Climbing the mountain of success - Part III: Quitter
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(Climbing the mountain of success - Part I)
(Climbing the mountain of success - Part II: The Dip)
“If you always put limits on everything you do, physical or anything else, it will spread into your work and into your life. There are no limits. There are only plateaus, and you must not stay there, you must go beyond them.” — Bruce Lee
All doubt is gone: this was a bad idea.
You haven't seen a break in the forest in ages. You just keep doing...things. You don't know if you're getting any closer to the top of the mountain or not. You keep trying. But there's no payoff, no tangible wins.
You feel like you've been going in circles forever, getting nowhere, with a great deal of energy and heart expended to get there.
You've disappointed yourself. You've done your best, and come up short. You're not where you want to be, you've no idea how to get there, and quitting feels so, so much like the only option left.
Why can't I figure out which way is the right way? Why is this so hard? Why did I do this in the first place?
By now you're having this dialog out loud with yourself, with the forest, with God and every creature near enough to hear.
You beg the universe for a sign - permission to quit the journey and throw this dream in the trash (where it probably belongs). You desperately just want to give up and go home. You've peaked. You've lost. Game over. You've gone farther than you thought you could, but you've hit a wall you can't get around. You're not as good as you thought you could be.
The obstacle is bigger than your belief.
You stop.
You sit against a tree.
And you break down.
Right where The Resistance wants you.
This is where the lashings become truly brutal. A cruel voice growls directly into your soul.
"Stupid..."
"Embarrassment...
"Talentless..."
"Imposter..."
"Weak..."
"Idiot..."
"Loser..."
"Failure."
God it hurts.
Your body is numb, leaving only the ache in your soul; a radiating, convulsing brokenness. Raw. Vicious. Sadistic.
Every insecurity pressed, every past shortcoming relived, every limiting belief believed anew.
You scream. Then whimper.
"I don't know what to do. I don't know what I'm doing wrong. I don't know why I'm doing this anymore. I don't know why this is so hard. I don't know...I don't know..."
Your whimpers go silent. You take shuddering breaths. And you drift.
Somewhere between conscious and dozing, between defeat and quitting, you dream.
You dream of your life, changed.
Because in your heart, you know that whether you go on or go home, your life will never be the same.
Your subconscious asks you hazily: "Which You can you live with? The one who dreamed, or the one who did?"
Flashes. Scenes. Words. Conversations. Visions. You see at once both versions of your life, both stories, both endings, both obituaries, both legacies.
Considered side by side like this, on a level of clarity beyond what the conscious mind allows, you know beyond doubt that if you quit now you will hate yourself forever for it. But you also know you can't go on. You know you don't know what to do, where to go next, or how much longer you can survive this journey. You've lost your Why.
A switch flips inside you.
You quit.
It's as visceral an experience as shutting off the breaker to a warehouse. Metallic. Cold.
Cold...
A cold wind hits you.
Colder now...
Your body shakes as the chill sets in.
This must be what death feels like. The death of a dream, of life-giving ambition and spirit and hope.
Colder...
Colder...?
Colder?
Your eyes snap open.
You're freezing.
You're awake.
Every hair stands on your body.
The cold.
The wind is cold!
You jump to your feet, turn your face to the wind, and begin racing toward it.
Your legs burn. Your chest aches. You're cold, but warming up quick. You suck wind as you trod heavy but fast toward the wind.
A sharp rise. You scramble up the swell. You can feel the cold wash over its edge.
Clawing, fighting, calling on every ounce of energy and faith you have left, you throw yourself over the crest.
You look up.
And see light.
More light than you've seen since you took those first brave, anxious steps into the forest.
Sunlight meets snow at the edge of the forest, and reflects painful but welcome into your eyes. It's a sight beautiful, overwhelming, and invigorating.
It's not the top of the mountain. But it's progress. It's tangible. You can touch, see, smell, taste, even hear it. The wind coming off the snow at once bites, swirls, whooshes, chills, and cleanses.
It's a new challenge. A new obstacle. A new plateau.
But you've made it. The end is close enough to feel.
Tenaciously, you have persisted where so many others have quit. You've strode through a cemetery of dreams left behind to die in that forest. So many who lost faith. So many who didn't power through. So many who didn't believe in themselves. So many who saw failure as a reason to quit instead of an opportunity to overcome.
You have survived The Dip.
And from here, there's nowhere to go but up.
"Defeat is a state of mind; no one is ever defeated until defeat has been accepted as a reality." - Bruce Lee
In Part 4 of this series, you'll have to fight for every inch of progress in the final stretch before you reach the top. And you'll have to answer a life-changing question: "Where do I go from here?"
