episode 230: how to rethink the way you look at (not in) photos
Summer is basically here. Which means less clothes, more skin, more photos and more body noise.
In this episode, I’m unpacking a powerful client convo about how much meaning gets lost the second we start picking apart how we look in a picture. We talk about:
How to respond to that gut-punch judgment when you see yourself in a photo
Why our first reaction isn’t the full story
A simple question to ask before you even look at the picture
Weddings, vacations, graduations, recitals, pool parties—photos are coming. Let’s get ready to see more than just what we look like.
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2025-05-27 14-28-24
[00:00:00] Hello friends. Thanks for being here. Um, this episode is gonna be live on, is it Monday, June 2nd? Um, Ben's Bar Mitzvahs is coming Saturday, which is crazy. Um, maybe I'll do an episode about all of that stuff and I don't know, I'm not sure what will, what will be relevant, but, um, a couple things I think will be definitely in terms of like.
Food and thoughts coming up around my body. Anyway, um, what I wanted to talk about today is something that came up on a client call last week that was a great conversation that we had, um, and I thought was really timely given we're coming into summer. Um, and this is around photos, and photos are. Often tough all the time, but photos I think become even harder during the summer when we are wearing less clothes, wearing bathing suits.
Bodies are more exposed. We're on vacations. There's sometimes even like more opportunities for photos because of the nature of [00:01:00] what we're doing and schools out and all of that. Um, if you have kids. And so the kinda the question that I wanted to pose today is, can a photo be about more than what you look like?
Right. A photo is a visual medium, obviously, but what is that visual medium capturing? What is it representing, what is it showing us? We are so conditioned and used to thinking about photos and evaluating it kind of in terms of like the aesthetics of what the thing looks like, how beautiful it is, um, and especially when it comes to seeing ourselves and seeing other people.
Our brains are making a judgment. They're making an evaluation on what they see about what that person looks like. That person looks great. That person doesn't look gr look great. That person looks really thin and small. That person looks big, right? These are the things that our brain are doing on, on reactive, um, like autopilot, meaning those thoughts are coming out way faster than we can even [00:02:00] attempt to sort of like modulate them, and that's okay, right?
That's how our brains work. And so the, the, the reason this question came up is this client, um, was telling me a story about a photo that a friend of hers took of like a group of them, and the friend is like very into fitness and very, very focused on her appearance, sounds like to maybe like a negative extent, and made a comment to the client.
About like, oh, friends don't post unflattering photos of friends. Basically insinuating that she thought that the picture of my client, the way she looked, was unflattering. And so she therefore wasn't going to post it on social media. So kind of like, not really like being nice because who's to say what's flattering or unflattering?
And the client shared this story with me, um, and then she sent me the photo after our conversation, right. And because her feelings, she saw the photo and she was like. I didn't like love how I looked, but I didn't hate it. Like I didn't really see anything wrong with it. Right. So again, just a [00:03:00] reminder that what we see is our opinion, our evaluation, how we feel about what we see is an opinion.
It's not a fact this one woman thought it was unflattering. 'cause that's based on her lived experience and then the person of the photo that the person she was referring to. Right. My client had a totally different um, uh, interpretation of what she looked like. Which I think is in and of itself just really interesting and, and happens all the time, but we don't really stop to think about it.
And so we ended up having a conversation, um, and kind of working through this, around this idea of, well, what was that photo about? Or the photo was taken to document a really special, fun thing that these people did together with their kids. And so was the photo there to kind of show off or represent what they each looked like?
Or was the photo there to capture this fun memory this time they spent together? Right this, this is kind of what a way that we can start to use to respond to some of these thoughts that come up about about a photo. Why did you take that photo? There was, [00:04:00] sometimes we take photos just because we think we look good.
