Hello and welcome back to the podcast. We're gonna be discussing my biggest lessons of 2025, and there's only five, but I'm sure this might be a little long-winded because I got so much to say. These things have been at the top of my mind for quite a while. Actually, let me just open my notes. Okay. My biggest lesson, number one, mindset over everything. go figure the mindset. Girly herself had spent 2025 crashing out consistently every week, every month, and honestly. I think it was because I had impossible goals. And I don't mean that in a way of everybody has audacious goals and if you don't make it, if you shoot for the moon, you'll be among the stars. Like you'll, it'll be fine. I had goals of tripling my income, and I had goals of just this big, huge, robust business, and every time that the robustness wasn't working, I would just. Fall the pieces. And I also found myself spiraling so much about the unknown. And so I mentioned in my previous episode about how I feel like my intuition was shot, and one of my friends was listening to me in a voice message. I was asking her a question and she's like, you are, intuition is like not, basically saying babe, do you know yourself? And I was like, I'm so glad you asked.'cause I don't think so. That's not good. That's not good. So I realized that I spent so much of my time just ingesting content and believing what other people maybe assume or say that I am, and I just took it at face value without really fighting for myself, without really knowing myself. And I'm gonna lead that to me starting over at 35. Okay, because being a wedding photographer for well over a decade, since I was 21, the only thing that I have ever been is a wedding photographer. I was a wedding photographer at 21, charging$400 a wedding, and I had a bunch of random side jobs back and forth I finished college and went full into photography when I got married to my husband. Three years later. So that's all I know. I've always been, oh, I'm a wedding photographer, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I think diving into the education space and shooting my last wedding was when it hit me. It hit me like a ton of bricks. Somebody pushed me off the dock, the bridge, what have you. Humpty Dumpty had a great fall. Literally, it is the weirdest thing to start over in your thirties. In my twenties, I had all of this energy. I had launched so many business plans in my head with my friends picking my brain over coffee. Like I did it all. I did it all with children.. And so I was able to just launch so many things pregnant or not. I did it. No excuse policy burnout. Who is she? And honestly, sometimes I was burnt out, but that's what we have massage therapists and estheticians for baby. And so kissing that life goodbye I had to obtain a new identity. stripping me of the one thing, and I don't wanna say that I was my job title, but it feels that way. And to let a part of that go. I will always be a photographer even if I don't shoot weddings. I photograph my daily life. I'm actually photographing political events and I will always be a photographer. the skill never goes away. if my niece did some family portraits for my mother, because that's my mother. She likes fancy pictures, and so she bought her own backdrop and told me to bring all the fancy lighting stuff, and I did. she was like, oh, how do you use this camera? Instant, 10 seconds. I was like, oh, here's the settings. Boom boom. I will never forget photography. Photography is in my veins and my blood. It is a part of me. But to feel like I had to shed that, or maybe because I'm just so all in or nothing crippled me, and it left me feeling like I don't even know who I am, who am I? What am I supposed to do now? And feeling like a has been maybe almost oh, she doesn't do that anymore. What do you do now? Or, why would you do that? And me having to say I just love serving people and weddings was just not sustainable for me, especially in my thirties. I think at 33, my back with the backpack, the roller the satchel, the two cameras on my side holding the two OCF stands like. some people can do this. For 20 plus years, I've been in too many car accidents to count, and my back was telling me like, Hey girl, your days are numbered. It's about that time, and my kids are in school now and so the only time they have with me is the weekends. And I just knew, it's not sustainable for mothers in the long run, but. I will always do photography. I will be shooting film forever. I think even if I don't share it, just know somewhere Allo is doing photography. I will never not be a photographer. Even like when we take selfies, my parents like, oh, give it to all Laura. I'm like, dad, this is an iPhone. It's not the same. The buttons aren't that hard. You just turn on the flash, but mindset over everything and the way that I thought about it, I think I grieved it. Way longer than I should have. And honestly, like looking back, it's so embarrassing to say that I've grieved something longer than two years. It's okay, Lord, oh my gosh, get over it. But I don't know. Can you describe the feeling of grieving over pivoting? Only if you've done it before. And so I feel like last year I had a lot of things that I wanted to do and I was so scared to do them, so I didn't, and then I watched all of my friends do incredible things, and I'm just like sitting on my futon in my office boo-hooing, because why isn't it working for me? And I stand before you December 31st, and everything is working now because I had to get over myself. Long explanation for this one, but if you need the sign and you feel similar in any part of this story, this is your sign to get over