Many people want to do something interesting with their lives. They want to accomplish something. But they are unaware that effort is needed, deliberate focused effort, to do those things. What stops them is the overwhelming nature of the big picture. ‘I can never graduate from college, I can never get a law degree, I could never move to another country, I could never learn photography.’ They are thinking about ALL the things they need to do and it seems like it can’t be done.
But the truth is you don’t have to do ALL those things. All you need to do is the next thing. If you, for example, want to be a portrait photographer. What is it you need to do? Do you need to have an entire studio, all the top equipment, the best computer and software and printer? No, you don’t. What you need to do is take a photo and look at it. Then maybe you need to read your camera manual and play with the settings. Then maybe you need to look for good lighting opportunities in your house or yard and take some more photos.
See what I mean? You might have a goal, you might have a dream, and that is good. But the key is that you then put that big picture dream on the back shelf and focus on the events of today, right here, right now. Here is an example. Take Tiger Woods, the famous golfer. It is obvious that from an early age his goals have been lofty. He truly has set his sights on being the best golfer ever, winning the most tournaments over the longest amount of time as possible. Intimidating goals to say the least.
But guess what? Interviews with him repeatedly have him saying that when he is on the golf course he thinks of NOTHING but the shot he has right in front of him. Not the dreams, not the accolades, not the money. Just the shot. And the amazing part is the more he is able to focus on that one shot and NOT think about anything beyond it, the closer he comes to winning the tournament, having the best season, and having the greatest career in golf.
He has very few stop signs in his head. What are your stop signs?
Stop sign #10 – But…but…but… Answer: no excuses, go be who you are suppose to be and create what you are suppose to create. Don’t wimp out, don’t be a lazy baby about it. If you see something on the side of the road that might make a good photo, STOP YOUR CAR and take it! And no, I don’t mean you should do that on the way to your daughter’s wedding with a car full of people. Be smart about it obviously.
Here is a good quote. “It is easier to act yourself into another way of feeling than it is to feel yourself into another way of acting.” What that means in the context of the stop signs is that if you wait until you feel creative to act on it, you might wait a long time. But if you act creative, if you take the photo, walk around the corner, look at a detail, pay attention to the light, even if you don’t feel creative, guess what? You will have a VERY creative day!
So, go take the photo! Then take another and another and another until you can’t stop smiling because you are so proud of yourself, just as we all will be.
Stop sign #9 – Everyone is so much better than I am. Answer: True, they are. Get over it and take your photos. Pretty soon you will be who the faint hearted ones look at and say ‘they are so much better than I’.
There are those who feel they know everything and as a result have nothing left to learn. There are those who feel they know nothing and as a result are afraid to learn. Both types miss out because they have wrong thinking about it. Their thoughts in that case are all about ‘self’. The ‘know-it-all’ is wanting to show the world how much he or she knows. The ‘know-nothing’ is consumed with what others will think of them.
What both have in common is a lack of concern for others.
The know-it-all isn’t out to encourage and motivate and lift up those who aren’t as educated and as a result more often than not diminishes and puts down those who know less. People don’t like to follow ‘know-it-alls’ and so they eventually find themselves alone and bitter.
The ‘know-nothings’ aren’t thinking about what gifts they do offer to others. They are also not thinking how their need for education might be a gift a teacher needs to get motivated themselves. They don’t realize that teachers need students, mentors need mentees (mentoes, mentals?). All they are thinking about is how they will appear to others and so they hide and bewail their shortcomings. They are tiresome.
What both types have in common is selfishness.
So, yes, there are people who know more than you. They are better at lighting, cameras, painting, drawing, selling, marketing, planning, printing, talking, on and on and on.
Will that fact (and it is a fact) make you hide, or will it inspire you to go find those people and have their input and help in your art life?
Stop sign #8 – It costs too much. Answer: What is it you can’t afford? A point and shoot camera? A computer? Transportation? Membership fees? Be creative, find a camera at a pawn shop, or a resale shop. If you can’t afford a new computer, once again, find a refurbished one. Maybe trade services for what you need. You don’t have to go anywhere to create interesting photos, you have yourself as a subject, and you don’t have to travel to get there do you? You have your home, your yard, your sidewalk, your street signs.
I realized by having children that we are all capable of saying we don’t have the time or the money to do something. But I found out that without exception my children almost always found a way to do the things they REALLY wanted to do. That usually did not include cleaning out the garage with dad, so in that case they had too much homework. But a call from a friend to go to the movies, well, in that case, they realized they could do their homework when they got home, or in the morning. In other words, they WANTED to go to the movies, and found a way.
In other words, don’t say ‘I can’t afford it’. Say instead ‘HOW can I afford it?’ and go out and find the way.
Do you WANT to be a photographer, an artist, a creative person? Then you WILL find a way and you will not use excuses.
Stop sign #7 – I don’t know what to photograph. Answer: What are you passionate about? photograph that. Even if it is your secret doll fetish or chronicling the cutting of your toenails. Artists who continue to create art are the ones who have admitted to themselves and the world what it is they love. They have courage.
There are two things you must love to be successful. One, you must love your subject. You must feel passion and love and excitement about it. If it is old couches, fine. If it is women, fine. If it is carpet samples, fine. If it is women on old couches looking at carpet samples, fine. It doesn’t matter what you have a passion about, what matters is you admit it.
