective where it’s like, the success will come if you keep doing the thing that you know the habits that lead you to success. The success will come. If you put boundaries around your fulfillment, your joy, your mental health, so you don’t get burned out at year five. And then you’re like, Oh, I’m out of this this this industry sucks. It’s like it’s actually pretty great. Like it’s pretty flexible. You get to work with wonderful people. So let’s talk about this. Like all the stuff that piles on but then how you how and maybe it’s a this is just hyper personal because I think everybody’s got sort of a different way that works for them. I’m on how you start to unpack that and put up some boundaries and start saying no to things and, and find this way through that, that still makes you able to enjoy being a photographer, enjoy the lifestyle, enjoy couples and enjoy the life outside of you. Or not being a wedding photographer, that it’s not just your identity in being a photographer,
Taylor Fisher
if I can touch real quick on what you just said, Dan, I think a lot of photographers have this mentality, we’re like, Make hay while the sun shines, because there is a level of scarcity of like it happened this year, will it ever happen again. But also in tandem with that we do work May through October. And that’s it. For people who are full time I have November, December, January, February, March April off, I can schedule a few things if I want to. And so I think there was this work hard play hard mentality, at least for me for a long time. Like, if I can just get through these five months, then I can have seven months off and I don’t have to do anything. And then of course, I started mentoring. And that took up my my off months, but learning boundaries around that too. So I do think that there was at least for me, this level of guilt associated with it. And I’m not sure what it looks like for you and your wife. But for me and Mike he was still working in the corporate world while we were shooting together. So we’d literally be at a wedding, and he would be in the car like messaging his boss, and I’m like the bride’s getting ready to come out. So there was this guilt that I had where I really wanted to provide I wanted to be an active partner financially in our marriage. But he’s working all year long, he gets Friday and Saturday off and I’m only quote unquote working five months out of the year and so there was this level of guilt of if I can push really hard for five months. I won’t have to think about anything for seven of those months. So that was for me at least and maybe it’s true for a lot of other photographers this Make hay while the sun shines work hard play hard mentality that I had to break myself up because I was like okay, well working hard and playing hard is not working for my mental health for six months out of the year. So what do we have to do to shake this up a little bit but also
Dan Moyer
why do people get married in those months because it’s nice out because it’s sunny your stuff like the opposite monster like don’t get me wrong I love that oh I love I love that but just give me some like hot dogs well not only hot dogs and vegetarian but like give me some backyard grill and some corn on a grill or like you know some waterslide with my kid or or you know going to the pool in the summer like that’s the stuff I also want and you can’t do that in the winter in Pennsylvania like it doesn’t work that way Yeah,
Taylor Fisher
yeah, absolutely. And I think of like of course they get married in the summer that’s when I want to be mountain biking and camping and but then there’s also this like other side of the coin right where like the one weekend I’m off we’re like let’s go camping and then we get out there we’re like this sucks everybody’s out here camping. I don’t want to be around people give me my Tuesday mornings at the campground back there’s this we get spoiled we want to have our cake and eat it too. I don’t want to see people on the weekends. If I’m if I’m you know not working but I also really want to be you know, even going to the grocery store on a Saturday I’m like you Why did I come out on a Saturday and go to the grocery store like everybody else?
Dan Moyer
So this work hard play hard mentality was not working for you. And then obviously 2021 You got some you got some help for your mental health, for your just capacity to Mom Brain, all that stuff like so what steps have you been taking to make this like solidify it to make sure that you don’t slide back in and you know, what is what is the year look like? What does the day look like? What kind of things are you trying to build in that are healthy habits?
Taylor Fisher
That’s a great, great question. Dan. I did a lot of things in 2021. So getting my therapist was the first thing Mike and I quit drinking in 2020 that was just something that I saw I saw where it was trending in my family. I saw what it did to my family and I don’t really love being like I love weddings but there’s a certain time a night where I’m like I’m good to go nobody can see straight like I don’t feel comfortable getting like hanging out here anymore. And so watching that sober I was like I really this is not as fun as I guess I thought it has been I was also nursing and so the like mental game of like do I pump now do I pump later? Do I feed him now? Do I like let him get a little buzz? No, I don’t want my son to be buzzed off of my drink. So do I pump and dump like it was just so much mental capacity that I had already exhausted because this is before I got UV itis and had my therapist and I was just trying to clear out some mental space and so drinking went and we also started we switched to a plant based diet And for me, yeah, that like supported, it’s supported, my energy is supported my goals, my skin looks great, like things were just changing where I was like, Okay, this feels this feels good. Um, but also, there were some other things that I did in 2020, I hired a VA,
Dan Moyer
and I sighs Oh, I love her.
