Productivity For Photographers: Mindfulness
“Life is a dance. Mindfulness is witnessing that dance.” - Amit Ray
I know, I hear you.
"Dangit James Michael, now I can understand how going to bed earlier and getting up earlier and focusing on important work can raise my productivity, but mindfulness? Meditation? Presence? What's this woo-woo voodoo got to do with staying productive toward my dream of professional photography?"
Time is precious.
But presence is powerful.
One of the most insidious forms of The Resistance is that of distraction.
Not the obvious stuff: constant e-mail dings, Facebook notifications, and that coworker who's never around until you're working on deadline.
Distraction is the slippery, slithering snake in the thicket: you see it when you come across your to-do list from three months ago (last year?) and recognize how long it's been since you even thought about your dreams. You skipped your morning routine, had a spat with your spouse, and then went off the rails for months.
E-mail and Facebook will distract you for hours. That annoying coworker? Minutes.
But The Resistance will distract you forever, if you let it, or the over-and-over-again equivalent if left unchecked.
Mindfulness is the hydrogen bomb in the scorched earth campaign against distraction.
Mindfulness is hard, though.
It takes proactivity, purpose, prioritization; slowness, stillness; awareness.
Especially when we already feel like there's no time to waste, it's a big ask to stop and look around and think.
But consider it this way:
Life - job, family, friends, passion work, community - demands you put the pedal to the metal seven days a week.
Before long, you're going 90-to-nothing. You know you're getting somewhere, but you have no idea where that somewhere is, or if it's where you wanted to go in the first place.
Mindfulness is the act of hitting the brakes, pulling over, and checking the GPS.
"You're certainly busy... But is what you're busy with taking you where you want to be in life?
"Going further down a road you don't want to be on just because you're already pretty far down it doesn't take you closer to where you want to be, does it?"
"Where are you, where do you want to be, and what change in course do you need to make to get there?"
Over and over, I'd get serious, get committed, and set goals for myself. Health goals, photography goals, business goals, fatherhood goals, husband goals, employee goals. Something would shake me up (a mini-Harajuku moment), I'd get mad and get my to-do list out, and get back on track.
For a day. Maybe a week, at the most.
Three months later...
"Now I'm mad and motivated and I'm gonna get this stuff done! Where'd I put that to-do list..."
Years.
For years I repeated this cycle of get serious, make a plan, then get distracted from everything I was so desperate to achieve.
The Resistance had an easy time of it with me.
Maybe you're sitting there, shaking your head, recognizing how easy a target you've become as well.
If so, this is for you.
Why Mindfulness?
"It is not death that a man should fear, but he should fear never beginning to live." - Marcus Aurelius
- Mindfulness raises your level of consciousness. Most of our fellow human beings get up, go to work, come home, go through the motions, and go to sleep; all with a general sense of ennui. They're zombies. They don't think. They aren't conscious. They lack purpose, awareness. Everything they do today is to survive with no risk or pain so they can get up tomorrow and do it again. Mindfulness gives you agency over your life, so that you can live with passion and purpose.
- Insidious distraction pulls you silently away from your purpose. Living with mindfulness is as close to "seeing the Matrix" as you can get: when you're conscious, aware, and present, it's like The Resistance is an absurd pickpocket trying to lift your wallet from your hands right in front of your face. "I see you" stops distraction cold in its tracks.
- When you're mindful, you're able to evaluate every action, every choice, for the value it brings (or doesn't) to your life. You retake agency over your choices. As your butt hits the couch, instead of settling in for four hours of The Walking Dead, you bounce right back up. "Nope! I know what's going to happen here! I'm going to grab my camera, hit up the park, snap some portraits, practice the lighting techniques I've been reading about, come back and process and post those shots for critique in my photography group, THEN I'll settle in for an hour of Netflix."
- Mindfulness lets you recognize what quadrant of productivity you're in, and shift your time and choices and actions back into the Important and Not Urgent zone. This is where almost every story-changing action will take place. time spent here will greatly accelerate your progress toward the life, art, and business you dream of.
