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Rachel Sarah

Photographer, Videographer, and Writer.

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By : Rachel Sarah July 21, 2020July 27, 2020

Seeking discomfort from a solo wild bivouac in Langdale

And it’s just that feeling, you know? With being a little uncomfortable but still safe. A feeling you crave.

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By : Rachel Sarah July 10, 2019July 14, 2019

Stay in

Perhaps it’s time to enjoy the little things you might forget to enjoy sometimes and remember that rest might be what you need, however much you fight it, and try to do too much.

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By : Rachel Sarah June 28, 2019June 28, 2019

Be alone

The beauty of solo travel, of backyard adventures, of being able to take yourself off into the wilderness to switch off for a while – to focus on creation, reflection, and a few hours of peace.

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By : Rachel Sarah June 26, 2019June 27, 2019

A solo trip to the Langdales | Photojournal

Self portrait practice, accidental summiting, and too much time looking at lambs.

bouldering woman 6a kentmere Read More
By : Rachel Sarah April 29, 2019June 18, 2019

Don’t let one thing define you

Experimenting through so many things helped lead me to this point, knowing a little more about who I am by not defining myself as one thing.

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By : Rachel Sarah January 18, 2019January 18, 2019

A selfish year

A wholly selfish year, and a lot of running before I’m even really crawling.

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By : Rachel Sarah December 21, 2018January 16, 2019

Chasing followers: a path to feeling hollow

If you’re seeking to find value in your own work, then it’s time to spend more time creating than trying to ‘hack’ people into seeing your creations.

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By : Rachel Sarah December 3, 2018January 16, 2019

Writing what feels right

For the better part of a year, I’ve been swirled up in thoughts of the persona I should now be, so I could become ‘successful’.

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By : Rachel Sarah October 23, 2018January 16, 2019

I can’t sleep.

Will blue light blocking glasses make a difference?

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By : Rachel Sarah September 22, 2018January 16, 2019

A body is [just] a body

I think back about how it felt to be the subject of a life drawing class. How sitting, standing, laying, naked made me feel liberated.

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Rachel Sarah 💙
16 Apr
Rachel Sarah 💙
@rachelsarah_m

I'm going to pretend that spelling mistake was a pun because I'm in the peak district... twitter.com/rachelsarah_m/…

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Rachel Sarah 💙
16 Apr
Rachel Sarah 💙
@rachelsarah_m

it's been a little while since I've peaked out of the van door to a view like this 🌞 #peakdistrict #photography pic.twitter.com/5vZlOVCjm8

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Rachel Sarah 💙
13 Apr
Rachel Sarah 💙
@rachelsarah_m

a few stills taken from mine and Sam’s first day filming Jim’s documentary. Already, I’m blown away by his willingness to be vulnerable and tell his story on camera. Injury, mental health, and self image are all such hard things for a man to talk about, especially publicly. pic.twitter.com/g7YQFmsK0W

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Rachel Sarah 💙
13 Apr
Rachel Sarah 💙
@rachelsarah_m

the first time I met Sam, we went for a chilled climb to see if we vibed and wanted to work together some time in the future. The second, I recruited him as a model for a @ParamoClothing shoot. The third - at the very beginning of co-directing a film together 🎉 #collaboration pic.twitter.com/i1bHkMeEH1

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Rachel Sarah 💙
13 Apr
Rachel Sarah 💙
@rachelsarah_m

How I initially felt about getting into the sea. But it turns out my wetsuit actually does the job and filming in the sea is my new favourite thing. 🎥🌊 @JessieLPhoto #filmmaking # pic.twitter.com/5dgmJtCD9M

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Rachel Sarah on Instagram

rachelsarahm

Freelance 🎥
She/her | vegan 🌍 | creating films, taking photos, + running around the mountains.

Rachel Sarah 🌱
I sleepily crane my head to look out of the front I sleepily crane my head to look out of the front window of the van as blue hour approaches, slowly swinging my feet around and into my slippers, sliding the side door open and peeping the camera out as the sun begins to rise.

We all love moments like this, moments in the outdoors. When we’re peering out of our tents in the mornings, huddled around stoves making our dinner in the mountains, waking up in a chilly van to find the light creeping in, stood at the trig point - looking out at endless views.

We keep repeating that the outdoors is for everyone, but it is not. In so many ways. We largely see these places as our ‘playground’, but they are more than that. Our National Parks are hard won spaces, our access to places like crags are complicated with land ownership rules with organisations like the @teambmc and volunteers doing hard work to keep that access for us. 

The majority of my 8,000+ followers are people who love the outdoors, who - I assume..? - love the freedoms that are associated with living in a democracy.