Taylor Fisher
I was like, I don’t want to be on social media, I can’t, again, freeing up this mental space. I was like, I can’t manage social media. I was at a point with social media where like, I wanted to share my story, but I couldn’t write like it was before reels. And so like, I didn’t, I couldn’t write eight paragraphs for one post. And, and so I hired her. And she helped me with social media, she helped me get really clear on my messaging for couples. One of the things that we also started doing was booking vacations in advance, we would see how the season was like kind of shaking out. But there’s some years where we have like, 12 weddings in June and July, we have nothing. So we kind of would see how things would shake out. But then we started booking our vacations in advance, because if we waited, we wouldn’t make it happen. We would just book those dates, we would totally book up. And so that that was really helpful of just being protective of our time. And it’s really hard. You know, somebody’s emailing, saying, Hi, can I pay you $1,000? And you’re like, No, I’m gonna go around that. And Hawaii.
Dan Moyer
Protect my mental health.
Taylor Fisher
Yeah, I know. I’m like, it was such a mind. Like, it was such a mind game. And I really had to get out of the mentality of it being like this, this opportunity cost, it was more I had to feel empowered around it like, No, I am protecting this time. I cannot just let it like, like, I think you said Dave said, like, if you don’t protect your mental health, your burnout will do it for you. Yep. It’s the same with your schedule. If you don’t protect it, your business will do it. Like your business will make sure that you’re booked and you have no time to see people.
Dan Moyer
Yeah, two things about what you said. One is that like, I love you, you gave up social media. And this is something that like, You’re my favorite, like online acquaintance, right? Like never met in person told other sides of the country like, and I love watching you. And the things that you post, like earlier this year, you posted like, like, this is what happened like this is this is the big the big wins. I had like my recap for 2022. And like you have these big moments. I love it. But then you’re also not afraid, like couple of weeks ago when we’re trying to get this podcast scheduled. Or like, Oh, I’m gonna see my god family coming into town. I’m deleting Instagram from my phone. If you need me, email me. I was like, yeah, that’s hard to do right now. It’s really hard to do. It’s very
Taylor Fisher
hard. And I’m very protective of my phone. I don’t know if you’re familiar with the Enneagram Dan. But the NE I’m an Enneagram two. So I’m the helper so I’m always like on and I’m always reaching out to people. But one of the things that I learned about like how I function is if I can clear out my phone from distractions like Facebook hasn’t been on my phone and probably seven years. But Instagram I started deleting at random I’ll go on and do a photo dump. But I can like I’ve I’ve taken pressure off myself Snapchats deleted tiktoks Deleted even Pinterest I don’t have on my phone. And even my my I messages I set up to delete after 30 days because I would have like hundreds of messages from people and I’m like, why do I still have these? So just to clear up like, I’m already a pretty minimalistic person with my home space and just my life in general. But having my phone minimize of the amount of distractions that I had was huge.