(Climbing the mountain of success - Part I)
(Climbing the mountain of success - Part II: The Dip)
(Climbing the mountain of success – Part IV: Next)
Next Steps
- The Way: If you haven't read it yet, Ryan Holiday's The Obstacle Is The Way is the perfect book to put on your phone's Kindle reader. Every time you're tempted to check Twitter, scroll Facebook, play a quick round of Candy Crush, learn to load your Kindle reader instead. Take in a short chapter, a page, a few paragraphs of the empowerment within this book of wisdom. Stop distracting yourself from success and start holding yourself to a higher standard.
- Take Five: Set your alarm five minutes early for tomorrow. As soon as you're out of bed, wash your face, and sit down with five minutes of inspiration: Holiday's book, any book or audiobook on motivation, any motivational YouTube video, your affirmations, your vision board - anything that reinforces your dream and your capacity to reach it. Start every single day with fire.
- Brainstorm Session: Get out your pen and paper. Get real with yourself: what are all the horsesh*t excuses, reasons, justifications, weaknesses, and choices you're allowing to stand between you and your dream of becoming a successful part time professional photographer? Give me all of them. Give me 52 excuses. Give me more. Make your brain sweat, as James Altucher would say. Now take this list of what's truly holding you back, put a massive black X across every page, and then rip it to shreds. This one doesn't go in your Brainstorms folder. It's over: you are a new, better, stronger, unbreakable, unstoppable person, as of now - right now. Your success is inevitable because you choose it to be. Get to work.
- Subscribe Today: It's my calling to help you earn your first $5,000 to $50,000 as a part time professional photographer. I am truly grateful for your readership, and encourage you to subscribe to my e-mail newsletter at the top of any page of this site.
- Do This Now: What's the biggest struggle holding you back right now? E-mail me your answer (yes, right now!), and let's make a breakthrough today.
- Start The Conversation: If anything in this post has spoken to and inspired you, please comment below or drop me an e-mail. I'd love to hear how you're hustling to better your art, life, and business!
Climbing the mountain of success - Part II: The Dip
(Climbing the mountain of success - Part I)
"Man does not simply exist but always decides what his existence will be, what he will become the next moment. By the same token, every human being has the freedom to change at any instant." — Viktor Frankl
What's truly harder: quitting and turning back, or committing and driving forward?
Striding boldly into the forest that separates you from your dream at the top of the mountain, you are emboldened by your own bravery, and a not insignificant dose of adrenaline.
Step after step, you've launched into your journey. You're in it, now: you're carving your own path up the mountain.
Your progress is steady. It feels good. You're proud. You feel strong. You've got a backpack full of tools, and you know how to use them...at least you hope so.
Progress feels good.
Then you start to get sore. Then tired. Then sweaty, itchy, almost hyper-sensitive. Hunger and exhaustion set in.
Night is coming.
It's going to be long and low.
This isn't so fun anymore. It isn't so easy. The biggest challenge is no longer just making the decision to climb the mountain - now, it's work. Honest work, but the kind of effort you're not used to in your 'normal' life. You don't feel able. In fact, you feel pretty clumsy, well outside your comfort zone.
"Nothing worth doing is easy," you repeat to yourself. You're right, but it doesn't help much.
Every time the path gets muddy and the way forward is too dark and hazy to see, quitting seems so easy.
Still, you feel your progress, and there's enough newness and scariness and excitement that quitting doesn't seem so... Necessary.
Give it time... Very soon, quitting will feel very, very necessary.
The first time you trip and twist your ankle...
The first time you stumble over some venomous or teeth-laden forest creature...
The first time you do something truly foolish, slap your forehead and say, "How the hell could I be so stupid!"
The Resistance is hunting you, haunting you, here in the forest. This is his playground, not yours. You are not home here. You are not welcome here.
As night falls and the sounds of nocturnal creatures rise, you settle in for camp. You wrap up, warm up, eat, enjoy a cup of campfire coffee. You tend your wounds; minor, this early in the journey. Your body's ready to sleep, but sleep doesn't come quickly as your mind processes all of your wins and challenges so far in the journey.
You smile.
"Man, I've already got some great stories to tell."
With this, you relax, and sleep.
Dream...
Then wake.
Oooh...shouldn't have done that. Waking up was a bad idea.
Sore. Sweaty. Itchy. Who knows how many things took a bite during the night.
There's so much inertia to overcome after stopping.
But this mountain isn't going to climb itself.
You stretch, scratch, pack up, and peer up the mountain.
At least, you think you're looking the right way.
Wait a minute...
As you look this way and that, you realize you're not sure which direction you came from...how far you've made it...worst, how much further to the top of the mountain, and which direction is the right one to get there.
Damnit!
Which path is the right one? Which is the fastest way to the top? Is the fastest way the easiest way, or the hardest? A fearsome thought: which way is the wrong way?