And I think many of us think that these things, these protections, are just... there? No. Less than 1% of the population in England own the majority of the land. At the moment trespass is a civil violation, it’s tolerated. The new policing bill seeks to change that to a criminal trespass, largely seeking to harm traveling communities. The policing bill also seeks to, essentially, make ‘annoying’ protests illegal. Please, go back and read that again. Protests, illegal. 

I see more anger and more posts about trash being left in outdoor spaces than I see about our government trying to take away our actually rights. There is something wrong with that. And it kind of rings of that rhetoric of blame that shifts from those in power to individuals. Because individuals are easier to blame and be angry at than a decade of austerity, lack of education, of government corruption.

And that blaming of each other, and the distraction of our new freedoms post lockdown, it is kind of what they’re counting on.
I find it difficult to talk about mental illness, I find it difficult to talk about mental illness, about body image, about injury and recovery. And I know that there are many people who find it so much harder to talk, to be vulnerable, because of societal pressures and stigma. 

On the theme of me being in the water with a camera a lot this year, I am really excited to share my second (and last!) waters film for this year - a documentary focusing on something I often feel is missing from adventure films - men’s mental health. 

Talking about suicide, our relationship with our bodies, about trauma - these are all so hard to open up about, let alone to a camera and microphone, so I feel really grateful that @swimjim58 is letting @samwalker.uk and I into his life, his thoughts and feelings, his story.

And here’s to hoping that this film may help -everybody- in feeling more open about sharing and supporting each other ♥️

Oh and also Jim will be doing the small thing of swimming from Jersey to France this summer too... 🏊‍♂️ this is an endurance swimming film with a pretty special place in my heart already. 

Our pitch trailer will come soon (currently getting sent to sponsors!) and there’s a sneak peak in my stories. 

📸 video and film stills by @samwalker.uk and I
I’m learning to be gentler with myself. Well, I’m trying. I spend almost all of my own time in my own mind and thought after thought after thought are those kinds of thoughts that make me want to curl up into myself and never want to leave. A very fine line between motivating and criticising, a line so fine I crisscross over it all of the time. I understand and accept that this is often what living with depression is but it doesn’t mean that I can’t try and embrace the good so much more. 

Hello to trying to be a little more unapologetic, and so much more kinder to myself about my body, my career, my creativity - just all of it. Everything. To celebration of self rather than shrinking because ‘it’s never quite good enough’.

It’s not all just bad, there is so much joy, too. 

📸 @jessielphoto capturing me in my element, fresh out of filming in the evening sea with @harvmania and full of creative energy. Edit, me 🌙
“This is what democracy looks like.” Solidar “This is what democracy looks like.” 

Solidarity with everybody heading out this weekend. I don’t think I’ve ever really seen in person so many different causes unite together like this - movements from all facets of social, environmental and animal rights justice speaking truth to power and challenging our government in a way that goes beyond this crime bill. It is just more than this single thing. We are tired of this corruption, the suppression of rights, and this movement toward fascism. 

This is what democracy looks like. Spaces like this for normal people to have their voices heard. Please please know and repeat that protests are spaces for everybody, not just for ‘activists’, you belong there. And protests do create change, literal history is my reference for that. 

To those able and comfortable to head out this weekend: 

- don’t take or post imagery of others without consent 
- know your rights (resources in stories) 
- know what legal representation you can call if you’re arrested (hopefully your local protest has shared details on who is your legal rep contact) 
- go with others if you can
- mask, sanitise, and distance.

It is past time for action. Not just reading and learning and unlearning. Action. Whether that takes the form of protesting or donating or having difficult conversations, in giving space to others, in challenging and turning down opportunities. 

- I hope you’re able to stay safe this weekend ♥️
“the thing I find that’s missing from adventur “the thing I find that’s missing from adventure films and film festivals and things like that is swimming. You see the beauty of swimming, but you don’t see the endurance behind it, you don’t see the grit behind it. And I just want to show people.” 

Here starts a 12 month project, with @harvmania training over the next year for her Ice Mile. Exploring the solitude of swimming, and how much she has missed her swimming community - her mentors, and support - throughout the pandemic. How this community will begin to become part of her life again. Exploring and training from now, this spring, into the warmth of summer, autumn, and then into icy waters of winter when she will hopefully be ready to do her Ice Mile. I have to be honest, I had no idea how hard it was.

I grew up by the sea, I used to love the water, when I lived abroad I literally lived on a beach, and used to swim almost daily up until a five or so years ago. And it slipped away from me, and so I’m finally also fulfilling my own goals of getting in the water with the camera, in the oceans, tarns and lochs of the UK.