Dan Moyer
So how did you figure out what kind of person you are though? Right? Like, how did you figure out like, okay, removing phone stuff is something that works for me. Is it just trial and error that you’ve been doing for the last
Taylor Fisher
trial and error? Yeah, I mean, it was stressful. Like if if being on social media was stressing me out. I wanted to remove it thinking about alcohol. Do I drink tonight? Do I drink tomorrow? No. Do I save it up? Do I drink this weekend? Do we do we have wine at home? Do we have beer at home? What do we want to I was just like this is stressing me out just having to think about it. And with food like do we want pork chicken steak fish? What like what do you want and so eliminating the amount of decisions that I had to make on a daily basis made my life so much easier. And then eventually I was able to weave it into my business but with my phone, my phone causes me so much stress. So I just deleted I was like I’ll just delete it for a little while. And eventually it became addicting and I was like oh my god, I’m just gonna delete it forever and then eventually I do have to download it and you know, respond to messages or engage a little bit but
Dan Moyer
you are very self aware. Right? Like did you always I’m very as you always have that as a something that you have the ability to be like okay, I can see, this thing is competing for my attention more than I wanted to, we either need to squash that, like, were you always that way? Or is that something you cultivated,
Taylor Fisher
so I was aware of it, but in a different sense. And I’m not sure if this will resonate with you or not. But I’ve been very hyper vigilant since I was a kid and hyper vigilance, I’ve been learning through my inner child work. I get migraines a lot after enduring weddings. And it’s because I walk into a situation and this is what hyper vigilance is, I walk into a situation, within seconds, my brain knows who I need to avoid, who I need to protect who I need to pay attention to, who’s gonna cause me stress later, like, I just read it. And I used to think like, oh, I’m an empath, I can just read a room. No, that’s actually a trauma response. And it’s my body going into survival. And so I learned that at a very early age, like what, and I think a lot of people do, what do I need to do to survive in the situation that I’m in whether it’s family, extended family, school, but what what is my body doing? And so I love wedding. So I don’t want to give those up. And I know, I can’t just be like, oh, I’ll just avoid all this. And so that’s, that was kind of this, like jumping, like Launchpad into the inner child work that I did. And I started working with plant medicine, where I really got a chance to look at that. And I’m excited for wedding season this year, because I get to like test myself, like every other weekend. But what started out as hypervigilance, I’ve been training and rewriting the story to be self awareness, like I am very self aware. It used to be to a fault and purely as a trauma response and a survival mechanism. Now, it’s like, how can I make other people’s lives better, like I can make my kids lives better by not being on my phone by not just tuning out and getting on my phone and completely disassociating from the world around me. And so it’s been a training, I’ve always been this way. But again, it was a survival mechanism before it became a good thing.
Dan Moyer
Yeah, the I love that I’m so I’m, I’ve become more self aware, over I don’t know, maybe the past 1015 years or so as, as I like, you know, got out of the high school years and realize like, that was actually a friend of mine pointed out, I didn’t quite know what self aware was, or were like being very in tune with, like people’s emotions and my own emotions and how I’m feeling and like, like walking or like driving home from a situation and sort of analyzing and be like, Oh, I don’t like how that person did this to me, or like, that person manipulated me in this way. But I was reading a book, and I just realized I was in a dark place. And this was like, sort of the very, very early parts of my like journey towards trying to shed some of the weight in life. And it was I just, like, started reading everything I could about like a better mindset, and you know how to live a better life and awesome. And so I just naturally dove in this stuff. My friend was like, like, you’re just talking to me about that stuff. I was like, yeah, like, I’m just trying to, like, I don’t like the way I’m feeling right now. I don’t like these things that I’m doing in my life. And she’s like, wow, like, I’m just, I’m really happy for you that you feel comfortable enough to like, talk about this because I know plenty of people who don’t. And there’s a lot of people who don’t talk about that. And she’s like, I’m just, I don’t know, I feel like I’m just rambling on this part right now. But it’s just No, I love hearing that. Thank you. But I do want to go back to something you said before about how you start scheduling things now and just with a very quick story, and then I want you to dive into a little more. But you know, I’ve mentioned this on this podcast several times two, but this was something that was a game changer early on. And it was that I realized like do you have Parkinson’s Law? Is your heard of this? Um, no, I have not enlightened Parkinson’s Law says the like, work expands to fulfill the allotted time to do it. Right. So an example would be Oh, like this, this highway is too small. It’s only two lanes here and two lanes there. So we’re gonna build it make expand it and make it a four lane highway. Well, more people travel more people use that road river is still there still traffic, right doesn’t matter. Same thing goes with work. If you have an hour to complete a task, you use the hour, if you have like, eight weeks to complete a task. You use the eight weeks. And I realized that years ago, I was hammered with weddings and engagements and all kinds of stuff. And an engagement session got cancelled. And I looked at my wife, I was like, wow, we have like a night for free. Like let’s do some date night. Right? And you would think that I would have made the change right away. But it was like months later, I was like, this sucks. Like, we need to put family and US time first. Right? And I love that you’re like, you know what if we just leave it up to our calendars or our business, it’s it’s not going to get worked in we need to plan our vacations now. And then everything gets filled in around them. Love that. You know