yourself. Take one step, figure out the complicated how later. Go back to your roots. Go back to why you started the business. Go back to yourself. Figure out what you wanna do. Figure out your voice. All the ideas that were given to me, why did I need so much approval before I just did them? What is wrong with failure? Really nothing. And it's so funny because the fear of failure will keep you stuck forever until you snap out of it. But you have to decide to be embarrassing, to be cringe, to be possibly laughed at, which nobody ends up doing that, but your brain. It tries to protect you, and it keeps you stuck in this loop of sameness and you realize everybody's passing you by for what to not be scared. And I get why people say, follow that fear, because it's what you were meant to do all along. And that's what I'm doing in 2026 is following that fear. Yay. Me. Love that journey and you guys can keep me accountable because I still don't know my word of the year next year, and I'm just waiting for it to hit me. But I keep coming back to alignment. I keep coming back to visibility, freedom. These are my core values in business. They always have and always will be. And so I'll probably make A vision board, and put those up there. But I'm ready now. It only took 12 months for me to be ready, but I'm ready now. If you're feeling stuck, if you're feeling like, oh my gosh, why am I in the same place that I am last year? Or only a half a step ahead, not a full step, like a half a step oh, got a little win, I'm gonna hold onto that until I get the courage to take the next step. Like just do it. Follow that fear. Get over yourself from one person getting over themself to another. And if you're a journaler like myself, a really good prompt what's the worst that could happen? When people are so afraid to approach someone, DM them a question or anything like, or just reach out. And I'm like, what? The worst thing they're gonna do is say no. Is no really that scary. And then you say out loud no, it's really not. Try again or find somebody else. Rejection is just redirection. And I'm writing all these down'cause why are these pouring outta my head while I'm talking? Like I need the transcript and I'm just gonna this up on my vision board. So yes, mindset over everything. Always get your mindset and check and tell it to catch up because you got things to do. You got places to go, you got goals, you got visions. You got dreams. Number two, rest is a business strategy. Yes. I used to think I had to earn rest to get rest. I always say a hustle now and rest later, but maybe I should have moments where I. Sprint, rest, sprint, rest, or just have more systems for vacations or days off where I'm not thinking about work. And I've noticed that like when I rest, that's when the creativity Flows like a piano playing something super complex and gorgeous. creativity flows like butter. I don't make the rules, but it makes a world of a difference, and it's gonna save me burnout in the long run. For example, my holiday hiatus. Why did I work so hard just to give myself three months off later? I'm thinking about every quarter mapping out my rest weeks, days, or months, and I am doing really good with this because I've created a new CEO calendar for myself. Monday is CEO Monday. And so I can decide whether or not I really want to get anything admin work related, done, or I spend that time taking care of myself, or I spend that time planning everything for the household, basically resetting my week. What does that include? And I give myself choices so I don't feel like I'm stuck. So it's okay, CEO Monday can either be self-care or it can be business admin tasks, or it can be taking care of the household. And then tuesdays are one-on-one calls usually. And then Wednesday is wedding atelier calls. Thursdays is podcast interviews if I do them or I record my podcast on Thursday. So Thursday is podcast day and Friday out of office. Unless I have a huge deadline. but even if I do, I am now creating a tiny team. Finally for myself, because I have reached my peak, okay? I have reached my limit and my kids are only getting older and busier. They're having hobbies, they're having tasks. my son going to karate twice a week this year nearly took me out Took me out only for him to not wanna go anymore. I'm like, you know what? You're not going anymore because I'm not dragging a crying kid to karate who doesn't wanna learn how to defend his family. So I will be the CEO source of my marketing, my content, my sales plan, and then I'm gonna be creating a marketing plan to outsource to my. Team, and that will include admin assistants, and also design. So really excited to do that. Have a vision for that, have a plan for that, and be able to batch the ideas, put them in a system, and my team will take care of the rest. That way I can work and rest and harmony without pedal to the metal for nine months, nine months straight, and then taking three months off. But actually, I think this year what I did was I went quarter one insane, quarter two, insane Q3, I relaxed for a month or two, and then back to pushing it from September, October, November, and then December was mostly off. So being a little bit more aware of my capacity and is it worth burning my body to the ground for the sake of being productive. No. Also, I need to turn my brain off for my kids. Once it's time to pick up my son from preschool, I need to be able to turn off all of the tasks I need to get done and learn how to just be present with him and not thinking of a bunch of things in my head because my team will be taking care of that. So I think that's gonna help me. Next year is okay, Laura, you can