You're in The Dip. You don't even know what The Dip is, or how in it you are, or what it takes to get out of it.
But you're there. You can feel it.
As with so many times to this point, you're presented with the ultimate conflict:
Turn back?
Or go deeper?
Enter The Resistance...
Hey, you gave it your best, and just like everyone else knew, you're not good enough to do this. I tried to tell you. You're so deep in the forest now, and so stupid for getting yourself into this situation. How much easier would it have been to turn back at the mountain's edge? I tried to tell you. How much smarter to have stayed home and kept your dream what it should have been - just a dream. A fantasy. You're an adult; you should know better. I tried to tell you... I tried to tell you this was stupid; that you're stupid. Now the best thing you can do is cut your losses and quit this stupid game before you really screw up and embarrass yourself. Go home, sit down, shut up, and be normal.
Whoops. The Resistance went too far again.
Normal...
The word - all it means, to you, about you - manifests in your psyche, a sick whisper from deep inside.
Normal...
The friction between your dream and your fear lights a spark. It catches in the tinder of your dormant spirit, and emotions blaze: anger, fear, disgust chief among them.
Normal...
You can't abide normal anymore.
That's why you're here. That's why you're sweaty, smelly, confused, a little scared, and a lot of sore, here in the thickest of the forest. The summit is out there, up there, somewhere. And you know the only thought more painful than striving on against all obstacles is that of turning tail, turning back, and living a normal, defeated life.
You know success is in your hands. You know failure is, too.
True failure. Not the kind where you pivot, change direction, and quit one path to pursue a greater good.
True failure is where dreams go to die. Where dreams lay in a grave and wither, all of their power and energy and inspiration left to rot. But never vanish. If dreams just vanished when ignored, we'd not feel the soul-sucking emptiness of their unrealized potential. You may take your eyes off your dream, but even through hollowed eye sockets and sunken scowl, your dreams never take their eyes off of you.
No. You can't abide normal anymore. The mountain is where you make your stand.
This dream deserves to live, breathe, and thrive.
Sun's up. It's time to go.
"The impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way." - Marcus Aurelius
The obstacle is the way
Staying the course after the shiny newness wears off and the easy gains are made is what separates the dreamer from the doer - the regretful from the truly great. When you feel stuck, confused, lost, and incapable - that's when you need to lean in, press on, and double down in your fight against The Resistance...
In the third part of this series, The Resistance will stop at nothing to keep you from summiting the mountain. You're hurt. You're lost. You're questioning every decision. There's no end in sight. You've lost hope...which is exactly where The Resistance wants you.
(Climbing the mountain of success - Part I)
(Climbing the mountain of success – Part III: Quitter)
Next Steps
- Reinforcements: If you're in The Dip, steel yourself: this is the long haul. Read The Dip by Seth Godin, to understand the landscape and nature of The Dip. Read The Obstacle Is The Way by Ryan Holiday, to flip the script and see the opportunities within challenges. Listen to The Practicing Mind by Thomas Sterner, to learn the tools for making The Dip easiest to navigate. And if you haven't yet, read the indispensable The War of Art by Stephen Pressfield, to know the face of your greatest enemy.
- Brainstorm Session: Get out your pen and paper. Describe your perfect day, five years in the future, after having summited the mountain of success. What are you working for in life by becoming a part time professional photographer? In what ways does success better your life? File this away in your Brainstorms folder.
- Subscribe Today: It's my calling to help you earn your first $5,000 to $50,000 as a part time professional photographer. I am truly grateful for your readership, and encourage you to subscribe to my e-mail newsletter at the top of any page of this site.
- Do This Now: What's the biggest struggle holding you back right now? E-mail me your answer (yes, right now!), and let's make a breakthrough today.
- Start The Conversation: If anything in this post has spoken to and inspired you, please comment below or drop me an e-mail. I'd love to hear how you're hustling to better your art, life, and business!
Climbing the mountain of success - Part I
"The man on top of the mountain didn't fall there." - Vince Lombardi
That mountain is going to kick your ass, and you're gonna hate it...and you're gonna love it.
Looking at the mountain from a distance, it's beautiful, majestic, grand.
You can see the peak, the snow, the forest, maybe some notable cliffs and plateaus - but not a lot of detail.
And certainly no clear path to the top. There's no ski lift on this mother.
In admiring this wondrous sight, you ponder: "Do believe I'd like to climb that one."
So you prepare.
(Which in this age means reading blog posts, asking friends on social, e-mailing some apparent experts, ordering books you'll read three chapters of, buying on credit lots of gear you think you need, suffering buyer's remorse, sending most of the gear back, figuring for sure beyond a shadow of a doubt you'll never be good enough, saying this to everyone who will listen so that everyone can tell you you're wrong, accepting the possibility you won't completely embarrass yourself, taking a deep breath, gathering every ounce of bravery and adventurous spirit you have, and taking the first step.)
