Fighting and Conquering Inner Demons

“It is better to conquer yourself than to win a thousand battles. Then the victory is yours. It cannot be taken from you, not by angels or by demons, heaven or hell. “
-Buddha

We all have our demons. Whether they be born of insecurities, things that we lack in our lives, or irreversible events of our past. They torment us and drag us down every single day. Everyone has to deal with their demons in their own way, unfortunately the route that most people take usually only provides a temporary release and causes them to relapse and fall back into a slump.

· Alcohol and drugs are not the answerGetting drunk or high may provide one with a temporary freedom from the shackles of our demons and lift the weight of the world off your shoulders, but your demons will always be waiting for you when you sober up. This can also cause new demons, namely addiction. You’ll find yourself needing to be drunk or high all the time just to feel that release, which as the years go by can cause serious health issues and affect your personal life as well.

· Running away from your demons does not work

A lot of people are in denial about their demons. They say “Oh that’s not true.” Or “That’s not a problem I have.” You can run from or refuse to acknowledge your demons all you want, they are there. And refusing to acknowledge them will only give them power over you. Often times ignoring them can have a serious negative effect in that when they come your immediate reaction to push them away causes you to turn to the aforementioned drugs or alcohol, or other self destructive tendencies.

So how do you cope?

· Take a moment to understand

When you find yourself under attack from those demons, before you have that initial immediate reaction take a moment to pause. Say to yourself “OK I feel shitty, why do I feel shitty?” “What brought this about?” One of the most important aspects of dealing with your demons is to acknowledge and understand them. When you have an understanding of what it is, you can better prepare yourself to deal with them.

· Find something positive that relaxes you

Go for a bike ride. Or grab your Ipod and go for a walk. Go for a drive. Exercise. Get a hold of some friends and go do something. Find a positive means of release. The important thing is to not be idle when you find yourself under attack by your demons. If you remain idle you will have nothing to do but sit there and sulk in your sadness. This can lead to depression which is a serious problem.

· Don’t be afraid to talk to someone.

Seeking help is nothing to be ashamed of. This doesn’t necessarily mean you need to go out and spend heaps of money on a therapist. Get together with your most trusted, closest friends and say “Hey I need to talk to someone.” If they are in fact your closest friends they will listen. If that doesn’t work and you feel you need to seek the help of a professional than that’s nothing to be ashamed of either, if you feel that’s what you need than do it.

· Face your demons!

This is without doubt the most important step that is absolutely necessary in dealing with ones inner demons. We have inner demons. Period. They’re a part of you. If you don’t acknowledge, understand, and face your demons you will never conquer them. Take a long look at yourself and admit that you have a problem, and that it makes you unhappy. Whether its something that happened to you in the past or something that you don’t like about yourself, in order to overcome it you have to first come to terms with it.

Conquering ones demons is all about finding inner peace. It’s about being comfortable with who you are, only once you have accepted these things can you make changes for the better.

“No man is free who is not master of himself." -Epictetus

Always remember, God will be with you through it all, helping you each and every step of the way. "Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor have entered into the heart of man the things which God has prepared for those who love Him" (1Corinthians 2:9, NKJV)

Minot, ND Photographer Nelly Hernandez Photography:Happy Valentine's Day

Ahhhh... Valentine's Day, what a wonderful day for me! I have been one very blessed lady who has been fortunate enough to have by her side her high school sweetheart for almost fourteen years now! Valentine's Day means so many different things for different people.


In honor of Valentine's day I am giving away a free boudoir or glamour photoshoot!! In order to enter this giveaway you must
comment below and let me know what it is that makes Valentine's Day special for you and who is that special someone you will be celebrating it with whether it is a spouse, boyfriend, girlfriend, friend, son, daughter... etc. You must also share my Intimate Xpressions by Nelly fan page on your Facebook wall letting people know you have entered the free photoshoot giveaway with Intimate Xpressions by Nelly.

I will choose a winner using random.org  first thing tomorrow morning!!!! Happy Valentine's Day to all and best of luck!!

Radiantly Beautiful Ms {S)

Talk about one amazingly gorgeous woman from head to toe! Yes, ladies and gentleman, she is taken, but man oh man, all I can say is she's got one lucky man. I had such a fun time with this shoot, even made me reconsider going to the gym more often, lol. Here is just a sneak peek. Enjoy!

Minot, ND Photographer: Nelly Hernandez Photography: Walking down the Aisle

I still remember it like it was yesterday. Every time I would go to the Base Store (the BX) in Stuttgart, Germany, I would always walk through the "fancy camera" aisle. LOL. I had always drooled over nice cameras even though I didn't have the first clue about how to use them.

I am not one of those photographers that has a story that starts out like many other photographers that say, "back when i was a little girl/boy, my grandfather gave me a nikon...." Nope, that is not me. I have always loved "taking pictures". I always managed being the one in my family taking all of the photos for parties with either my digital point and shoot or my disposable camera. Haha, yes, disposable. I am just like most moms that love taking 1,001 photos a day of their children. I thought, well I need a better camera to take better photos, LOL. In March 2009, my dear husband surprised me with a Nikon D60 kit. I was ever so excited. I hugged that box like it was a newborn baby. As I opened the box in excitement, all i could picture in my mind was how wonderful of photographs I was going to be taking of my kids. No, at that moment, not once, did it ever cross my mind I wanted to be a photographer. My dream was always to become a Psychiatrist. At 26, I only had a Bachelors in Psychology, and my love/hate for school was just not going to work to continue to med school. However, I wasn't upset about that. I was happy. I was happy with what I had and that I had an amazingly little family.... SOOO back to my camera. I opened up that baby and saw sooooo many buttons. WOW! I thought, I wonder what this A, S, P, M mean? Yes, i had no clue what any of those meant. I think the only thing I was familiar with in my camera was AUto, on and Off button.


