We’re looking forward to introducing you to Bethany Forest. Check out our conversation below.
Hi Bethany, thank you for taking the time to reflect back on your journey with us. I think our readers are in for a real treat. There is so much we can all learn from each other and so thank you again for opening up with us. Let’s get into it: What are you chasing, and what would happen if you stopped?
I’m chasing something some may relate to, but that a lot of people take for granted: basic stability and vitality in my own body.
I chase lab results, appointment dates, supplements, schedules, and flare triggers like it’s a full time job. I’m constantly balancing my desire to live my life with the potential risks just living spontaneously involves. I chase the version of me who isn’t derailed by constant pain and fatigue, and persistent life threatening infections hovering over me like a dark cloud.
When I stop chasing, and let’s be honest – I do. All of us do. It’s exhausting to keep up this tidy schedule of eating the right thing, moving my body, avoiding triggers and bacteria. But when I stop, my body doesn’t just pause with me. It avalanches. Small neglect turns into big problems, and suddenly my world shrinks into doctor’s offices and a bed I didn’t choose to be in, and I’m left watching life go on without me for a time.
I’m constantly negotiating the delicate balance between just surviving and truly living. If I stop, it feels like giving up. When I do stop, it’s very rarely because I don’t care – it’s because I’m tired. I want to feel spontaneous, normal, and free.
At this point in my life I know I’ll never be able to stop chasing my health. Chronic illness and a disability make my body a moving target. But I’m working hard to make the chase more of a partnership. I know I deserve better!
Can you briefly introduce yourself and share what makes you or your brand unique?
I’m the founder and lead photographer behind GloHo Photography, a real estate and hospitality photography brand rooted in the Bear Lake and the Northern Utah region. I specialize in capturing homes, rentals, retreats, and boutique stays in a way that feels both aspirational and honest. My images blend clean, editorial composition with lived-in warmth, always circling around one core question: *What does it feel like to be here?*
Before GloHo, I built and ran multiple businesses and I host yoga and wellness retreats, so I understand the guest experience from all sides: owner, host, and traveler. That perspective comes with me to every shoot. I’m not just thinking about pretty pictures; I’m focused on the details that actually move bookings and build trust. The way morning light falls across a bed, how a fireplace anchors a room, how a property flows from space to space – those are the moments and the lines I’m chasing.
Through GloHo Photography, I partner with builders, designers, real estate professionals, property managers, and hospitality brands who care about storytelling as much as they care about square footage. My work includes real estate listing photography, luxury and vacation rental imagery, hospitality and resort shoots, twilight sessions, drone coverage, and lifestyle add-ons that bring real people into the frame.
I am actively building and training a GloHo Real Estate team that covers Northern Utah and Southeast Idaho, so more properties in our region can have access to elevated, consistent visual storytelling. I’m constantly seeking out and investing in talented artists who can help me grow my brand.
Whether I’m photographing a mountain cabin, a lakeside escape, or a boutique retreat space, my goal is simple: to turn beautiful properties into irresistible invitations.
Okay, so here’s a deep one: Who taught you the most about work?
My grandpa taught me more about work than anyone else I can remember as a child. We lived in California’s San Joaquin Valley, where he was a grower running a large nursery that shipped plant starts all over the country. I spent hot days in his office trailer with the brown linoleum floor, eating saltines because that’s what he kept on hand, watching him work.
He had this incredible ability to tune everything out and focus on the task in front of him. When he’d take me into the giant greenhouses, with the fans whirring and the humidity wrapping around us, I’d watch how he moved through the space and how he spoke with his team. His workers weren’t just employees; they were like family to him, and by extension, to me.
The way he led with a quiet but firm focus, loyalty, and care for his people shaped how I run my own businesses and teams today.
What did suffering teach you that success never could?
Suffering has taught me something success never could: how to recognize success in the first place. I don’t think you can fully feel success without having walked through some kind of pain. For me, I honestly can’t remember a single genuine win that didn’t cost me something. These days, I measure success by the sheer power it takes to get there.
Living with a disability and knowing I’m always one infection away from being taken out for weeks, I don’t take my work for granted. Just being able to show up, create, serve clients, and stay in motion feels enormous. That alone feels like success.
Suffering has given me a kind of ruthless clarity: my time and energy are finite, my time here is short, and I want to leave a real mark while I can. That awareness doesn’t just make me push through the hard days; it fills me with a very grounded kind of gratitude for what I *can* still do. Every project finished, every retreat hosted, every client served isn’t just a checkmark on a page or CV. It’s proof that I’m still here, still moving, still creating. And that, to me, is success in its truest form.
Sure, so let’s go deeper into your values and how you think. Is the public version of you the real you?
Is the public version of me the real me? Mostly, yes. It’s very important to me to be real. I value honesty and transparency, and I feel good about the “me” I put out into the world. What you see in my work, my humor, my online presence, that’s genuinely me.
But there’s a line I almost never cross: I don’t show pain in public, literally or figuratively. Even my closest friends have rarely seen me in real pain. Growing up with endometriosis, I was often dismissed or told I was overreacting, because no one could see a clear reason for what I was feeling. So I learned to hide it. I became very good at appearing fine.
I think these experiences led me to associate showing pain with being weak or “too much,” and that’s something I’m actively working to heal. So yes, the public version of me is real. It’s just not the whole story. The part that still struggles, still hurts, is quieter, but I’m working to let her exist too.
Okay, so before we go, let’s tackle one more area. Are you tap dancing to work? Have you been that level of excited at any point in your career? If so, please tell us about those days.
Yes. Absolutely. I’m still tap dancing to work.
When I was a kid, I was obsessed with architecture. I had a subscription to *Architectural Digest* at eight years old and spent my free time drawing floor plans and building facades by nine. I went into Interior Design in college, but between money being tight and dealing with severe depression from unresolved trauma, I ended up dropping out of the program. At the time, it felt like I’d walked away from the thing I loved most.
Years later, when I picked up a camera, it didn’t even occur to me that real estate photography was “a thing” for a while. Once the opportunity came up to get trained, I jumped on it and never looked back. Now I get to walk into beautiful spaces every day, chase light and angles, and basically live inside my childhood obsession. It’s always something new, always a different challenge. I’m so dialed into it that my friends now joke about noticing when a building has “good lines” too.
So yes, there were specific seasons where that excitement felt brand new, but honestly? I still feel it. That little kid who loved houses is very much alive and clocking in with me every day.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.glohophoto.com/real-estate
- Instagram: @glohophotore
- Facebook: GloHo Photography
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@glohophotography6428
Image Credits
Photos by Bethany Forest of GloHo Photography