The closer you get to the mountain, the less you can see of its totality, but the more you can see of its finer details.
You reach the first swell, the tree line. As you're close enough to the mountain to be standing at its edge, the forest casting its shadow upon you, you're overwhelmed.
You can't see the mountain anymore.
You can't see the peak you're striving for.
You can't even see the sun - just speckles and streaks of light through the canopy.
All of a sudden, your dream of climbing this mountain is a lot more real. As reality sinks in, every fear and warning your lizard brain can muster comes rushing in.
"What if I fail?"
"Oh this is going to hurt...a lot."
"If I don't succeed at this, I'll be so embarrassed. Everyone will laugh at me."
"I'm so unprepared for this. I should have read another tutorial."
You stop. The easy wins are behind you - all the dreaming, talking, buying, reading, list making.
Now there's just you and the mountain.
You look back. You can always go back, right? Going home and kicking back on the couch with your iPhone seems mighty appealing right now. If you don't start, nobody will know. You've got other things to do anyway - laundry, house cleaning, video games, the whole last season of Walking Dead on Netflix. Who are you to take this kind of risk anyway? Mom always said you should be more practical. Maybe she's right. Maybe those pros on the net who said you shouldn't even try this until you've had years of practice were right. Maybe you were never going to be good enough anyway.
Yeah. Going home looks safe. Comfortable. Easy. Normal.
Oh. Oh man, that one hurts.
You're standing at the edge of one of the biggest adventures of your life, and the thought of normal is like a punch to your gut.
You're sick of normal.
You've been playing small doing normal things in your normal life with normal people for so long that you have a physical, sickening reaction to anything normal.
You feel like throwing up. Because you're scared of stepping forward... But more so because you're scared of stepping back. Back into the normalcy that depresses and bores your soul. What soul? You haven't felt it in years.
What soul...what soul...
You turn back toward the forest.
What soul...
Now you're exhilarated. Now you're pissed off. Now your heart's pounding in your chest. You're light-headed, but clear-eyed. Your senses turn up to 10. You can hear every cricket, smell every plant, see every leaf, feel every wisp of wind, taste pollen on the air.
What soul...
You're awake now. You're alive now. That feeling of breath in your lungs and blood pumping in your veins and the tension of every muscle in your body ready to break free of normal.
Your soul is stirred.
And it feels incredible.
And you can't go back. You know you'd die inside if you quit now, before you even start this journey.
You have to try. You have to be free. You have to choose you. You have to leave it all on the mountain.
You hold your breath.
Your heart pounds.
Slow motion now.
You lift your foot...
All the perfectionism and procrastination and paralysis in the world can't stop you now.
You move your foot forward...
This is stupid. You're stupid. You're going to fail like the idiot everyone knows you are and everyone will laugh at you and never forget stupid little you pretending you could ever climb any mountain. You never did it before, you can't do it now, and you'll never be able to do it.
The Resistance makes one more, desperate attempt to stop you.
But you can't be stopped.
Your foot falls.
Then the next.
And the next.
And you're moving forward toward destiny. Your legs are at the same time weak and strong, pressing forward on pure adrenaline.
One step after the other. Over and over again.
The obstacle is the way. The mountain is your journey. The forest is your path. The only way is up.
And, step by step by step, summiting the mountain is inevitable.
Only you can stop you. And you won't. Because deep down inside, you need this. You've needed this for too long.
And you're hungry. Hungry for more - from life, and from yourself.
Reaching success - however you uniquely define it - is like climbing a mountain.
It's exciting from a distance, scary up close, incredibly hard work to conquer, and life-changing to summit.
But it's in your reach.
You're alive, talented, capable, and blessed.
Launch, and share these blessings with your community and the world.
In Part 2 of this four-part series, you're deep in The Dip. You can't see the forest for the trees, you can't tell if you're making any progress, you don't know which path leads to the top, and every decision feels equally pointless and crucial. The only way to the top? Perseverance and tenacity.
Next Steps
- Freedom: You are free of the bondage of indecision. You are in control. And you are capable. What are you going to do now? Tell me what your Next Step is: james@banderaoutlaw.com.
- Brainstorm Session: Get out your pen and paper. What are you so scared of? You know you're holding yourself back. It's five years in the future: write yourself a letter titled, "What I wish I knew five years ago." Put yourself in the role of your older, wiser self. What would you say? What advice would you give? What greater wisdom would you share? What would you tell yourself about your art, about fear, and about launching your business? What are the life decisions you'd wish you had made? What brave choices will you wish you had made? What regrets would you have if you didn't make those choices? File this away in your Brainstorms folder.
