Not making enough money in your boudoir photography business? You’re probably too focused on what you are getting from the client, rather than on what you are giving to the client. And you probably aren’t working with love.
I remember reading the bestselling book Return to Love by Marianne Williamson and my jaw dropped as I read Chapter 7 on Work. Here are some of my favourite passages:
Do what you love. Do what makes your heart sing. And never do it for the money. Don’t go to work to make money; go to work to spread joy.
People don’t come into your place of business so that you can get anything. They’re sent so that you can give them love.
When we’re working solely for money, our motivation is getting rather than giving. The miraculous transformation here is a shift from a sales mentality to a service mentality. Until we make this switch we’re operating from ego and concentrating on the things of this world rather than on love.
When we are motivated by the desire to sell, we are only looking out for ourselves. When we are motivated by the desire to serve, we are looking out for others.
Money is not scarce. It is not a finite resource. We are not poor because the rich are rich. We are poor because we do not work with love. The issue is whether we’re working for money, or working for love.
Think of your career as your ministry. Make your work an expression of love, in service of mankind. Within the worldly illusion, we all have different jobs. Some of us are artists, some of us are business people, some of us are scientists. But in the real world that lies beyond all this, we all have the same job: to minister to human hearts.
No job really has any more potential impact on the planet than any other. We’re always impacting the world in which we live, through our presence, our energy, our interactions with others. The question is, what kind of impact are we having?
Miracles shift us from a “get” to a “give” mentality. The desire to get something reflects a core belief that we don’t have enough already. As long as we believe there is scarcity inside of us, we’ll continue to manufacture scarcity around us because that is our basic thought. No matter what we get, it will never be enough. When our desire is to give instead of get, our core belief is that we have so much abundance, we can afford to give it away. The subconscious mind takes its clue from our core beliefs, and brilliantly manufactures situations that reflects them. Our willingness to give directs the universe to give to us.
That chapter was a game-changer for me in my photography business. Until then I believed all I had to do was ‘do what you love and the money will follow’. But I was loving being a boudoir photographer, yet the money was definitely not flowing to me. After reading that chapter I realized I was missing a vital step. My love of photography wasn’t enough, I also had to spread love to my clients. Now I believe the saying should be ‘do what you love and serve people’s hearts while doing it, and the money will follow’.
The importance of giving was reiterated to me when I did a shoot for a very successful millionaire couple. I travelled to their home to do a boudoir shoot for the wife, while her husband stayed to watch. Rather than treating me as someone who was there to work for them, they treated me as warmly as if I was a family member or friend. They fussed over me, like no one has ever fussed over me. They made me a refreshing healthy smoothie for a drink, my leggings got wet while shooting at their private beach and she gave me a pair of her own leggings to wear home. They offered to tell me where they kept the house keys so I could do photo shoots at their home while they were away on holidays. And to top it off they gave me a home cooked meal to take home that night. I have never met more generous people in my entire life. And I realized very quickly why they were successful millionaires – they were so focused on giving. It reminded me of the Maya Angelou quote “People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” That couple reaffirmed what I had read in the book Return to Love and taught me exactly how I should be treating my clients.
It’s normal when running a business to become focused on money and to lose sight of what is important. Or once you’ve been in business for a while, and could almost do the job in your sleep, it’s easy to just ‘go through the motions’. But stay mindful. I believe the money will start flowing to you once you return your focus to giving more to your clients.
If you enjoyed this post, and wanting more practical tips on how to give to your boudoir clients, then I highly suggest you read my blog post on using the 5 love languages in your boudoir business. You can read it here.
Wishing you all the success in your photography endeavours xxx