Taylor Fisher
what, Dan? It’s COVID COVID tested me in a way that I had never been tested as a lot of people but it’s so easy to say a family comes first. They always of course, have. I don’t know if you follow daily dad? Oh, yeah. You need us. Yeah. So Mike’s like, Man, this guy puts me on a frickin guilt trip every morning. But one of the things that he said was, he said, Of course you would die for your children, of course, you would lay down in front of a train, you’re never going to have to actually do that. What you are going to have to do is prioritize them make their needs, feel met, carve out time be intentional with that time. And I know I was like, oh, so COVID was the COVID was the first time that I was like, Oh, it does my family come first, or am I like, Am I willing to give up $15,000 This month to make sure my family safe. So that was the first time that I really had that I really got pushed to prove to myself, my husband and my kids that yes, family does come first. I will always prioritize my family and their health and our time together. And one of those things was deleting social media, like I don’t need to be on here. I don’t need to be looking at other people’s lives. I don’t need to be obsessing about what to post next. And so yeah, COVID really pushed me to because I don’t think I would have been given another opportunity like that in my career to actually prove that my family does come first. And I’m sorry that this is like derailing your wedding day, like there were weddings that Mike couldn’t be at, because my kids were sick, or our babysitter got COVID, three hours before we’re supposed to be at a wedding. And I just I just show up to the wedding and say I’m sorry, we had a family emergency. I’m here. I will be here. And they’re like, and all of our couples were like, What do you need? How can we support you? And but it was, it was really uncomfortable for me to like, Oh, that would they have been fine. Yeah. Like my my kids had been fine. Yes. But it really forced me to be intentional about not just talking to talk, but walking the walk. And one of the things that really helped Dan, this year, we decided to take 50% less well. So it’s actually only about 25% less of what we used to shoot. We used to shoot about 40 weddings a year. Last year, I said I only I only want 20 I want 20 weddings, we booked 20 weddings, it felt really good. And then going into 2023. I said, maybe maybe a couple more than 10 No more than 15 and I have 12 And I’m so happy with that. I just booked my first 2024 Wet Yeah, and I’m like, Oh my gosh, like I’m looking at my calendar. I’ve no doubleheaders. I have one overnight, but it’s gonna be like me at a hotel by myself, which I’ll take one overnight. But there were nights to and when Mike and I would be sleeping in tents, like in between weddings, because we were we were like, you know, we had to be here and there and everywhere. We had a tripleheader weekend. So we would just camp like, three hours from the you know, so I don’t mind that. But doing 12 It was really hard because I have students that that I work with who were like, I want 20. And then I’m like, well, I should want 20 If my own students want 20 Like why do I not want 20? And so different value? It’s yeah, different values, different perspective. So Mike and I had to sit down because it’s it’s easy to say like, oh, I only want half this year. But Mike and I sat down and we we had a come to Jesus conversation of when is enough enough, because it’s never going to be enough, you hit that five figure mark, you hit the six figure. Now it’s a half a million. And I’m like, who is out there trying to make a half a million. Why? I mean to each their own. But when Mike and I actually looked at our finances, and I highly recommend people get a bookkeeper and an accountant, if you can swing it do both. Because when we looked at the numbers, it was not an emotional decision. It was not an ego driven decision to take 20 weddings or 40 It was because those were all ego. But when we sat down and looked at our finances, we were like Mike was like if you want 12 You’re still gonna make the same amount you made last year and I was like no, no. And he was like yeah, I your new prices if you’re booking you know, portrait sessions, and if you want to coach and that’s the thing, like I want to coach I’m not doing it for the money. I’m not doing it to make you know, side side money or to work less weddings. I do it because I love it. And so Mike was like, if you choose to do coaching, great, you’ll exceed you know, whatever. But whenever we actually looked at the numbers, I could make a very clear intentional decision that was not wrapped up in emotions and fear base and felt really good to go. Yeah, 12 Feels good. And that’s all that I need. And now I have weekends off and I can I’m going home to see my family for a few weeks and it’s just been I don’t know if you can remove the emotion remove the emotion even a little bit, it makes it a lot easier, I think, to prioritize your health.
