Let's Redefine Joy!

What is the Redefining Joy Project?  Well, it's taking The Love My Life Project* to the next level... to change the world!  It all started two Christmases ago... that fateful day, as I scrolled through my Facebook feed, feeling "less than" and not good enough to post beautiful photos of my "incomplete" family. Since then, I've heard many others echo the same sentiments that I felt. Whether they're other single parents... or just simply single... or older... or their pants are 5 sizes bigger than they "should" be.... so many of us feel "less than" when we compare our lives to the "Shoulds" of the American Dream.

I started The Love My Life Project as an internal journey, to use photographic portraiture as a means of empowerment, of overcoming the external "Should" and embracing What Is. The process of deciding your life is worth celebrating, then treating yourself to a beautiful portrait, and then posting your beautiful life for all to see is a joyful and healing journey designed to help you proclaim, "I Love My Life!" 

The Redefining Joy Project takes this one step further... from internal work to activism! You are not alone in feeling "othered" by society's perception of The American Dream (owning a home in the suburbs, having a heterosexual marriage between two cisgender people, maybe 2 able-bodied kids and a dog...). Yet SO many of us don't fit that mold... and that's okay! It's even awesome! And the rest of the world needs to know that joy DOES exist-- and it exists a-plenty-- outside of that mold. In sharing our beautiful portraits publicly, and bombarding social media feeds with ALL KINDS of beautiful lifestyles, together we can REDEFINE JOY. 

*What is The Love My Life Project? Read more about it on my homepage.

(Photo credit: Jeramie Lu)