- Mental and emotional padding - breathing room and flexibility mostly earned through meditation practice - is a powerful result of living mindfully. Without that margin, you live in a constant state of reaction: as soon as something unexpected happens, you become angry, upset, distraught, discouraged, confused, and frustrated. You become raw. You react too fast, and poorly. You're stressed. You're on edge. The slightest things set you off. Raising my hand here, because even in the good place I'm in now, I still get reactionary when I lose perspective. This is the angry text message you wish you hadn't sent, or those times you snapped at a coworker or friend or family member because you were having a bad day. Mindfulness gives you the margin you need to stop, breathe, and choose your reaction - both internally and outwardly.
- They say time is your greatest gift, but without presence, it's just empty wrapping paper. Mindfulness is about being present. Attention. Focus. Caring. The most charismatic people in the world are masters of presence, making the person to whom they're speaking feel like there's no one else in the room, and no place they'd rather be. Being present at work is a blessing to your boss, your coworkers, your clients, and your work. Being present at home is a blessing to your family and enables a future with fewer regrets. And being present with your passion work, your art, your business, and your self, is a blessing to you and everyone you touch through your professional photography. The time is going to be spent either way; get in alignment, and get present, so you can enjoy each moment to the fullest.
Want to know why this is so hard?
Because so long as you're living in a state of unconscious, purposeless distraction, you have excuses.
You put on 50 pounds. "I didn't realize I gained so much weight. It's like I looked in the mirror one day, and there it was!"
You go three months without touching your camera. "I've been so, so busy. I just haven't had time to shoot."
You go three years without launching your business. "I hate this job, I hate my boss, but I've got to pay the bills. I'm just waiting for the right time."
When you know what you're doing (which you do), and know the consequences of your choices (which you do), you have no excuse for doing what's easy instead of what's right.
But no matter how much doing the right thing would bring health, prosperity, and real, lasting happiness, we still choose poorly.
How many pizzas and cheeseburgers did it take for me to realize I was going to die 10, 20, 40 years too young?
How many months did I have to ignore my camera to recognize the distance I was putting between today and the art I wanted to make?
How much time did I have to spend on low-yield activities before realizing I would never get to launch by doing the easy busywork?
How long did it take me to stop being scared, to overcome my limiting beliefs (which were all in my head), and realize what a blessing my work is for my clients and community?
It's fear. It's The Resistance. It's distraction. It's waste.
And it's okay.
Because the time I lost was a check I had to write to pay for the mindfulness I now enjoy. It's a small price to pay to live the rest of my life consciously, and purposefully.
The same goes for you.
No matter how deeply you're feeling the regret of those lost years, the greatest failure is to not choose differently now that you're aware. Even with this feeling of loss, be grateful - grateful that now you know, now you're aware, and now you won't allow another day to go by without taking control over your future.
How I Practice Mindfulness
"Mindfulness helps us freeze the frame so that we can become aware of our sensations and experiences as they are, without the distorting coloration of socially conditioned responses or habitual reactions." - Henepola Gunaratana
Morning Routine
My morning routine is the first line of defense against distraction each day.
Being up early gives me time to breathe, think, and reconnect with my Why.
Mix in some affirmations, visualization, exercise and motivational reading, and my attitude for the day shifts from "There's no way," to "I can totally do this!"
Meditation
Meditation, even just 10 minutes a day, gives me an almost supernatural amount of mental and emotional padding.
It gives me so much emotional and mental padding that I can truly practice an observing mind and take control of my reactions to whatever life throws at me.
This is especially valuable in a day job work environment fraught with distraction, and with young kids at home. Instead of feeling like I'm a victim of life, I recognize and exercise my agency, controlling what I can while letting go emotionally of what I can't.
Focus
If getting off track was a competitive sport, you and I might just make the Olympics.
Ever sat down at the computer to practice your Photoshop skills, then looked up to see four hours have disappeared? Ever "checked Facebook real quick" for an hour? Maybe two?
The Pomodoro Technique is useful for more than just getting started on a big task. I set timers (in Chrome and on my phone) regularly throughout the day - at work, at the coffee shop, at home - to check in with myself and ask the mindfulness question of, "Is this the best use of your time?"
