The following is a photography series by Kate Colby
Title: Who Am I To My Past Self?

My self portrait series is my reflection on what it meant to find a better version of myself. Throughout high school I subscribed harder to being a plain jane than I currently do to Netflix. But the thing is, I wasn’t even trying to. I felt the only surefire way for me to be successful was to take the planned track of a “normal” profession and became detrimentally focused on doing what it took to be on the right path. While I don’t regret taking challenging classes, I also won’t deny that the majority of my personality had evaporated my junior year of highschool from the pressure I put on myself.  I believed that because I wasn’t already an art prodigy by the ripe age of seventeen it would be a frivolous waste of time to try and develop those skills at that point, and doing so would simply be a leisure activity like reading or shopping, one that I wouldn’t make time for. In addition to the lack of belief I had in myself, I felt so restricted in my choices, due to a small class size full of typical suburban teens, that the risks of creativity felt like a chance to open myself up to criticism, not connection. I didn’t have outlandishly creative role models and friends to look up to the way I do now, and didn’t find those people until college. When my school size went from 1,000 to 40,000, I no longer felt like I had to play by anyone’s rules because who knew if I’d ever see them again past a five minute encounter. There was so much relief in the realization that others’ judgment wouldn’t be able to affect me that I began to open myself up to larger experiences. I was drawn to creatives and admired their decisive curations of self expression, and began to feel more and more like myself around them. I feel as though I’m getting to know myself all over again, and this time giving special care to the parts I hadn’t had the chance to meet yet. Only now can I look back knowing how much things would change.

Follow Kate on instagram:
Art - @katecolbycreative
Personal - @kaykaycolby