Dan Moyer
Yeah, I’m in the same boat where I always would go like 20 to 23. Like that was what I always wanted to go for. That’s the number I wanted. And by all circumstances, like I should have hit the gas in 2022, because there was the most weddings in the United States since 1984. Right, a massive amount of weddings. And I didn’t, I didn’t have anything left. I needed my family either to see the better side of me because 2021 and 2020 did not get I did not give it to them. And so I pulled way back, I did 15. And, and we had like, look at our budgets. And it’s like, well, we’re spending this money here. That’s like, stupid, we could get rid of that. And we’re spending this money here. That’s like stupid, why don’t we just not spend that it’s like, oh, actually, I could have been doing 15 weddings a long time ago and been making like, totally good money. If I just didn’t blow like I was basically, I made so many stupid mistakes with money. That’s a whole other podcast. I’m not gonna get into that. That’s a whole other podcast. Okay, so
Taylor Fisher
any mental health? Yeah.
Dan Moyer
Alright, so let’s wrap this up in a couple things. Because the big things that I’m hearing is like, being self aware enough to say like, okay, these things are distracting from me, fulfilling my my best ability, like social media, obviously, that’s like, gotta be on top of a lot of people’s lists. Making time for your family owning your calendar. What else is in there for you?
Taylor Fisher
I hired an editor. I know that you know, Nathan with photographers edit, but holy crap that that just I think whenever you’re running your own business as a photographer, you feel like you’re working all the time. Like I started getting emails in March from couples who were like, can you look at my timeline? And I’m like, No, I already sent you actually like sample timelines. And they were like, Oh, that’s right. Thanks for sending those. So there I just bought myself for hours back and forth emails. But hiring photographers edit, streamlining my booking process, hiring a VA, like I use Tavi to do contracts and send automated wedding guides, the wedding guides answer a lot of questions that they’re going to ask. So if you’re like, I don’t know if it’s type A or what, but if you’re the kind of person who just needs to see how much you’re actually working. I know it takes up a lot of mental headspace. But once I really got clear on how many hours I was actually working a week, a month, a season, then I was going okay, well there’s all these other hours in the day. What am I doing with those? Oh, I’m sitting on Instagram. Oh, I’m sitting on my email and rechecking it 150 times. Oh, I’m complaining about you know, like, and so once I got clear on what can I outsource? What can I streamline? And how much time is that going to give me back I realized like, it’s it’s a really great like, I love being a photographer. I don’t love like, you know, like the nitty gritty like, you know, sending emails and doing like all the smaller things, but are like ordering gifts that would take up so much mental space. So once I streamline my gift process and what that looked like that was huge. I also stopped meeting people in person. For like the initial consultation. I was like, we can book a call if you want but we’ve done a really good job with our website and our social media to put who we are out there. Yep. So by the time people reach out, they’re like, we’re ready to book What do you need from us getting clear on how much time you’re actually spending working? Even if that means you keep like a you know, track of it in your phone? How like, what am I actually spending my time on? And what am I allowing to sneak into my brain when it’s not welcome there? You know, right? I don’t know if that makes sense.
Dan Moyer
No, that makes a lot of sense. And I think but so the benefit of all of this is like of like outsourcing and streamlining your process and streamlining the ability to automatically send contracts and all that stuff is to free you up to do the other things that you love to do like hiking and a meditation by a river even though that felt weird and even like time with your kids and and going to Moab and you know going to Costa Rica and all these things that’s the goal right is to like have yourself so not wrapped up in just being a wedding planner and all your time is there that you can still do that clear off your space to do the other things you love. Right? Is that Is that right?
Taylor Fisher
Yeah, just do things that make you feel empowered in your business. And for me that was outsourcing that was hiring out that was taking like I took two two months off Dan from doing anything solely to focus on my mental health January and February this past year. I did nothing except actually you know what it started in November, November December giant but January February, I specifically blocked out on my calendar. I only did mental health focus and that was working with plant medicine that was talking with my therapist that was doing a course that I love with inner child work. work that was spending time in nature. I was very intentional about that. So just do things that make you feel empowered in your business, you do not have to be a slave to your business. And it’s there is no badge of honor. Nobody gets it, you you, you get the Bernel badge before you get a badge of honor from anybody else.