Absolutely. And that's okay. That's not bad or a problem. But we also take photos to document experiences and memories and people we were with and things that we know we want to remember, and that has a tremendous amount of meaning and value. And, but we often, sometimes, as soon as we see the photo, we forget that because we immediately see what we look like and our brain goes there first, and then we start to judge and criticize or kind of dismiss the photo because we don't like how we look.
And we forget the original reason why we took it to begin with. Right. Um, and so this is just something I wanted to bring up. This is not gonna be a super long episode, right? I think this could potentially be a very helpful check-in, right? When you see a photo of yourself and you don't like how you look, can you notice, write that, that snap response, which [00:05:00] is okay, and then respond to it, and asking yourself, well, why did I take this photo?
What is this photo capturing? Um, what was happening? Why do I wanna remember this? What does this photo mean to me? And what happens when you work to let your, uh, discomfort with how you look? Coexist alongside the significance of that photo. What it, the job of that photo, right? The job of that photo was to capture something, memorialize something, capture a feeling, capture a story, a connection, documenting experience, preserving a memory, capturing a special occasion, right?
That's like a list of things that photos do. Can your discomfort with how you look live alongside what that photo was doing, right? And. Can we learn to see, can we practice, not learn? Can we practice seeing or identifying the value of the photo beyond just what we look like? [00:06:00] And that's really what this is about.
And again, this is practice. This is a, this is a skill. And I'm also wondering, as I'm talking through this, if there's a way like. Even before you look at the photo, right? 'cause we live in the age of, I have for a long time where you take a photo and you instantly see it on your phone, right? Not in like the 1990s where it was like you took the picture and then you'd see it two weeks later and it's like, you forgot you even took it right.
Such a different time. Which sounds silly to say, but when you really start to think about how, um, you know, smartphone cameras have just transformed. I mean so much in so many ways and in very insidious ways, and this is one of them. If before you look at the photo, can you remind yourself of why you took it?
We're having this great day. I'm seeing a family member I haven't seen in a long time. We're out to dinner at this amazing restaurant. Um, I loved this outfit when I put it on and I saw it in the mirror and I want to capture it so I can recreate this outfit another time. Right. That is something appearance based.
Right. I love how I looked [00:07:00] in the mirror. Doesn't mean you're gonna love how it looks in the photo. Also doesn't mean that how you looked in the mirror wasn't real, and it doesn't mean that that outfit didn't look great. And it doesn't mean that you can't wear that outfit again, right? Because then that starts to go into, well, how does a photo manipulate reality?
A photo may manipulate the reality of what things visually look like, but it doesn't manipulate the reality of how things felt, or a memory or an occasion or experience that you want to remember that you were trying to capture and document. And so again, right? The check-in the question becomes, what am I trying to capture with this photo, right?
Why am I taking this photo and remembering that and using that as a way to respond to the noise that comes up when you see what you look like. And I'd love to hear how this works for you, right? Can you put this into practice this summer? Um, graduation parties, graduations, vacations, all this stuff. Um, we're coming into a time of year recitals, my son's bar mitzvah, right?
I mean, let's talk about that. Circling back to the thing I opened up [00:08:00] with, um, there are gonna be countless photos I'm gonna see of myself and my brain is gonna go, whoa, you do not look good there. There's your double chin, there's your stomach, there's this, there's that. And you know what? Every one of those photos is gonna be documenting a very special day in our lives, and there are gonna be pictures of people and smiling and eating and dancing and doing all of these things that are really, really meaningful.
That matter that I will want to remember, and there is value in that, and it takes work to acknowledge that value and have it again, coexist with the discomfort that we feel around not loving how we look. So that's it. That's what I got for you. There's a nice super short one who doesn't love a really good super short podcast.
I love 'em. They're my favorite. So thank you for listening. Thank you for being here. I appreciate. As always, the time, energy, and attention that you give to listening to what I am sharing. Um, and if you have requests, you can always reach out. I love getting requests for people for podcast topics. Please don't hesitate to do that [00:09:00] and uh, I'll be back next week.