a silent hope.

so i thought i would share with you some of my writings from college from time to time. hope you enjoy. this one is from a paper i wrote for my Theories of Rhetoric & Communication course...

Turn off the music. Shut down the computer. Or turn off the television. Take a walk through the forest. Do not speak, but simply listen. Can you hear it? The silence? What does it reveal? What is it calling you to do? How do you respond? What power lies within the silence? What of silence in conversation? In moments of pain and heartache? How can we cultivate a silent hope?

I do not allow for silence enough or perhaps it is that I do not engage with or entertain the silence. I listen to music or I talk with my friends or even talk to myself. I too often neglect to “quiet down my busy mind to find a hiding place.” I think to some degree silence makes me uncomfortable, and I am not sure what to do with it. I suppose I am not alone here. We are cultured to think that silence is bad or awkward or just dead air because we live in a noisy and busy world. The silence is often polluted with this noise, with ceaseless talking and with little to no regard for its power. Thomas Merton writes, “it is the silence of the world that is real. Our noise, our business, our purposes and all our fatuous statements about our purposes, our business and our noise: these are an illusion” (257). The noise seems to overtake us and consume our very lives. We go about all our business in a noisy hurry and rarely simply stop and quiet our hearts, our minds, our lives. We seldom put forth the time and energy to “practice the quieter virtues” (to barrow a phrase from Greg Spencer). If the silence of the world is reality, then we must seek to reclaim that reality. We must learn to be silent. We must come to respect the power of the silence and appreciate the quiet. “When we no longer walk in the presence of the Lord, we cannot be living reminders of his divine presence in our lives” (Nouwen, 29). Christ dwells in the “secret and the quite place—in the stillness he is there.” We must meet him there. “After that we go forth to find Him in solitude. There we communicate with Him alone, without words, without discursive thoughts, in the silence of our whole being” (Merton, 254).

There seems to be a beautiful and interesting connection between silence and hope. “If we fill our lives with silence, then we live in hope, and Christ lives in us and gives our virtues much substance” (Merton, 259). In order to live in hope, we must also live in silence. Let us consider hope in some more depth. Hope. Seems like such a simple word, yet in the four letters lies an immensity of meaning and significance. Hope is strongly connected to others. We must have hope in others and that hope empowers those around us. For, “our tongues are the keys that open heaven to others” (Merton, 254). It means being able to find a glimmer of hope in someone, something, and in ourselves that we are worthy and are His beloved. It is fully and whole-heartedly believing that He who began a good work in us will be faithful to complete it. That no matter how discouraged, unworthy, and insignificant we feel, He will finish the work that He has started in us. Yet it is so easy to let the world and others stifle that hope. We can so easily ‘stuck’. But the wonderful thing is that this hope can and will be restored. Because not only do we have a hope in the present but we also have a hope of an eternal future in Christ. I am reminded of the lyrics to the Avalon song “In A Different Light.”

Don't cry for me
No, I've never been one to shoulder the weight of the world
'Cause I believe
This is here and it's now, but it's not my home
There's a hope beyond what my eyes can see
And there's a place that He's preparing for me

Don't be afraid
Of the twists and the turns of the road that we're on, just believe
There'll come a day
When our faith turns to sight, and we'll see His face
While we're here the heartache's hard to ignore
So for now, we'll keep our eyes on the Lord

Knowing that everything is going to be alright in my eternal life seems to dim the despair of failure and allows for me to see things in a “different way, in a different light.” We must keep our eyes on Jesus and remember the beautiful promise of hope we have from our Lord.

Silence is often required in conversation. If we are to listen, we must first be silent—this is the case in both our conversations with God and with others. Sometimes people need us to simply listen, let them vent, get it out or tell their story. All too often people do not have anyone who just listens. Stories go untold, lives go unshared and conflicts go unresolved all as a result of a lack of silence. “Storytelling is as much for an other as it is for oneself” (Frank, 19). Stories must be told and heard.

