Maternity Yoga with Nicole Hamic

"I feel strong, and I feel vital, and I feel blessed to be making a healthy and strong daughter who should be joining us in about 6 weeks. "

When it comes to photographing the miracle that is the human Birth cycle, I am humbled by how little I will ever know about the experience. It is still a joy for me to gain new insight about what it's like to be my subjects. Nicole and I connected months prior to this shoot when she provided me with some beautiful mala beads for one of my other shoots. At that time, we vowed to create art together. 

In my first ever blend of yoga and maternity photography, Nicole and I set out to accomplish a few things: On the surface, this is a yogi doing what she loves to do: expressing herself and experiencing her body in a trusted way. #Yoga. It is the maternity aspect of this shoot which increases the complexity of our mission. Nicole was 33 WEEKS pregnant during this shoot, and she was conscious about how the photos would be received:


"I did these with the intention of starting a conversation: Women of all shapes and sizes should be celebrated and I hope these photos inspire other women to feel comfortable and brave enough to celebrate their bodies in all of their forms!

Being pregnant has also given me tremendous insight into what was before an unknown world to me, and that is the seemingly unending amount of time and energy spent trying to convince pregnant women that they are sick and frail, when in reality, 99% of pregnant ladies are in the height of health and their strength and vitality is something to be celebrated, not covered up, shunned, or hidden away." 
- Nicole Hamic

The Prophet: on children       -by Kahlil Gibran

And a woman who held a babe against her bosom said, "Speak to us of Children." And he said: 
      Your children are not your children. 
      They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself. 
      They come through you but not from you, 
      And though they are with you, yet they belong not to you. 
      You may give them your love but not your thoughts. 
      For they have their own thoughts. 
      You may house their bodies but not their souls, 
      For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your      dreams. 
      You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you. 
      For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday. 
      You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth. 
      The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite, and He bends you with His might that His arrows may go swift and far. 
      Let your bending in the archer's hand be for gladness; 
      For even as he loves the arrow that flies, so He loves also the bow that is stable. 

"I'm doing something I'm totally terrified of, but trying to remind myself that I have to be "the change I want to see in the world."

"I've been overwhelmed by the generosity and support of my family and friends and the patience of my husband as I waddle around trying to get things done. My clients and yoga students have been amazingly supportive and I couldn't ask to be surrounded by more lovely people."

You can learn all the Yoga from Nicole at Urban Yoga in Phoenix, AZ.