Catherine- Owner and Healer of Kokoro Ancient Healing & Sacred Ritual

Most people believe things happen for a reason. Most people believe that they meet certain people at certain times all for a reason. Call it fate. Call it the universe. I call it God and Divine intervention. Meeting Catherine and photographing her was a mix of divine intervention and purposeful fate. Catherine is a woman of science and ancient healing.

Catherine getting ready with the always amazing Bethany.

Everything about her speaks to wholeness, knowledge, peace, divinity, and pure love. She carries this love with her and fills whatever space she's in. When I first talked to Catherine and asked her how she wanted to be photographed she told me flat out, "I don't want to be seen at matronly." Even though Catherine is a mother to two boys who are her world and sit at the center of her universe, she knew, that for her, she needed to be seen differently.

Can we talk about those red shoes and snake skin pants and how totally ROCKIN' Catherine looks?

Catherine has always been a non-conformist when it comes to the media's standard of what beauty is. She's never bent to their ideas of what she 'should' be. But she has faced very serious, very difficult trauma and abuse that beat and tore down and desecrated her self-esteem. It was time for Catherine to see herself without those voices of the past, those lies whispering, sometimes yelling, that she was less than what she really was. She deserved to feel beautiful, to see it, to celebrate it, and to celebrate herself.

That light, I'm convinced that is her soul shining with pure happiness.

Catherine was a beauty to photograph! Her smiles, her connection to me, her honesty, and her HAIR made it not only a beautiful experience for her, but a joyful one for me and Bethany, my stylist and Catherine's close friend. Catherine wore dresses and killer, skin tight, snakeskin pants. We were in the studio and in my back yard. We laughed. We talked. We listened and we celebrated. From Catherine I was reminded that healing is a journey. It's not an arrival. And usually it doesn't happen overnight. Catherine has walked this beautiful path of spirituality not just for herself but as a guide for others. And she has walked it for years. She has helped, healed, talked with, and championed others who walk the sometimes lonely road of recovery and learning to love oneself.

I asked Catherine to just do her thing, to just be her. And this what she gave me, that movement, that pose, that look- perfection.

Despite her own history, her own struggles, and her own fears she shows up. At her photoshoot she bravely stepped forward with an open heart and trust that this was something she needed. This was fate. This was divine intervention. That this was a road on her journey and she needed to walk it. But Catherine doesn't walk . . . she dances . . . she shines . . . and she radiates her goodness like a bacon in the darkness for others to see and follow. Catherine, the gift of photographing you will be a joyful memory in my life, always. Your light is so powerful it still shines in my space and I believe it always will. Love, Melinda

Photography Studio in Athens PA.

Serving Athens Pennsylvania, Towanda Pennsylvania, Corning New York, and Twin Tiers area.