Silence has power in moments of pain, heartache and tragedy. One of my friends from high school was killed after she went missing in a snowstorm nearly two years ago. It was one of the most painful moments in my life when I heard that her body had been found—that meant that she had actually died and there was no longer anymore hope for survival. It was over. I had hope that she would be found alive, but now it was gone, non-exist. There were no words to be said—just tears to be cried and weeping family and friends to be held. Silence. It was a cold yet warm silence—a silence pregnant with confusion, pain, hurt, agony yet with faith, love and a glimmer of hope. Hope for what? Well, perhaps it was an unsaid hope that something good could come out of this trying situation and somehow God would be glorified. I cannot say that I myself had that glimmer of hope in the moment or for many weeks afterward. I wanted to, but I was too paralyzed, too exhausted, too frozen. The silence was what I needed—what we all needed. All that we could do is let the silence be and let the quiet calm our hearts and minds. We had to give the silence the space to heal, to mend the wounds, and to revive our hope in an eternal future. We had to be still and know that he was God.

Works Cited:

Frank, Arthur W. The Wounded Storyteller: Body, Illness, and Ethics. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995.

Merton, Thomas. No Man Is An Island. New York: Harcourt, 1983.

Nouwen, Henri J.M. The Living Reminder. San Francisco: Harper Collins Publishers, 1977.

connectivity.

i am such a gen-y guy. i get a strange high off of connectivity. it excites me. we just got hi-speed internet at the house, and i am ecstatic. a little too much so i suppose. the days of dial-up are officially over. every time i wanted to, you know, check my e-mail or bank statement, it was an hour-long affair filled with sudden outbursts of anger and profanity. things are different now on my trusty wireless network which i aptly named "allrightythen". "so typical", you might be thinking if you know me well enough to recognize the reference to my favorite movie of all time: ace ventura--when nature calls. but alas, i am reconnected and spent the entire day, catching up on my wired (or wireless) world.

so my apologies if my responses have been delayed, and if you faithfully hit up my blog only to find nothing new, or if you looked at my website recently only to find that it had not been updated in months. i hope that now you will not be disappointed. i am back in action people. and i had not officially began updating my site (check out the new additions to my "people" section). and caught up on lots of work and e-mails. woo hoo.

and as with any apple-holic, i got me an iPhone. so watch out people, i am connected. always. but i vow not to be one of "those" iPhone users. you know exactly who i am talking about...the constant texter, e-mail checker and tele-phone talker. even whilst you are conversing with them over dinner. you know the ones whose iPhone is always in hand...or pressed to the ear.

but not me. no, no. and if i stumble, kick me while i am down and then pick me up and shame me. accountability people. (now, some of you may be thinking, "jeff, you were THAT person last week when we saw you." now, now dear reader, it was new. okay? cut me just a little bit of slack. the newness (but not the coolness) has worn off and i shall never again be one of those...)

i went all sorts of vivi on it.

a few weeks ago, we had a knarly wind storm. it was intense. it blew over one of our prized aspen trees. this saddened me. a lot. i hate it when trees die. so i thought, "might as well salvage some of its limbs and create a vivi inspired arrangement." i got a little carried away and combed the garden and borders of our property in search of foliage i could use. my dad called me "the weed wacker" because i was harvesting dead things. "it's art man. leave me alone," i protested. so i scattered my palette out on the patio, pirated various containers and vases from around the house, and set out to get all sorts of Vivi on it.

for those of you who don't know, vivi teston is my friend who i met whilst i was working at eye of the day garden design center this summer. we bonded straight away. it is the artist in both of us i suppose. and that she is a wonderful woman. i adore her. and she is an INCREDIBLE floral artist to boot. i would frequently watch her create installations at the store on my lunch break. and we would chat it up about all things art. i miss those moments.

so, with Vivi as my inspiration, i created a piece for my sister's birthday dinner and a few others for around the house. good times. so check em out. and check out vivi's site here. if you ever need floral pieces for anything...weddings, parties, gifts, gallery openings, she will rock your world. seriously, she is fantastic, mad talented, and a delight to work with.

natural.

inside jokes, late nights, banters and rants, prayers and strategic planning, and creative ideas come from leading a ministry with someone. naturally you find yourselves spending a lot of time together. for sara and i, this often spelled trouble because we had too much fun together scheming ways to change the world and conceptualizing various photo projects. and from one of these times with my invisible children ministry co-director, sara, came an idea for a photo shoot: natural beauty. we tucked the concept into our back-pockets and carried on with our delegation.

three years later we were reminded of sara's idea and decided to actually carry it out. so alas, i give you a long-time coming photography project: natural beauty...