turn your brain off because you already downloaded everything that you want to happen. Everything that's going to happen. And all the content you want to go out. Therefore, let your team handle it and you'll just review things like, it's okay. Turn it off. I actually would love merch that says, turn it off as well. And now that I got my fancy headphones, I really can turn it off. Another thing is taking care of your body. I, this year I pretty much walked outside every day or every other day. Just to get my body moving. And it wasn't like a crazy workout goal or anything like that. It's just moving your body is so good for you. And they even show like the change in your brain chemistry. What happens when you sit all day versus when you walk 30 minutes a day, that's it. 30 minutes a day. And that's not including running errands and stuff. And so I did that up until basically. I wanna say October, November, whenever it got really cold. And so I love walking outside. I have a hard time walking on the walking pad. I will do it, but it's hard for me because I love seeing nature. I love hearing the sounds of nature. I love feeling like I'm going somewhere. I love the sun. I'm just a nature girly, so I gotta work on being consistent even when the weather is bad. But I am 99.3% sure. I'm gonna get back into Pilates. I did it after I had my son. My son is five now, and maybe I should get that core strength back because yeah, girl is struggling. The beam vitamin sticks are working. It's getting like that vitamin B inside of those drink sticks is insane. I think it's 300 to 500%. And so I find myself acting really a DHD after I drink it. But the ideas pour out. I just need to figure out a way to organize them. Rest is a business strategy. I'm also gonna put in there self-care as a business strategy because if you are not taking care of the business, burns to the ground. Three, business is always evolving, but so are you. Oh my gosh, this one basically points to my rebrand. And I used to think that changing your mind all the time makes you look like a hot mess. And I think if you do it very frequently, it can look inconsistent and confuse your clients, your audience, all that great stuff. But as a person, we are evolving, we are changing. Like 30 5-year-old AOR is not the same as 25-year-old. AOR 25 is when my light bulb came on and when I really was like, okay, Alora. We're gonna go all in on marketing my business. I'm gonna do whatever it takes. I don't have any kids I just was pedal to the metal and I had so much time and energy and my style was different. I don't even know what my style was. My style was still forever 21 Family. Oh, and asos. We gotta give ASOS credit too, but 30 5-year-old me completely changed. I feel like I am. The modernized, bold and spicy editorial queen. At least that's what I think I am. Let me know if it translates. And I'm a mother, I'm a mother of two, and I've built two businesses since then. It's insane. Like at 25, I think I was making less than five KA year on random photography side projects. and now I've built two businesses, grossed close to a million dollars in revenue, and I just, what. How did that happen in 10 years? And so it's okay to evolve. It's okay to rebrand. Not every three to six months though. Okay, let us breathe. But if you feel like you had this huge brand clarity and awakening, and you're like, I'm ready for a fresh start, a new me. I feel like this doesn't resonate with who I am today, then that's the moment. It's time. It's time. So change is growth and I'm changing all the time, so why not my business? Reflecting that too, you don't need to wear the same socks you wore when you were 11. That's the same thing. If you have the same website from a decade ago. I'm definitely talking to you if you've had your same website for a decade. But yeah, changing is gross. It's scary, but if it's scary, that just means it's new. And that's a good thing.'cause maybe it's time to try something new. That could be exciting. If you get behind the vision and you become passionate about it, you romanticize it, you become obsessed with it, you'll be surprised what you come up with. That's pretty much my whole theory behind my rebrand this year, which was so fun. But it did suck. It did take up a lot of time. A lot of self-awareness, a lot of digging, and that's also what we do. I basically just did the artist story that we have inside of Wedding Atill, but basically you just figure yourself out and everything else flows, and that becomes a marketing plan. Procrastination is just avoidance and disguise. Any one task that I avoided with a million other small ones, distracted my brain and my growth. Now I'm learning to lean into the thing that I'm avoiding. And then shifting my thoughts around it so I can move forward faster. And so what I always say is like you take a sheet of paper, you draw a straight vertical line down, and then a vertical line across making two different columns. And in one side you can say My biggest fears. And then the other side you can say. Six figure mindset or biggest accomplishments or crazy dreams or delusion. Actually, we can do that. We'll split it in half. One side will be fear and the other side will be delusion. What is your biggest fear about this thing and what would the delusional version of yourself say? Like they say D Lulu is a sa Lulu, but it's really true. I think actually if you are gonna build a business and sustain a business, you have to be delusional. You have to be because you don't know what's gonna happen. But if you stay optimistic, stay positive and be like. What if I fall, but what if I fly? And what if I grow wings? And what if I