Fail!!! What!?!? Yes, just do it! Fall flat on your face! Why? WHY would I say a terrible thing like that?? Well you see, I have had this realization recently that the world (well, maybe just me) is so terrified of falling on our faces or doing something not quite perfect that we don't try or we don't jump as high as we could, we hold back, and don't challenge ourselves to go for those all the things we love because we are just scared of failing.And this is frankly, dumb. What's so wrong about failing? Really? I mean what is going to happen, if one day my pictures are crap, if I look stupid on the dance floor, or if I get a 'B' on my exam (yes, I admit, I was one of those annoy 'A' student)?If I fail, the world won't end, everyone won't hate me. I won't have to give away my camera, burn my dance shoes, or ride the short bus for the rest of my life. No one wakes up just taking amazing pictures or composing musical masterpieces. You have to learn, and you learn by trying. If you try hard enough to learn you will fail many times, and that is OK. It's awesome actually. It means you have pushed yourself so hard that you could fail and when you fail you have this incredible opportunity to grow! Just like when you lift weights. The goal is to push your muscles so far that your muscles can't lift anymore, and in that instance when your muscles are too weak to lift any more, when they fail you, they are too tired for any more, this is the point when your muscles actually will become stronger.So I know we're in April, and the whole new year's resolution is so 4 months ago, but who cares? There are still 8 more beautiful months of this year left.. So this year, I want to propose a challenge to myself and everyone who is holding themselves back because of fear of failure.. Please just let go and fail!!!!Push yourself, scare yourself more and more, take yourself to that point of failure and let yourself fail. Then do it again. We'll still love you. Go learn to dance, cook a souffle, travel to Europe, or better yet invent a pineapple tree that grows in the arctic (OK, that last one was my selfishness coming through). You'll probably be terrible at first, and your souffle will look like I jumped on it, or you'll look as graceful as an elephant with four left feet on the dance floor, but you'll get better and better and then you'll be Fred Astaire. So Just Fail!So my first point of this challenge? Well I only have 4~5 months left in Korea and I have made a list of what I want to accomplish in these next months of my life... All of these are scary things for me to attempt, and even scarier to put them online. I tend to keep my goals all locked up in my journals, so if I don't ever get around to attempting them, I only know. However, this is a new year of going toward my fears. No more excuses!Challenge #1 Be more open!So here is the dastardly list. Short, Sweet and Scary. What would your list look like?1) Submit my pictures to a magazine that I like2) Collaborate with another artist(fashion designer, make-up artist, etc.) on a Photography Shoot3) Do a Fashion Shoot in Seoul4) Start a CREATIVE bi-weekly self-portrait series (all turn the camera around/in the mirror pictures are banned!) with Mandolyn McConaha in May.5) Finish learning to cook all of my favorite Korean dishes.6) Continue and Finish a Medium Format Portrait Series on my little Orphan Boys (Much more on them later)Finally this is my first attempt at using a Medium Format TLR Camera! I got a lot of uh blurry, underexposed, fail pictures, but I got some that I liked too. Using the camera was such a challenge, a totally foreign experience, but really fun all at the same time. Expect more TLR Pictures in the next few months. :)

Soooo... I'm back to school and according to a doctor my good grades are leading me to stress out which equals a too low body temperature leading to health issues(don't worry nothing major). But my brother's advice to me? just get bad grades. It will solve everything. Yes! perfect. I love you, Micheal. you're so intelligent. Such a sage(and I'm not talking about that little green thing you stuff inside a Turkey on Thanksgiving). So today I am sending a mass email to my teachers explaining why it is necessary for my health performance to do poorly in their class. I'm pumped! This is the Best Day of My life. It is up there with the day that I discovered that if you squeeze a little lime and chile on your Mango your mouth will start to parTY! yum!

Why is the title of this post my environment? Because I got an assignment from my photo professor where our class had to ditch our fancy-smancy cameras and use only plastic cameras instead. I decided to use a pretty blue Diana+ camera, Thanks to my amazing sisters Candace and Anna for that and my equally amazing model Emmy. The assignment theme? Your environment. So apparently this is my environment? Mom, are you worried? My photo professor is. I think the doctor was right. Mom, you should make an executive order and pull me out of school. Enjoy my environment. or be worried about it. it's a free country. Oh and more Plastic Camera fun to come soon as long as my body temperature doesn't lead to hypothermia.