One of my first shots with my Nikon D60 in auto. :) My handsome son JR.


I started just like any other excited camera owner to click away and take a million photos of my kiddos. Uploading them on to my computer would excite me even more as the photos were better than that of my older camera. However, they still didn't look like the photos I had in mind. I figured, well with an expensive professional camera, my photos should look professional. LOL.








Common rookie mistake, huh? I got on the internet, read reviews and all on what I thought was a professional camera only to find out it was an entry level camera with a kit lens. Okay I thought, so what can I do now to make my photographs better... I got on photography forums and got a hold of one of the best books you could ever read to teach you how to get out of manual. I bought Understanding Exposure by Bryan Peterson. Since I had no clue what any of this fancy photography lingo meant, this book was perfect for me. I would read a page maybe about three to four times, sometimes more, and try the exercise. Since I knew my kids would not stay still long enough for me to try different settings on them (also since i had to slowly move my settings with my manual next to me) I started out with me as the model. Yup, my toes were my very first models when I started learning. I had so many photos of my toes. See, what I would do was lay in my couch, put my feet up and read and have my camera , manual and Understanding Exposure book next to me. I did so many photos of my toes, some to get everything clear, others to get just my toes in focus. I started to learn slowly but surely.




Yes, I am aware my toes are not the prettiest models. LOL.



Yes, i am aware that it is totally blown out, but it was my first photo of myself with my camera.... I guess you can say a self portrait. :)

From then on I got hooked. I wanted to learn more. I bought more books, I read more photography forums. I took pictures of everyone and everything around me, literally.







I still hadn't realized I wanted to do this professionally. I was just intrigued by this thing called photography. Little did I know, Photography had always been there, waiting for me to make my grand entrance, even if it was photographing my toes. In 2010 I decided to do this as a career. Yes, I still had very little clue of what I was doing, but I knew that is what I wanted. I decided to give it my all and even if I had to fail at it over and over again, I decided I was not going to give up. I had the support of my husband who has always supported me on no matter what I have chosen, even if the ideas may seem crazy to many at the time. haha. Even more so I had the support of my very best friend in Germany, Alia, who was just as excited for me. I had never seen someone so excited for someone else's passion. She was so wonderful and would always be so supportive in everything. Throughout time I met a lot of amazing people who also shared my passion and pushed me to learn more, to be more. They are in great part the reason why I am who I am today. There were times I amazed myself and others where ummm... not so much. There were days I felt discouraged and felt like I could never learn all there is to learn. However, I found out, I am NEVER going to know it all. But that is okay. It is good to know, because I will always continue to want to learn more.



I was blessed to come across an amazing photographer who has had his work published and is very awesome at what he does. I found him on Model Mayhem. He extended and invite for me to meet up with local German photographers. I was thrilled. As I looked on to his work I saw he offered workshops . I was thrilled, only thing was... they were in German. I messaged him and asked if he would give me the workshop in english and that i would pay whatever it was. He gave me a deal to gather at least three to four more English speaking photographers interested. Now this would be a lighting workshop. He advised me I would have to know all of the basics and be well acquainted with my camera. The following weeks, not only did i study like a mad person to get to know my camera, but I looked for those four who will be willing to invest in their education. That workshop helped me find my style and find myself. Gero continues to be a personal mentor as well as a friend to me, which I am very thankful for.





Today, I continue to learn, I continue to attend online workshops, buy books, experiment like crazy. There are days I feel extremely inadequate next to some of my amazing photography colleagues. However, I come to the realization, this is who I am. Photography chose me, this is my calling. I will not give up. I will continue to strive.




Model: Me
Photo taken by an amazing friend/photographer of mine Jenn W.

So after reading that long book. :D I would like for you to tell me what dreams and goals you are fighting for, your struggles, and why it is worth it to you. Leave a comment below this blog post along with your name and an email. I will be using random.org to choose the winner. However, I love to read some of the inspiring things people go through. As a thank you for reaching over 2,000 fans I will be giving a free Boudoir/Glamour Photoshoot. This will include sitting fee and a fully edited CD with up to 15 images with a copyright release. If you would like a family sitting instead, you can also trade it in for one of those as well. :) Best of luck to all!!!

Minot, ND Family Photographer: Nelly Hernandez Photography Happiness is what Family is all about!

One of the wonderful things about my work is that I get to meet amazing families. Some families happen to be military families, just like us. The struggles they face and the strength they have is just so admirable. This one particular family has been through deployments a lot more than your usual military family. However, when you are in front of them, you would never guess they spend so much time apart. They were a happy family with lots of love. I am just honored to have captured their memories.

So again forgive me for not blogging as I should be. Sometimes with all of this technology that has been built and designed for us it makes it hard to do stay on top of it and still manage to spend quality time with family. I had been super busy this past year and each and I have all of my clients to thank for. However, this year, I will be taking less appointments to be able to continue providing quality service as well as still being able to spend good quality time with my family and friends. Thank you to everyone for their continued support. I have so many plans in store for NHP. I am so very excited to share it with you guys. :) Stay tuned!