I’ve regretfully taken a break from writing my blogposts about women I photograph who inspire me. This was a commitment I made back in 2018, when I took a deep breath and wrote a personal blog, This is Me, where I described how I feel turning 50, pursuing my passion in portrait photography, my life, my commitment to my health and my desire to meet and profile people around me who inspire me. I stated then that I have the opportunity in my business to meet so many women who have courageously embarked upon a new career later in life, have found their live’s purpose in helping others, and in general whose spirit and spark drive me to do better as well. However, as much as I try to keep to a schedule, life gets in the way – and although I have met (and photographed) an abundance of inspiring women, I have let other tasks get in the way of writing these posts.

If one woman could get me back to documenting and sharing a profile of an inspiring woman, Carolyn is the one. I have known Carolyn as a friend for over 10 years, as a mother in the neighborhood, the parent of children my own kids’ ages, always a kind, gentle soul who taught preschool for ages and had a massive group of little children, and their parents, in  town who worshipped her. We used to run together and I know for a fact that she cared about the welfare and felt the responsibility for every little soul that came into her classroom.

One day, Carolyn announced that she was going to start training in yoga therapy. I had heard other moms talk about that before. We dabbled in this or that, yoga was a little trendy and fun activity. But as I learned about Carolyn, she doesn’t go partway on anything. She strategically planned out the next 5+ years of her life, incorporating her 1,000 hour yoga therapy certification while continuing to teach preschool. Once she completed her training, Carolyn was completely ready to embark upon her new passion and business of Heart Tree Yoga.

I had a branding session with Carolyn earlier this year and I got to see first hand, her studio, the way she works with clients, and her extreme dedication to helping people find greater ease of movement, balance, stability and strength through highly personalized  yoga therapy.

It fills me with joy to see these images on Carolyn’s website because I felt that I really was able to capture her gentle soul, her intense desire to help others, and her general joy and appreciation of life and nature.

But what got me to sit down, write this post and share it with the world, was a facebook post I saw that Carolyn had just written about her “Hello Station” to be held Wednesday in downtown Vienna, VA.  While it doesn’t surprise me that she wrote it and will be doing what she said she would, I know that it is a stretch for her – emotionally and physically