Dan Moyer
Okay, here’s my final question. And it goes along with what you’ve sort of just said, I think there are there differences, right, between recreation and recreation. And I think a lot of us get into this idea like that. That’s pretty cool. So there’s like these differences, right? I think a lot of us get sucked into the recreation part where it’s like, I need to Netflix and have some ice cream, right? And I’m not going to be I’m not the person who’s going to like, you know, because hell yeah, like, there’s times we need that
Taylor Fisher
or family and some onsale to lenti it was all about that. 20
Dan Moyer
Oh, that’s like the fancy ice cream. That’s the gelato cream.
Taylor Fisher
Yeah, it was on sale, though. So I got to have my demolished one in about five minutes.
Dan Moyer
Yeah, I feel that. So there’s like, there’s that side of things. And there’s the recreations. And I think this self awareness part comes into like, what actually refills my cup. What recreates me. So what what are those things for you that really recreate you?
Taylor Fisher
Yeah, that’s a really great question. And traveling is one.
Dan Moyer
And it doesn’t surprise me just,
Taylor Fisher
yeah, I love traveling. And I just got into reading, I have not been a reader because I die. I just didn’t think I had time for it. Which is a lie that I told myself. But also one fun thing that I did was once I hired photographers Edit to edit all my all my weddings, I would schedule it for Tuesday, I would send them the wedding like a, you know, nine days after a wedding or 10 days after a wedding. And it was always due at 10am My time. As soon as I sent that gallery to them, I would go mountain biking. It was like my new ritual. I was like if I don’t and Mike was very supportive. He said if you don’t do something with this time, you’re gonna fill it with work. And I was like, well, that’s not fair to like, pass off this this work that used to. I mean, it used to take me 50 hours, 60 hours to edit a wedding. Yeah. So theoretically, I just bought back a whole week of my life. And so I had to be really intentional with that time. As soon as I sent the gallery, my mouth like i There were days when I had my helmet on and my gloves. And I was like typing in the link to their website. And I was like, Okay, now I’m gone. And so, so yeah, just being really intentional about that time, the recreating yoga, I go to yoga, I just, you know, spending time in nature and like, if I can carve off a weekend to be with girlfriends, I’m gonna do it. And I you know, it’s challenging. It’s very challenging to turn down money, it’s hard to turn down five to 810 $1,000. But if there’s any feeling in my body that come that weekend, I’m gonna go I would pay them five grand to not have to be here today. Whether it’s we just don’t connect as like, our personalities don’t connect or I know that like my sister’s having a baby that weekend. You know, like, who knows? But if I have that feeling at all, I usually tell people hey, there might be a better fit for you. Um, but yeah, just getting really in tune with what’s what’s gonna light you up and bring you joy and what is not but in being empowered is huge.
Dan Moyer
Oh, my goodness, Taylor, you’re such a joy to chat with. This will always happen frequently. Our we were like, totally not even done right. Haley’s.
Taylor Fisher
100 different direction. Oh my gosh.
Dan Moyer
Okay, so So final thoughts and a little bit about where people can find find out about you follow you like, learn about your coaching, all that
Taylor Fisher
kind of stuff. Yeah. So my wedding business or my photography business is Taylor Jones. photography.com. Instagram is at Taylor Jones photography. And then my coaching is Taylor jones.co. So there’s lots of different areas to reach out. But usually, if you find your way on Instagram, then you can find everything else you need. There. Love it.
Dan Moyer
Very cool.
Taylor Fisher
Thanks so much, Dan. I love our conversations. It’s
Dan Moyer
so good. There’s so much more to come. And I’m so thankful for your vulnerability for your just willingness to be open and talk with me and and just always for your, I don’t know, warm, exciting energy and your happiness and laughs and stuff whenever we talk. It’s always good time. So appreciate it.
Taylor Fisher
I agree. Well, thank you so much, Dan, I appreciate you. Thanks for what you’re doing in our community. Thank you
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