- Subscribe Today: It's my calling to help you earn your first $5,000 to $50,000 as a part time professional photographer. I am truly grateful for your readership, and encourage you to subscribe to my e-mail newsletter at the top of any page of this site.
- Do This Now: What's the biggest struggle holding you back right now? E-mail me your answer (yes, right now!), and let's make a breakthrough today.
- Start The Conversation: If anything in this post has spoken to and inspired you, please comment below or drop me an e-mail. I'd love to hear how you're hustling to better your art, life, and business!
It's your business and you can cry if you want to
One evening an old Cherokee told his grandson about a battle that goes on inside people.
He said, "My son, the battle is between two wolves inside us all.
One is Evil.
It is anger, envy, jealousy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego.The other is Good.
It is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion and faith."The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather:
"Which wolf wins?"
The old Cherokee simply replied,
"The one you feed."- Native American Folk Story
We have a lot more control over our lives than we like to admit.
You're here because you want to be.
You're reading this because you choose to.
You're a part time professional photographer because you chose this path.
You can stop anytime.
You can start anytime.
You have Caesarian power with which to choose left or right, to charge X or Y, to shoot with kids or couples or cucumbers.
As kids, we tested boundaries constantly, much to the dismay of our parents. Over time, worried parents and rule-mad schools and faithless employers clipped the wings of our fearless (even fearful) exploration, shoved them in a locked box and threw them in the ocean.
It was not in their best interests to see us fly.
After 18-plus years of living with our incredible power in bondage, we almost always go one of two routes, equally dangerous and tragic:
We explode, our power and control and freedom an incendiary cocktail. We drink, drug, sex and stupid our way through early adulthood. We don't have enough experience with our power to know how to control and focus it positively; we become undomesticated animals feeding our most immediate and base desires. We spend our college years and well beyond doing things our mature selves will regret - and this regret robs us of our power again. We eventually "grow up," get a "real job," and reduce our lives to debt and slavery until retirement.
or
We live scared of consequence. We've been warned, shushed, threatened, punished and brow-beaten into spiritual submission. We live outside our power, in a constant state of "I shouldn't do this," "What will my Dad say?," "I'd die if they were disappointed in me," "They would shun me if they knew," "I don't deserve it," "I should be happy with what I have," "What are they thinking about me?," "I don't know how to be good enough."
So we hide our power. We deny it. "No Risk, No Reward" becomes a reasonable mantra instead of the warning it's intended to be.
Do you see some of this in your own life? Do you see the people and experiences that have robbed you of your power?
We're left so damn scared, indecisive, weak, and insecure.
Listen: your business, like your life, is wrought by your hands. You've built this. You're in control. You're placing every brick and every beam. Storms will come and go, but only you can build and rebuild and shore up.
You are dreamer, architect, engineer and craftsman of your life, and of your part time photography business.
“If you are distressed by anything external, the pain is not due to the thing itself, but to your estimate of it; and this you have the power to revoke at any moment.”
― Marcus Aurelius, Meditations
You don't have to listen to any piece of advice that doesn't inspire you or resonate with you.
You don't have to adopt "The Top 17 Best Practices As a Professional Photographer."
You don't have to cold call. You don't have to upsell. You don't have to sell out. You don't have to answer the phone on the first ring. You don't have to be "on your game" every day of your life. You don't have to market yourself in ways you despise to make art you hate for clients you resent so you can sell in ways you loathe to get money to buy things you don't want to impress people you don't like. You don't have to launch today. You don't have to wait. You don't have to listen to me. You don't have to ignore me. You don't have to embrace your true, powerful self. You don't have to live scared, either.
You don't have to do anything.
But if you're like me - and like the thousands of PTPs I've visited with over the years - you want to.
You really want to.
You want to make beautiful art.
You want to serve wonderful clients.
You want to earn Cheshire-grin money.
It will take strength, persistence, and tenacity.
And it will take power.
Try though it might, don't allow the world to convince you that your power is extrinsic - gifted, granted, bought. Your power comes from within: thought, choice, action.
Embrace your wonderful, purposeful, powerful self. Choose yourself. Dream big and work hard. Earn it. Your people are waiting for you to step up and put your art out into the world; they're waiting to be blessed by your work.
The mountain of success is waiting for you.
Step. Step again. Rise. And summit.
“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, 'Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?' Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”
― Marianne Williamson, A Return to Love
Next Steps
- Don't Be An Ass: "To assume makes an ass out of u and me." What assumptions have you made about your business that you can now take a wrecking ball to? Did you assume you had to market yourself in a way you hated? Did you assume you had to make perfect art before launching your business? Make a list of all the "I have to..." assumptions you've been holding onto. Then make a big, bold strike through each. Then tear the piece of paper to shreds and throw it in the trash. You're free. You're empowered. You're in control. Make your business what you want it to be.
