Cameras and Ovens? what the?

Top of the morning all! The picture I picked today is from a wedding I shot last weekend the 20th and is going into a photo brochure book I am designing. I am very pleased with how it looks and thought it might be nice to share.

I also wanted to share some quotes I have amassed over the last few years. They are but a few of the number I have and glance at often. I find strength within the words and recognise that the people who have said them have in fact also learned lessons I can benefit from; I am trying to apply them in my life.

It was said to me by a man I know that; "Craig, you will be the longest overnight success in history." I laughed and appreciated that he saw that I have persisted for many years and just won't give up at my dreams. I am really happy, and pleased with the way my talents are beginning to find a voice. I am excited because I am feeling closer to the fact that in a coming day those talents I have nurtured will allow me to work full time for myself and allow me to touch many people around the world. The whiff of being so close to my dreams now, more than ever before is almost intoxicating. I move forward each day with a resolve to get there. One of my brothers once said to me, what happens when you won't make it or "get there". I smiled at his negative statement, looked him in the eye and just said "then I will never have feared that I didn't try." Ultimately though I wanted to say, "get stuffed!" How dare you rain on my parade!! But the inner resolve I feel, is evident over the many years that not everyone else gets me or what I do. Some people say wow isn't it amazing what we can do with cameras these days? Out of sheer frustration I have been known to retort with the following statement,

When was the last time you ate at a restaurant?
Was it nice food?
"Yes" is often the response.
Then I ask did you say at the end of the meal, aren’t ovens wonderful, these days?
I normally get a puzzled look - but occasionally the penny drops straight away.

Clearly the oven, as my camera, significantly help, but it is the creator that makes the difference.
I normally get a look that says "he's a bit precious" and then they amble away thinking I am all a bit too weird, totally unaware that they are the people who have little or no idea, that what I do isn't something I do on the side. It is loaded with my passion, hopes and dreams. In it's very essence the source of what gets me up in the morning and drives me on to achieve. I love that I have that. I know people who don't have a dream or hope and they seem to float from one crisis to another and have little or no direction. A multi millionaire acquaintance of mine said to me once, "I wish I had your passion." I thought, "he is the rich guy who envies me?" This I got to hear I said to him.
He answered simply, "I get up in the morning, I go to work. I go home. I eat. I watch TV and go to bed. Then I get up again the next day and do the same. I live 4 weeks out of every year when I travel away on holiday." He said further, "if I had your passion, I would multiply my investments and fortune many times over..AND THEN BE HAPPY." He then concluded I was lucky. And I am, broke but lucky!!!!

Have a great day everyone.

All of our dreams can come true - if we have the courage to pursue them.
~ Walt Disney ~


The journey in between what you once were and who you are now becoming is where the dance of life really takes place.
~ Barbara De Angelis ~


“Dream as if you'll live forever. Live as if you'll die today.” - James Dean

"Experience is simply the name we give our mistakes." - Oscar Wilde

"When you are courting a nice girl an hour seems like a second. When you sit on a red-hot cinder a second seems like an hour. That's relativity."
- Albert Einstein -


It is not death that a man should fear, but he should fear never beginning to live. - Marcus Aurelius

"We must not measure greatness from the mansion down, but from the manger up." - Jesse Louis Jackson

"Everybody can be great... because anybody can serve. You don't have to have a college degree to serve. You don't have to make your subject and verb agree to serve. You only need a heart full of grace. a soul generated by love."
- Martin Luther King, Jr

"The quality of a person's life is in direct proportion to their commitment to excellence, regardless of their chosen field of endeavour." - Vincent Thomas "Vince" Lombardi


"Persistence is the twin sister of excellence. One is a matter of quality; the other, a matter of time." - Marabel Morgan

"The greatness comes not when things go always good for you. But the greatness comes when you're really tested, when you take some knocks, some disappointments, when sadness comes. Because only if you've been in the deepest valley can you ever know how magnificent it is to be on the highest mountain."
-- Richard Milhouse Nixon

"When one door of happiness closes, another opens; but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one which has opened for us." - Helen Keller

"I am enough of an artist to draw freely upon my imagination. Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world." - Albert Einstein

In everyone's life, at some time, our inner fire goes out. It is then burst into flame by an
encounter with another human being. We should all be thankful for those people who rekindle the inner spirit.
- Albert Schweitzer

"Our worst fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.

It is our Light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, "Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and fabulous?" Actually, who are you not to be?
You are a child of God; your playing small doesn't serve the world. There is nothing enlightening about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you.

We were born to make manifest the glory of God, the Divine within us. It is not in just some of us, it is in everyone and as we let our own light shine we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.

As we are liberated from our own fear our presence automatically liberates others."
- Marianne Williamson
"A Return to Love"


What a pity that so many people rather believe their doubts and doubt their beliefs. Why don't we just decide to have no doubts, and believe your beliefs! Fear and worry is just the misuse of the creative powers we originally got to dream.
Jannie Putter

I believe life is constantly testing us for our level of commitment, and life's greatest rewards are reserved for those who demonstrate a never-ending commitment to act until they achieve. This level of resolve can move mountains, but it must be constant and consistent. As simplistic as this may sound, it is still the common denominator separating those who live their dreams from those who live in regret.
Anthony Robbins