Two, you have to love the process, not just the end result, of creating your art. If you don’t then eventually you will find ways to not create it. So, if you don’t love setting up lights and getting all your equipment in synch to create a great studio image, chances are you won’t do that as often as you need to be successful at it. If you don’t like climbing out in nature, getting dirty and sweaty and being at the mercy of the elements, then chances are you will not be a great, or even mediocre, wildlife photographer.
You get my point? What do you love? Subject, style, process? Admit that and do that.
Couldn’t resist, a woman on a couch (but without carpet samples).
Stop sign #6 – What if people don’t like what I do? Answer: Guess what? They WON’T like what you do! At least many won’t. Many might, some will. But that is like saying what if someone doesn’t like my flower garden or looks or gift, etc. So what? Are you not going to plant your garden or wash your face and comb your hair or give any gifts because MAYBE someone won’t like your choices? NO, of course not. You will go do those things. So, time to do a reality check and realize that the normal state of the creative life is that someone won’t like what you do. That isn’t bad, it’s to be expected. Embrace it, have it be an acceptable part of your understanding about life.
The Denver Art Museum, by Daniel Libeskind – I have a funny feeling many Denverites don’t like this building, though I am sure many do as well. What sort of building would have been built if the goal was to have everyone like the building?
Denver Museum over the street
Inside the Museum – Molten Polyester, by Ed Ruscha – I am sure this isn’t universally loved or understood by all that see it. What would this image look like if Mr. Ruscha worried incessantly about whether people would like it?
Stop sign #5 – I don’t have time. Answer: How much time does it take to snap a photo of yourself behind the wheel waiting in traffic, the full kitchen sink, the beautiful toy in the sunlight in your kid’s room. It isn’t time you are lacking, it is imagination and decisiveness. Keep your camera with you. If you have a big honkin cadillac of a camera, then get your phone out when you are on the go. FIND A WAY to take the photo!
This photo was at a local diner. It took no more than 20 seconds to get my camera on the table, take the shot, review the shot and put the camera back down on my seat. It isn’t time you are lacking.
Stop sign #4 – I am not educated in art and photography. Answer: Praise the Lord God Almighty you aren’t! Get over it and take some photos. There are many highly educated ‘artists’ who are picking their noses watching TV and eating too much instead of using their talents. They aren’t worth doodoo compared to one person with passion and vision even without a formal education. What matters is the doing. If you do the work you will learn.
That doesn’t mean there aren’t things to learn in a formal setting, there are. I have 2 degrees in art because I wanted to learn. I learned about printmaking, drawing, art history, certain artmaking techniques, and a bit about the art world.
But I had no formal training as a photographer at all. My sole educational work in photography was about 3-4 sessions in a dark room during grad school with another student who taught me the basics in exchange for me teaching him the basics of lithography. The truth is the vast majority of my creativity and my end results as an artist are not a function of my formal education, they are a function of my desire and my passion.
There is a woman on Flickr, Rebekka Guðleifsdóttir, probably the most visited of all the millions on flickr. She was doing pencil portraits when she found flickr and decided to try photography. Within 2 years she had 3 million views and a contract with Toyota to photograph their cars. She is a single mother of 2 sons. She lives in….ICELAND! She is as far from the center of the photography and art world as you can imagine. But she didn’t use that as an excuse. She didn’t use her children as an excuse. She didn’t use her lack of photography education as an excuse. What she did was go out into the middle of the dark Icelandic winter and take photos of 100-200 second exposures in FREEZING cold. She is now getting an art education, but the point is she didn’t wait. She went and ACTED.
Part 3 of a 10 part series on stop signs in your head that keep you from creating art.
Stop sign #3 – My equipment isn’t good enough. Answer: Then you would have to explain why photographer’s work from 75-100 years ago are worth thousands and esteemed the world over as great photographs when their equipment sucked compared to ours now. Even if all you have is a point and shoot, it is YOU that makes the photo great, not the camera.
This photo, by my friend Aikithereska on flickr, was made with a rudimentary pinhole camera. No aperture, no shutter speed, just a hole in a box. You can’t get any more primitive photographic equipment than that. And she got a great photo out of it.
The point is, lack of equipment is an excuse and shows a lack of imagination. Go out and take photos with what you have, quit waiting for a better something.
“A Genius is someone who simply has fewer stop signs in their head.”
Each day for this week and next I am telling about 10 stop signs to creativity that I have learned about over the years.
Stop sign #2 – It’s not perfect. Answer: According to who? If it is a print and is too green, blurred, flared, dark, whatever. Then collage it with something that makes that ‘negative’ stand out. An art piece is not limited to one photo all by itself. Draw on it, Cut it in stripes and layer it over the same exact shot you took that is good. Cut the worst part of the image out and tack that bad part on your wall, look at it, find something in it. Keep tacking up the pad parts until you find something interesting.
If it is a digital image in your computer, make a copy of it, then do special effects on it up the wazoo until it is something cool or at least you learned something. Go to the extreme with each setting, see how far you can take it.
The point is waiting for perfection is an excuse. It shows lack of creativity and imagination and it shows a worry about what others will think instead of seeing things through original eyes.