- Brainstorm Session: Get out your pen and paper. Make a list of 10 ways you can choose to make your part time photography business more fun. Don't take yourself so seriously; really let your imagination run and dream up fun ways to make art and do business. Trust: that fun will translate into your brand, and the experience people enjoy with you. File this away in your Brainstorms folder.
- Subscribe Today: It's my calling to help you earn your first $5,000 to $50,000 as a part time professional photographer. I am truly grateful for your readership, and encourage you to subscribe to my e-mail newsletter at the top of any page of this site.
- Do This Now: What's the biggest struggle holding you back right now? E-mail me your answer (yes, right now!), and let's make a breakthrough today.
- Start The Conversation: If anything in this post has spoken to and inspired you, please comment below or drop me an e-mail. I'd love to hear how you're hustling to better your art, life, and business!
How I overcame the limiting beliefs echo chamber of parents, friends, and coworkers
Tim Ferriss introduced me to the idea of lifestyle design, and for that, I will forever be grateful.
His book, The 4 Hour Workweek, broke my echo chamber.
I grew up in a small town, had parents who lived poor but comfortable, graduated from a small high school, and went to work straight out of school at a small newspaper.
Up to the point of reading Ferriss' book, which I consumed as an audiobook on a long drive from Bandera, Texas, to Fort Worth and back, my life questions were simple:
- Do I have enough money to buy computer games?
- Can I afford to upgrade my computer so I can play better games?
- How loud can I make my car stereo?
- Am I doing good enough at work to keep getting a paycheck?
- Do I have enough money to spend on dates with my girlfriends?
I was a sadly typical twenty-something.
A Basic Bro.
(With a few shades more class, thanks to good parenting.)
Life was comfortable. Good enough. I didn't really have anything big worth caring about, so I cared about small things: video games and bassy car stereos.
My echo chamber consisted of my parents, friends, and coworkers, all with similar ambitions: get the next paycheck, and get by best you can. Don't rock the boat. Don't take risks. Don't fix what ain't broke.
Then Tim Ferriss broke my life. He busted my echo chamber.
Listening to 4HWW, it's like someone turned on the lights - like sitting in a dim theater, and then, the curtain is drawn: wide-eyed, excited...the show begins.
The answers to questions I never knew to ask came flooding:
- I don't have to live in this small town forever?
- I can move up in life without a promotion gifted by my corporate owners?
- I can make more money by creating value for others?
- I'm...valuable?
- I can...design my lifestyle?
Is there a word for this kind of epiphany? "Pashoom!" It's like the sound of fireworks whistling and popping inside your head. It's like walking through the wardrobe, right into the forests of Narnia. The shift in my world was tectonic.
Suddenly, in the course of listening to one audiobook, I was anything but comfortable. Quite the opposite - every corner of my brain and my heart were on fire.
All the "good enough" brainwashing I got in school and from my corporate owners was violently not "good enough" anymore.
Thank God.
Because with the curtain drawn and the lights up, I could see the stage of my life - and I was now the director.
There is another way.
There are a trillion other ways.
You don't have to live the life you've been handed, taught, or encouraged (or discouraged) to live. You don't have to be a people-pleaser. You don't have to 'pay yourself last' in life. You don't have to suffer energy vampires (many times, friends and family) who drain you of your dreams and spirit and life. You don't have to work your way up the ladder - or at least, their ladder (you can build your own). You don't have to hurt, steal from, or step on anyone to get ahead in life.
Whatever horsesh*t has been beaten into your head and heart over the course of your life doesn't have to define and cage your life.
You're better than that. You're capable of more. You're worth more. You are worthy.
And the world is waiting.
“You are the average of the five people you associate with most, so do not underestimate the effects of your pessimistic, unambitious, or disorganized friends. If someone isn't making you stronger, they're making you weaker.” - Tim Ferriss
Next Steps
- Never Forget Your Why: Never forget that you're climbing the mountain to success as a part time professional photographer because you want to. However much work, effort, trial and error is involved in getting up that mountain, you're here right now because you want to be. Because you put a stake in the ground and have chosen to pursue your dream. This is the life, the lifestyle, you want to live, blessing others with your art and the experience you craft for them, and enjoying the blessings creative, social and financial in return. It's a good life. And you're earning it, one small step at a time.
- Do Some Soul Searching: Are there people in your life who contribute to your echo chamber of limiting beliefs? Are there people who through their words, actions, or mere presence in your life are causing you to stay in the same old ruts in life? Always remember the parable of the crab bucket. It's only in the past few years that I realized A) how negatively certain people affected my life, and B) that I could do something about it.
