I started a newsletter this year to be more reflective, purposeful, and attentive in my creative endeavors. In order to do this, I had to unlearn behaviors, methods, and processes. The majority of these are silly and inconvenient at worst, others are debilitating and lead to near-stagnation in my output. Through the year, I worked to not only reduce the behaviors which stalled my creative process, but, also, find new methods to continue moving my work forward.

Chasing Five Rabbits

In September I journaled, “Over the last year, I’ve paid attention to my focus on time and attention and how I allot it to certain tasks. I didn’t gain clarity or anything magnificent from this, but I did improve my focus and notice my own self-talk (which can lean negative).” This year, I noticed how I’d mentally maneuver certain situations. I would allot myself near-endless amounts of time to complete tasks or find ways to avoid completing one task and move to the next thing and then the next thing and so on. The chase was ambiguous and full of excitement. The possibilities were endless. Finishing a project meant I’d have to stare at the thing I created and reflect on the merits of it.

Optionality … Be Wary

I’ve had a bad habit for a long time. I’ll be halfway through a project and I’ll shift my attention. It isn’t that the project is going poorly or that I'm disinterested, it’s just a mental method I’ve utilized throughout my life. I don’t particularly know why, but it might be to avoid having to review the final product and evaluate its successes or its shortcomings.

What is lost in this shift of attention is the benefit of seeing a project through. It diverts focus when it’s needed most and removes the benefits associated with taking something off one’s plate.

“The problem is not with optionality itself. The problem is that we tend to assume optionality is built by keeping as many doors open for as long as possible; by staying on the main road for as far as (we) can go instead of taking the risk of making a wrong turn. The conventional path of accumulating optionality gives you reassuring but fragile options,” Anne-Laure Le Cunff writes in a Ness Lab article. “In contrast, the best options—which involve lots of experimenting and tinkering—may feel riskier in the short term but will help you thrive through uncertainty.”

Embrace the uncertainty. Experiment with new methods, new motivations, new endeavors. Within this practice, we are holding the uncertainty of life close and riding the waves that are a part of existence.

Choice Overload

“Psychologists have long understood that being faced with too many choices can make individuals less likely to choose anything at all,” Dr. Hannah England wrote recently. This is otherwise known as paralysis analysis. For the first half of the year, I felt uneasy about my focus and my aims as a creator. The possibilities of how to best focus my creative attention led me to overthink these actions, which inevitably led to not pushing further in any direction. When choice overload kicked in, I found myself spending more time researching cameras/technology and other shiny/new things that I didn’t need, and spending less time on the work. I was focusing on choices that were important, but not essential to moving my creative work forward.

In the middle of October, this choice overload started to increase in volume. It got to the point where I didn’t want to make pictures because I was second-guessing everything: was that the right angle, was the light right, was it even worth it. This final question, trying to measure worth before or immediately after is impossible. Attempting to identify the worth of what I was creating set me up for self-criticism and doubt, which led to a debilitating mix of fear of rejection, failure, and the possibility that the end product may suck. As I critically examined these thoughts I started to recognize the absurdity of this self-critique.

Since I’ve been a photographer, I’ve made my way through a world where worth/value is tricky territory for photographers and other creatives. From folks wanting free or cheap photography to actual full-time positions being slashed, worth is something no one else will give you unless you give it to yourself. This can be difficult when we link our worth with external factors and other's opinions/reactions.

Expectations & Silence

There were two big assignments this year. They were national stories (The Washington Post & BuzzFeed) and they were for prominent outlets, being assigned within a two-week period. Beyond that, I’ve had my steady clients who book me about once a month, and some other projects cross my desk. Overall, it’s been a slow year. And that has been ok. But, expectations got the better of me. I felt a swing in momentum when those two assignments landed and I felt that I was out of the pandemic lull and transcending into new territory as a photojournalist/photographer. After the stories were published, I, figuratively, leaned back and waited.

Silence. I’m not 100% sure what I expected, but I didn’t expect silence.

As I look back, I realize I was (and probably still am at times) in a relatively fragile creative space. I found value in my work only when others were acknowledging the value as well. This as a game is short-sighted and inevitably leads nowhere positive.

It wasn’t that I was naive to the struggle or had blinders on. I was actively reading about how others became successful freelancers and often conversing with them about the waves of work. Over the summer, Isaac Fitzgerald published a fantastic Q&A with Maddie McGarvey, a fabulous photojournalist based out of Columbus, Ohio. In their conversation, McGarvey is very candid about her first years as a freelancer: “But I would say the first couple of years freelancing I was simply unemployed. Living off unemployment and maybe photographing an assignment a month. Taking on a lot of shit that I didn’t want to do.” McGarvey is definitely not the first or the last photographer who has or will struggle in the early years as a creative. It often seems like this is the only story for photographers who are making a career of it in recent years. McGarvey goes on to say she was “taking on any job, so long as I was paying the bills—paying some of the bills—with photography. It was slow going, but I still felt like I was moving in the right direction.”

All Steps are Forward

What is the right direction? I don't think it’s really as clear-cut as we might like to think. Life is not a road map that we observe from an omnipresent point of view. Rather, it is driving at night, with your headlights on in a bit of a fog. We can see in front of us, but not too far. Details are blurry. There are times when we come upon a place and can make out the surroundings and realize where we are at. Maybe there is even a sign that can tell us how far we’ve come and the possible places we may go. But, sooner or later we have to depart these locations as we pursue the right direction.

Throughout this year, I found myself stuck in the fog. I had pulled over and didn’t want to move. Optionality got the best of me and I was uncertain which way was the right way, I was stuck. I was thrashing. I was sinking.

I hadn’t felt this way in years. I was still doing creative work, but I was losing my why, which I believe served as my right direction during my career. For years as a photojournalist, I was driven by telling community stories that impacted the understanding of a place, this was my motivation and a key part of my identity. My own understanding of myself was rooted in a job description. This time, I wanted to find a why that was internal and long-term, not dependent on my job. Finding my motivation took me down some backroads, but I’m now starting to see a bit clearer.

Lessons Learned

In the Oct. 28 edition of Oliver Burkeman’s Newsletter “The Imperfectionist,” he quotes the late Sheldon Kopp, “You are free to do whatever you want. You need only face the consequences.” Kopp, who was a psychotherapist, showcases how we have freedom within a moment, but also are indebted to the future. We have to be able to acknowledge that all choices have outcomes, no matter what. And, that waiting to make these choices is an act of choosing in itself. The aphorism highlights the relational existence that we all have to the things we have or haven’t done. To choose is to create consequences, but to not choose will also have consequences.

So, the question is: What consequences are we willing to face for our choices?

I’ve often waited to make a choice. I’ll keep my options open as I work through a project and split my attention. I’ll start chasing five rabbits in order to avoid seeing how chasing one plays out. I’ll overthink a social post because I’m in pursuit of more followers or a reshare or two. I’ll hesitate on sending over an estimate because of my misunderstanding that the expectations of someone else should be my own. As this year concludes and 2022 begins, I am aiming to continue unlearning these behaviors and bring lessons of this year forward. I will strive for a more honest examination of my own workflow and create time-blocks to make the work I want to, I’ll share my images and finish projects, and I’ll hold strong with a better understanding of my own value as a creative. These decisions will have consequences, but at least, they are my own.

Interested in learning about how I’ve been combating these behaviors? Read more here. Or, sign-up for my newsletter to receive these posts directly in your inbox!