And, one of the best things, I’m working with @jessielphoto - who is somebody I looked up to when I first decided I wanted to start making outdoor films 🎥 it’s our first project together and I am pretty excited! We will be sharing lots of behind the scenes content and speaking to some really experienced swimmers to learn so many important things 🌞
I keep looking at this photo and imagining that th I keep looking at this photo and imagining that there’s a big blue body of water in the middle, it feels like there should be, I don’t know - it just feels like empty space. A bit like how I’m feeling right now - I’m just pretty deflated and second-guessing myself. It’s the end of the tax year and 2020 hit me hard with work. Like it has a lot of people, many who don’t have the safety nets I do. It’s been so incredibly demoralising not having work, not having an income, seeing yourself sink into debt as you wonder day after day whether to give up freelancing and take up something else, even if just temporarily or part-time. Being approached and time spent in meetings and planning to then be ghosted or told the budget isn’t actually available. I’m just really tired. 

I’m tentative about sharing this, but I feel like that this kind transparency is important especially to anybody who may look at what I do with jealousy or longing. There is so so much joy in this job but fact is that it’s hard to be freelance in normal circumstances and the pandemic has really thrown things into chaos even moreso. I’m really tired and I’d really like to just pack my trad rack and climb a mountain and not worry about this for a day or two.
With conversations centering on solo travel, solo With conversations centering on solo travel, solo adventuring, I’ve been thinking a lot more on solitude and how it can be often seen. As unsociable, selfish, and as a rejection of others. Solitude has always been a large part of my life, pre-pandemic and now. It used to upset me, my own need for space from others. Space to reflect and create and just, be, without outside influence. And it still does bother me a little now from time to time but mostly because I worry that it upsets others that I can be perceived as distant or uncaring. I am not any of those things, I love and care deeply, but I just enjoy space more than most. I have come to accept that it’s just who I am - I’ve grown into it and the acceptance of it. The last few years I’ve leant so much more into who I am- somebody who loves to be alone, travel alone, create alone, process and heal alone. But also with the knowledge that there’s a place in which I love being with others - the ratio is just a little different to most people’s, and that’s okay. I’ve also noticed that in embracing this love for solitude I now enjoy and value the time I do spend with other people so so much more.

 I went fully in with the imagery metaphor here, I truly love this photo and it seemed like an apt time to share it ♥️

[image description: taken from high above, the image is mostly white cloud with a solitary orange piece of land poking out from the cloud in the middle of the frame. If you look closely it looks like a road runs over this piece of land.]
I remember seeing myself as invincible; I could pr I remember seeing myself as invincible; I could protect myself. I was ‘strong’ and nothing could hurt me.

Mid-teen, I tucked away trauma into a small, unvisited part of my brain - where it still largely lives - and carried on trying to feel invincible. But this sense of self assurance was chipped away, ground away, with each experience of trauma, ‘big’ and ‘small’- and the more stories I heard from other women, and the more I am told that we should behave differently to keep ourselves safe. 

So many women are sharing experiences because of what has happened to Sarah Everard - I saw a thread on Twitter today where women shared their experiences on what men could do to help them feel safer when walking at night. And this is a conversation so much larger than that - a conversation where race, sexuality and ability (and so much more) all need talking about. But still, it’s a thread worth reading. I’ll share it in my stories.

When a man crosses the road when he’s walking behind me when I’m alone at night, it makes all the difference - to me anyway.

I’m usually very open as a person, but there are certain traumas I personally do not want to go into publicly. And I’m sure that’s the case for nearly every woman I know. And not just women. 

For every person speaking about their experiences, there are so many more who don’t. 

I ask this of the men who follow me - have you ever had a conversation with your male friends about this without being prompted? Call out misogynistic behaviour. The jokes, the ‘banter’. Not just when somebody who will disapprove is present. 

♥️
When I first found out where our basecamp in the A When I first found out where our basecamp in the Andes would be, in the shadow of this mountain, I spent some time researching the area, and was determined to shoot the Milky Way and this peak, despite the fact I had (and still have) very little experience in astrophotography. And not *quite* the right lenses to pull it off. Quite often my dreams for a photo are far beyond my actual capabilities. 

So fast forward a few weeks and I’m there, with a wonderful group of people I’d been photographing for the past week, feeling such joy and looking up at the sky, seeing the Milky Way the brightest and clearest I’d ever seen it. 

But the Milky Way was in completely the wrong side of the valley. Not above the mountain. So, in between cups of rum and dancing by a fire in the cold Andean evening, I wandered off into the darkness alone and set up the camera to capture the stars, and then, after an uncomfortable frozen night’s non-sleep, I crawled out of my tent and captured the mountain as the sun rose. These two photos have been sitting in my Lightroom for over a year now, and in the early hours of the morning this week I was reminded of their existence, and decided to finally create that photo that’s always been in my head. An image I never actually saw but one that represents my time spent in the mountains that night. 

It’s really easy for me to stick to the things I am good at, to stay away from trying to create things that may be beyond my skill. So it’s nice to step out of that comfort zone and play with new ways to reflect on and capture moments.
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