creative director: sara truppo.
models: kara reynolds, lauren salaun and sara trupp.
location: santa barbara, california






the girls insisted that we get a shot all together self portraits status. so here i am with my gorgeous models/friends...
this shoot was a blast. sara, thanks for your vision and concept and for pulling the shoot together and of course for modeling. thank you kara and lauren for being so much fun to work with. you all are incredibly beautiful. damn!

santa barbara.

so i journeyed up to santa barbara after the conference to get my fix of my friends and of one of my favorite places in the world. and my favorites things in life...the beach, good food and wine, high-speed internet and westmont. woo.

i purposed to be here till wednesday, but i am having too much fun, so i am gonna stay through this weekend. i am loving it. so many fun people to hang with and adventures aplenty. yes, please.

crowley lake: i will be back soon...

partner-con highlights.

so last week i had the opportunity to attend the Pictage Partner Conference in Los Angeles. and to no surprise, i am still reeling from the experience and on a sort of creative high. ideas are swarming around my head and i am enthusiastic about the days, weeks, months and perhaps years ahead in the wedding photography industry. what struck me most during the conference was the high concentration of incredibly talented and truly wonderful people. i was all about the networking, the chit-chatting, the business-card-collecting. i met some amazing people and am excited about fostering and deepening relationships with them.

some blog love:

dane sanders. dane was my leadership professor when i was a freshman at westmont. i remember hearing that he was a wedding photographer as well, and soon found myself on his website, inspired, excited and intrigued. i wanted to see what that was all about. this wedding photography gig. one conversation with dane stands out in my mind when he shared with me his vision and heart for photography. i dreamt of someday do the very thing dane was doing. but was scared. unsure if i was ready. afraid of failing, of falling short. dane challenged me to commit to it fully. but i couldn't bring myself to do it. i tip-toed, dabbled and experimented. started a blog and bought his back up camera off him. only to fall in love with photography and realized that i wanted to pursue photography seriously. it took me a while, but finally mustered up the courage to become legit. dane inspired, encouraged, and prompted it all. i am blessed by him and honored to be his former (and current) student. i am reading his newly released book Fast Track Photographer, and am loving it. AND i am proud of him for sharing his gift with the industry and so excited that he is teaching. he is gifted people. read his book.

gabriel and carly. i met this awesome couple at lunch on the first day. i recognized them from Jasmine Star's blog, she was their wedding photographer. they are a absolute delight and i am so pleased to have meet them. their work work is inspiring, authentic and unique. and gabriel loves to snowboard. yay, for new friends.

whitney and peter are a super couple from nashville tennessee. they are so cool. we hung out the whole time. good times. and their work is amazing to boot.

david manning is a san diego based wedding photographer who is awesome and such a genuine, encouraging, and inspiring guy. he is the real deal. so happy to have met his dude! woo.

and of course, there is mike colon. this guy is awesome. i chatted with him after the Thirst Relief presentation, and we discovered we both have any affinity for snowboarding and surfing. mike is one of the world's best photographers and i can't believe i not only got to hear him speak but also got a chance to converse with him one-on-one. only at partnercon. mike is a genuine and humble man of God and is passionate about serving Christ in everything he does. seriously, what a treat to meet him.

my friends from santa barbara, Chris and Katie Humphrey's, were speakers at the conference and it was so fun to see and hang out with them. i adore this dynamic duo and have learned so much from them. thanks chris and katie for always supporting me. :) love you guys.

yay for partner-con and for new friends. thanks everyone for the inspiration and love. 'preciate it.

pictage partnercon

wow. i just got back from two incredible days at the pictage partner conference in la. i am inspired. motivated. encouraged. networked. empowered. and EXCITED. i met so many wonderful photographers who were an absolute delight and pleasure. i am stoked to have new friends in the industry and people to blog-stalk. haha. i got to hear from some of the best and most inspiring photographers in the industry and often times could not believe who i was listening to or with whom i was speaking. crazy. what a wonderful opportunity and i can't wait for WPPI and next year's partnercon. i shall post more thoughts and nuggets later, but for now, i am off to get some rest...

libes.

i went to boarders the other day to stock up on some biz books. i was anxious to get some reading in while a had a bit more time especially after going to david jay's workshop:free to succeed. so i took his book list and browsed the aisles in hope for expanding my own personal libes (library).