- Brainstorm Session: Get out your pen and paper. Really open up your mind to possibility and ask yourself: What limiting beliefs are holding me back? Who in my life is slowing or stopping me from achieving my goals? Who in my life is accelerating and encouraging my dreams? What would I do if I wasn't afraid? What would I be doing if there was no way I could fail? What really excites me? File this away in your Brainstorms folder.
- Subscribe Today: It's my calling to help you earn your first $5,000 to $50,000 as a part time professional photographer. I am truly grateful for your readership, and encourage you to subscribe to my e-mail newsletter at the top of any page of this site.
- Do This Now: What's the biggest struggle holding you back right now? E-mail me your answer (yes, right now!), and let's make a breakthrough today.
- Start The Conversation: If anything in this post has spoken to and inspired you, please comment below or drop me an e-mail. I'd love to hear how you're hustling to better your art, life, and business!
Why do I feel like I'm getting nowhere with my photography business?
“There is nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed.” ― Ernest Hemingway
You know how to kill a writer?
Put a blank page in front of him.
Same goes for your limitless options when it comes to creating art as a photographer - if you can dream it, you can shoot it.
But it's hard to do anything when we're presented with the option of everything.
You can do it all.
But here's the rub: do you want to be busy or do you want to be successful?
I've wasted years spinning my wheels being very busy getting nothing (important) done.
I was trying to be a jack of all trades, a Renaissance man, a photographer who could solve any visual riddle.
Let's argue that time is finite.
Let's also argue that energy is finite.
So, a lot like money. Painfully like money.
Sure 'nuff: ever get to the end of the month and your bank account is empty, but you have nothing to show for it?
Where'd all my money go?
Where'd all my time go?
It's easy. We do it all the time.
Now, how about that summer when you worked your butt off to earn enough money to get in on the big senior trip to Spain? Mowing lawns, doing odd jobs, spritzing produce overnight at the grocery store.
You had a specific goal. And every dollar you earned, but for the occasional soda to quench your thirst, you saved to put in that savings account or mason jar - you had a Why, it was a clear vision, and you knew if you worked your butt off you could make it happen.
Let me be clear:
Every time you divide your attention between multiple niches of photography, you are halving (or worse) your progress in each.
"I specialize in family, pet, church, non-profit, event, corporate, headshot, interpretive dance, concert, newborn, children's, and industrial photography."
Greg McKeown illustrates perfectly what I think of this in his book Essentialism:
Do you want to make minimal gains in a dozen directions, or huge improvement toward your most important goal?
Your definition of success is yours alone.
But whatever that definition may be, I submit that you will be happier and more successful in your art and business faster if you tighten your niche instead of widening the net.
Stop using a net and start using a spear - when you try to be everything to everyone, you're nobody to anyone.
Don't be a children's, family, wedding, and "whatever photography needs you may have" photographer.
Be a children's photographer.
Better: Be a black and white children's photographer.
Better still: Be a black and white children's photographer specializing in special needs kids.
Even mo bettah: Be a black and white children's photographer specializing in portraits that tell the story of relationships between special needs kids and the parents, teachers and caretakers who love them.
You might be surprised at how tightly you can define your niche without leaving the realm of commercial viability.
Keep in mind: depending on your definition of success, you're only looking for 52 bookings a year. Are there 52 parents, schools, and doctors in your market who appreciate the beauty of good black and white photography, who have or serve special needs kids and make up the loving relationships in those kids' lives?
In this specific niche, maybe so or maybe no.
But the point stands that you'll reach artistic and business success multiple times faster when you tighten up your niche and target market.
Consider the above tight niche.
Can you see how having a niche this tight immediately makes clear exactly who your target market is?
And can you see how this tight niche makes clear to your target market that you're the perfect fit for them?
Just narrowing your focus, and your options, down this tight may be giving you very clear, specific ideas for business cards, logos, marketing pieces, marketing campaigns, books you should read, blogs you could read, photography techniques you could practice, maybe even specific images you'd love to make as a black and white special needs children's photographer.
It makes clear who you could reach out to as mentors.
It makes clear what non-profits and local charities you could support with your art and a portion of profits.
And odds are good it will be vastly easier (and faster) to become the best black and white special needs children's photographer in your local market - not in the whole wide world, but certainly in the world of your local clients.
Instead of drowning in questions and limitless opportunities, you suddenly have purpose, direction, ideal clients, specific and executable ideas.
The creative brain thrives when given boundaries.
Your path up the mountain of success becomes so much clearer when you know what value you're creating and for whom.
How tightly can you define your niche?
