The photo that launched Lauren Greenfield’s career is extraordinary. From the framing to the clarity and control of the aperture, the photo shows an extremely strong feel for and knowledge of a camera. What is crazy to me is that she was unable to get that photo, along with the rest of her series, published. She has a narrative and theme, the photos are all expertly crafted, and yet no one wanted them. What is even crazier than the fact that no one would publish the photos is that she managed to capture such amazing photos during an internship with national geographic. The time, the place, and even what she was photographing (theme wise) was likely all already decided by the company when they assigned her the project. Being able to produce works of that ability when your own creative ideas are limited by someone else is especially interesting, but more so inspiring. Being able to put my passion, my creativity, and my skills to work to create the best work possible is something I try really hard to achieve. But I tend to struggle when the prompts given to me are not interesting to me. Lauren Greenfield’s story behind her first photo is inspiring, as a photo I may not necessarily want to take could end up being my favorite photo ever. She has taught me to act first and think later in photography, when I used to think first and act if I still liked the idea after thinking about it.