i started with Tim Sander's Love Is The Killer App. wow. i finished it in about two days. it is excellent. and i would recommend it to anyone involved in business. oh, wait isn't that everyone.

my summary: Tim candidly and simply articulates profound principles and thoughts on what he calls the Lovecat Way! ultimately, he encourages his readers to bring love back into the bizworld. the humanity. the Lovecat Way hinges on three primary intangibles: knowledge, network and compassion. gaining knowledge is one of the most important things you can do for your brand and it trickles through the rest of your biz. the more reading you do, the more you learn, the more you expand your mind, the more successful you will be. he then goes on to discuss the importance of networking and how to love the people with whom you connect. he gives concrete ways by which you can expand and grow your network. finally he reflects on the power of compassion in the bizworld and purports us to wield that power more often. be human, be honest and be real. bottom line: love. after all is it is the "killer app."

what impressed me most about this book was how it took much of what i had already heard or seen, and took it to a new level. Sanders weaved it all together and created a tangible schema for thinking about intangibles. i love it. i am particularly excited to employ this thinking in my own biz and career and am simply tickled that i read this book so early in the process of building a successful business. thanks you DJ for the rec. 'preciate it.

here are a few of my favorite quotes:
"when you represent knowledge, opportunity, selflessness, and intimacy, you are not just a service provider or a product. you are fun, you are interesting, your are valuable; ypu take people places they have never been before, you show them books they have never heard of, you introduce them to people they never dreamed they would meet--in short, you are the equivalent of a human them park."

"the ability to create an experience can jet-propel your career. It raises your vale and drives your price."

"to the extent i can differentiate my person, product or service, I extract premium value."

"success in the future will be base on the fuzzy intangibles:" the way you speak as a leader, the culture you nurture, the process for managing information you set up for your people, the partnerships you from around technology's opportunities and challenges."

"at the office, our humanity can be defined as the ability to involve ourselves emotionally in the support of another person's growth."

get this book. read it and add it to your library. but don't forget to "share the love" with others. read on...

next up: dale carnegie's How to Win Friends and Influence People...

gone country.

highlights (in no particular order): kettle corn. coronas. time with my friend kathy. four first places in the photography exhibition. 2 seconds, two thirds and quite a few honorable mentions. all first places in the design exhibition. the aisle walker. every night with my fam. dancing with my sister. having ashley up all weekend. running into an old friend, nate. destruction derby.

yup. i did that thing were i went country. i adorned myself in country attire and spend the past four days at the Eastern Sierra Tri-County Fair. it was a hoot. i can now say (proudly) that i am a one time all-fair pass holder. the fair is a trip. one is always in for a treat, a one-of-a-kind experience, a countryfied weekend to be sure. we saw some kooky people, bizarre outfits (stacie and clinton would have had a fit), and of course some not so impressive fair entries. we witnessed our fair share of drunkenness, cowboy hats, horses, quilts, photographs, and vegetables. not to mention our crazed, hair-piece adorned, silicone enhanced, leather-wearing loyal Grandstand aisle walker. we may or may not have laughed out loud and surreptitiously snapped a photo or two of her.

thursday: emerson drive. a absolute thrill. they are quite talented and i definitely found myself enjoying them and their country tunes. i for sure do-cee-doed a time or too.

friday: the truck pull. mildly entertaining. the announcer was the worst of all time. she made a potentially pleasant evening miserable. but we all had fun laughing at her. and of course, i had to critique her "rhetorical choices". but the trucks pulled and modified tractors made some serious noise. in one class, they are allowed to put as many engines on as they can so long as the whole thang doesn't exceed 8000lbs. so that was cool.

saturday: rodeo. this was fun. a classic country affair. the buckin' bulls were cool even tho none of the cowboys make it 8 seconds.

sunday: destruction derby. this was a BLAST. so must mangled metal, spilled anti-freeze, and smoking engines. our friends teb long and dustin delGuidice, had a car in the derby and my dad was the pit boss. this made it all the more fun. we had someone to cheer for. so our car made it to the main event and won second place in the beauty contest. it was a pirate ship after all. and my dad even made a working cannon for the thing. it was schweet. but we lost to the local bishop car. ugh. popularity contest rather than a beauty contest. teb did an awesome job and had quite the cheering section. well done!



all and all, it was great to be back at the fair after five years of not being able to go. you will probably see me there next year too. you should come up for it. what a hoot.