Don't worry about all the people who "won't do business with you" because they don't fit in your niche. Trust, if for example within your market you become the best young children's portrait photographer specializing in vibrant colors and big personalities, you're going to get more inquiries for family, maternity, newborn and other work than if you kept throwing a wide net instead of a sharpened spear.
Being the best in one niche makes you more attractive and more interesting to potential clients in every niche.
The benefits:
- Tight niche, faster artistic and business development.
- Faster development, better art and client experience, and better ability to communicate your value through marketing.
- Better art and experience and better marketing, the more clients and testimonials and social shares and circle of influence and money you can command in the market.
- The more exposure and social proof, the more your name is on the lips of influencers in every niche of photography in your market - and beyond.
This huge wave of success results from the ripple effect of your bravery in seeking out and serving your ideal clients, a tight niche of photography buyers who are the perfect fit for your art, experience, and personality.
“There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.” ― Maya Angelou
Don't let the fear of committing to a tight niche keep you from living out your dream and your life story as a professional photographer.
Next Steps
- Pick your top five or 10 favorite photographers. Visit their online portfolios. How would you describe their niche? How tightly can you define the themes and patterns in their work? By way of colors? Subject? Theme? Story? Style? Pose? Wardrobe? Emotion? How have they niched down in their work to create differentiated art and experiences for their clientele?
- Brainstorm session: get out your pen and paper. Let's build out potential 'dream niches' for you and your business. For each niche, write it out layer by layer. For each layer, ask, "What's the One Big Thing?" For an example, here's how my brainstorm might look: Photographer > High School Senior Photographer > High School Senior Photographer specializing in exciting, personality-driven portraits of young thespians, dancers, and other performers; earning Likes and 'Wows' from friends and family through super-shareable digital images and Big Wall Art. You can do this for each potential niche you'd like to pursue. In the end though, choose the one that most excites and intrigues you, and commit to it. You can always pivot to a new direction later, but here in the startup phase, niche down and level up in your artistic and business growth.
- My writing at PartTimePhoto.com exists to serve your needs as an amateur photographer making the transition to paid professional. I am truly grateful for your readership, and encourage you to subscribe to my e-mail newsletter at the top of any page of this site.
- What's the biggest struggle holding you back right now? E-mail me your answer (yes, right now!), and let's make a breakthrough today.
- If anything in this post has spoken to and inspired you, please comment below or drop me an e-mail. I'd love to hear how you use these ideas to better your part time photography business!
You know what? You suck.
You know what?
You suck.
Your art sucks.
Your web site's an amateur piece of crap that would embarrass a real photographer.
Which you're not.
Your dream is silly, naive, and will only end in you failing - like you've done so many times before.
You're not even capable of learning how to make art, make clients happy, or how to act and market and shoot and sell like a professional.
You're an imposter. An immature, self-absorbed, selfish wannabe who's getting laughed at right now by the cool kids - the ones with real cameras, real clients, and real talent.
Unlike you.
I think you'd best listen to a real professional and quit playing 'photography business' before you really embarrass yourself.
...
Let me ask you:
Would you ever...
ever...
EVER...
allow someone to talk to you this way?
Or to someone you love?
...
Then why do you say these things to yourself?
Think about it.
"The key, maybe, is resistance, and it is people saying no. And it should fuel you, and make you that much more determined to see your dream come true."
- Jessica Alba, Inc. Magazine interview
Next Steps
- Think about it.
- We are always our own worst critic - don't worry, you're in great company. But what we desperately need is to be our own biggest cheerleader. We need to stop treating ourselves worse than our worst enemy, and start treating ourselves with love, encouragement, and grace. It starts with recognizing negative self-talk, whether actively or lurking about taking jabs in our hearts and minds. Commit to catching the Resistance in the act from now on, taking a deep breath, and taking dominion over your self-talk.
- Brainstorm session: How did the cruelty of those negative words affect you? Did any hit home, emotionally - a pain point where you've beaten yourself raw? Make a list of all the negative self-talk you do to yourself on a regular basis. Now, put on your Best Friend hat, and rewrite that list in the positive. Read this (much better) list every day. Recite it out loud each morning and each night, even if you have to 'fake it.' More often than we recognize, the mind follows the body: the more you speak the words, the more conviction you imbue into them, the more you open your heart to show yourself love and grace, the more powerful these words will become in changing your life.
- My writing at PartTimePhoto.com exists to serve your needs as an amateur photographer making the transition to paid professional. I am truly grateful for your readership, and encourage you to subscribe to my e-mail newsletter at the top of any page of this site.
- What's the biggest struggle holding you back right now? E-mail me your answer (yes, right now!), and let's make a breakthrough today.
- If anything in this post has spoken to and inspired you, please comment below, drop me an e-mail, or call or text me at 830-688-1564 and let me know. I'd love to hear how you use these ideas to better your part time photography business!