magically ascend into the ceiling in the unknown? What if I make six figures? What if I make multiple six figures? What if I make a million dollars? what does that look like? who do I have to be to obtain this wild and crazy delusional dream? I don't know. It's worth a shot, it only takes 30 seconds to do the thing that you're avoiding right now. Answering an email takes 30 seconds. Posting on Instagram without overthinking takes 30 seconds. And honestly, procrastination is also fear in disguise because if you're putting off something, why? Why don't you wanna do it? What are you afraid of? What's the worst that could happen? Will you die? That's the main thing. I'm like, if this happens, will I die? No, you won't. But you feel like that because your mind will confuse you and be like, if you do this, you're gonna die and you're not. But you have so much like electrifying fear about this thing that you just don't do it.'cause you don't wanna feel whatever that fear is, So if I can give you any advice, just lean into whatever it is you're avoiding. Write that sheet of paper down, fear versus delusion, and see what you come up with. And also DM me and share it with me because I need to see this and also cheer you on with your delusion because you never know the craziest thing in the world might happen. Five, you can't pour from an empty cup. I think this goes back to rest as a business strategy, but I do have a tendency to constantly pour from an empty cup, and I will give myself to anyone anything, and then I'll burn my candle and I will be RIP for a week trying to regenerate my energy, and so learning to refill my cup with creativity. And hobbies plus alone time made the biggest difference this year. So this year my goal was to have two new hobbies I've never had, and those hobbies was adult coloring. Those cute little like bears I don't know, is it coco Wild from like TikTok or like the girls coloring book. I had so much fun at the end of the night. Coloring when I put the kids to bed and everything was done. It's the best way actually to stop thinking about work, to reset, just not think about anything. All I'm thinking about is can I color in the lines? Can I color in the lines? And how do I highlight this area? Actually highlighting and shadows. But we learned guys, the best reset. But that's number two to journaling. You guys, I usually have a bunch of different journals and I never finish them, but this year I was like, I am committed to having one journal, one notebook, and filling it out. Every other day or so for the entire year. And I filled it with notes from my husband, pictures of my kids, screenshots of funny text messages, tons and tons of business ideas. it was the All Laura's brain journal. and if you wanna know what it looks like, I actually recorded a video for my wedding at students and I could just send it to you. But basically. That journal is my brain and I am actually emotionally attached to it. I had to move on to a new journal'cause it's full. But all of the stickers and the aesthetics and the vibes and my feelings, my ups and downs, my books, everything that I've read and done is in that book. And I think it's 300 pages long. It's just everything I could have dreamed of and more getting everything out of my head and not letting it cycle in my brain. So I tell everyone and anyone. Please go buy a notebook journal. Journal your thoughts right now. Put it in your purse, your backpack. If you have an idea, write it down. You might forget it. It could be a millionaire idea. or Maybe this is a thought you have, but you need to get out. So you can stop thinking about it. That thing that person did in 2009 is not important. Write it down. Leave it in the book. Leave it in 2025. Okay, leave it. we're not taking it into 2026. And so refilling my cup. By taking time for myself self-care, here we go. Self-care again, and understanding myself and my thoughts and then coming back to it. Like I was actually reading this time last year in my journal and that's when I got the idea for Wedding Atel trademark and rebrand. The entire rebrand and what that was gonna look like. The rebrand studio inside of Wedding Atelier and everything that I'm having ideas for now, I had the exact same download of my brain in 2024, so write it down. You just never know. If you're sitting on a gold mine of incredible ideas and you didn't start a business to be burnt out, you didn't start a business to always feel down and out and overwhelmed. Write it down and if you gotta talk it out, get a therapist. Me personally, I don't like talking it out. I tried it. It's not for me. But I will write. I will write four to five pages. Give me a prompt. I will hit the ground running. Okay. So yeah, these are all my lessons. This is a long one. It's almost 30 minutes help, but these are my biggest personal lessons of 2025. And I am going to look back at this checklist that I have for myself, and make sure that I follow these to not have to repeat. Any of the mistakes that I made this year? I always say that if you are constantly faced with the same test and trial and situation, that means you didn't pass the test. You're just taking it over and over again. Learn the lesson, move forward. Okay. Love you guys so much. I will see you guys when I launched the new name and rebrand for the podcast and when we open the doors for Lab 35. Would love to see you in there. Join that wait list. It's gonna be so fun. I can't wait. Literally can't wait to be your biggest hype girl over your portfolio makeovers, and also stay tuned for my new offer that's gonna change the world. Okay, I'll see you guys next year. All right. I'll talk to you guys soon. Bye.