We have all heard the classic saying that life is too short and that we should live it to the fullest. It is often difficult to come to terms with this, and sometimes we even stress out about how to really get the most out of this life we are living. I contemplate this all the time–about who I am, what my purpose is and what I will leave behind when I leave this world. I obviously still have a lot of learning to do, and I will always come to find myself more and more as my life goes on—we all will. However, I have come to realize from the 19 years that I have been on this earth that having memories and reminiscing about milestones in your life is so important. The best way I have found to do this is through photography and taking videos to look back on.

I love the idea of being able to capture all of the best life moments and be able to take with us just a little bit of the emotions that we feel during the best times of our lives. I saw a quote on Tumblr the other day that said, “I wish there was a way to know you're in the good old days before you get out of them.” I found this so relevant, especially at the point of my life that I’m in now. I just graduated from high school back in June, and I have spent a lot of time reflecting on how much my life has changed over the course of the last couple of years. I can’t even begin to explain how much I love to have pictures from over the years in high school and knowing that I had the best time. I can only imagine how I will feel ten years from now (hopefully married and having kids) and I will think back on basically my whole childhood and youth. I want to be able to see how I have grown and how all of my friends and family have grown. I can’t stress enough how important it is to remember all of the best parts of your life and be able to share them with your kids and family someday, or at least I would think so.

I follow so many beauty bloggers and people on social media who have photos from a day-to-day basis with their families, and I can’t help but think about how amazing that will be someday to have captured all of those memories. However, I don’t think we should wait until we have families to start documenting milestones. Even just basic day-to-day things will someday be worth remembering. At least when certain milestones like “the good old days” pass us by, we can relive them through the pictures and videos we take. So I would encourage you, when you are having a good day out getting coffee with you friends or mom or significant other, to take a picture or two! You most likely will not regret it.