An Explorer of Life

 I was just reading this blog post here by Heather Plett, whom I follow on Twitter, about who we are. Americans seem to especially define themselves by what we do to earn a living and it's a question I've often struggled with. As I wrote my response to her post I figured I'd share it with you here as well.

I often struggle with this question myself.  There have been times when my profession defined who I thought I was and times when I did not. I'm primarily a caregiver now & for the last 4+ yrs to my grandmother, but I don't particularly like being defined by that, although taking care of ones grandmother 24/7 is an honorary purpose I don't ultimately relate to it.  I'm here because of love, not because of passion. I'd rather be known as the job I will go back to: a hairstylist. That tells more about me I think. But I see the negative in that too. Ultimately I'd like to be known as an artist. I spend most days creating in some way whether scrapping or art journaling or taking pictures or painting quirky little gifts yet I don't feel like an artist because I don't support myself with that job, yet it's my passion. I'd like to be known as a reader for I love a great book but the books I love reading aren't the types of books "well read" people read.  Traveling the world is one of my greatest dreams, & I've spent some time in a handful of places, but does this qualify me to be a world traveler? I love photography and I take a ton of pictures but the other day someone was describing a friends scrapbooking compared to mine and said that this other person was a photographer and that made her layouts pop because the pictures popped where my lo's were about the art. I took a slight offense to this. Does the other girl take great photos? Yes she does but does her expensive camera give her the title of photographer over my cheapo camera? I think not. I think I can take a great picture, just a different picture than she and maybe a little less to work with than her. But I am an artist, a caregiver, a reader, a very amatuer photographer, an art journaler, a hairstylist, a would-be world traveler, an explorer of life. An Explorer of life kind of sums it all up for me.