If you get distracted easily, set a timer for every 15 minutes. The more I've practiced this (and eliminated digital distractions), the less I need to rely on timers to bring me back to course.
Kill Notifications
Cleaning the slate is a scary, but powerful exercise.
Set aside an hour to go through and turn off every push notification on your phone and computer, and don't turn on your e-mail until your daily scheduled e-mail time. As soon as that time is up, turn off your e-mail program and don't look at it again until the next scheduled time (start with twice a day and work down to one, or start with one and see if you need two).
This was one of the most powerful choices I made as a notification-distraction-junkie.
I used to love it (and look immediately) when my phone would ding with a new notification. Someone liked my post! Someone followed me on Instagram! Breaking news out of Kazakhstan!
There are exceptions to this, such as if your job IS to quickly respond to e-mails - but for most folks, being immediately accessible is a choice, not a necessity. (If it's truly important, don't worry: they'll call.)
First Things First
You have to get your time, mind, and priorities in alignment before you can have peace in the present.
This is one of the superpowers bestowed through early rising and a consistent morning routine. Take care of your self and your dream work first every day, so that when you're at work or with friends and family, you're free to be present and attentive and grateful. So long as you're putting your needs and your dreams off to serve everyone else's needs, you will constantly suffer a state of misalignment, leading to distraction, disgruntle, and resentment.
I spent so much time angry at work and distracted at home before I learned this. It kills me to consider all the time I spent in the presence of my kids, but checked out and ungrateful, because my mind was on all the other things I "should" have been doing. My time was being invested either way; why waste it with distraction?
Slow Down
It is a constant battle for me to slow...down...
Again with my young kids, I used to always be dragging them on to the next thing. They wanted to stop, and look, and explore, and play... But we had a schedule to keep! Things to do! Errands to run! We have to hurry up and get to the playground so we can hurry up and play so we can hurry up to go home and hurry up and watch a movie and hurry through baths and into bed so we can hurry up and call it a good day!
Then I read one blogger's post about slowing down to your children's pace, and learning to appreciate their wonder with the world.
A child will spot a ladybug on a flower, stop in their tracks, squat down to get a closer look, and just watch and wonder in awe. As Thich Nhat Hanh teaches, peace is every step.
Derek Sivers tells the story to Tim Ferriss that he used to cycle like a bat out of hell, huffing and puffing, head down and dead set on maximum speed throughout. He taught himself to hate cycling.
So one day he took the same bike path he always did, but sat up, rode casually, looked around and enjoyed every moment of the experience. When he got home and checked his watch, he'd lost only two minutes on a 45-minute ride.
The difference between making his life miserable and making it beautiful was about 4%.
Sivers said he has never looked at life or business the same way since.
The Observing Mind
If you've ever gotten snippy with a coworker or gone to work after a spat with your spouse, you know that emotional turmoil can wreck 100% of your productivity.
How can you learn to bounce back, or better yet, not get worked up in the first place?
Talking about the Observing Mind is as far afield into Woo Woo Land as I'll take you guys. I know I'm already asking a lot with recommendations of meditation and turning off your Facebook notifications (!!!).
With meditation comes emotional margin - you get some space, some time to react, between what life throws at you and how you respond.
The observing mind is your higher intellect recognizing that space, recognizing the emotions in play, and choosing what to do with them. Thomas Sterner explains this more clearly and practically than I ever could in his book, The Practicing Mind.
When I talk about fear and embarrassment and other 'negative' emotions as being energy, energy you can use to fuel positive progress, I'm encouraging you to recognize those emotions for what they are and make better use of them than self-destruction.
This is the observing mind in action.
Life and love and work and the boss and clients are going to throw you curveballs, that's guaranteed.
But with practicing an observing mind, they don't so easily bump you off track.
Do This, Not That
"Mindfulness helps you go home to the present. And every time you go there and recognize a condition of happiness that you have, happiness comes." - Thich Nhat Hanh
When I began practicing mindfulness:
- I stopped being a victim of life's distractions, and started recognizing and exercising the control I have over my life.
- I stopped living in misalignment, feeling the pull and pressure to constantly be somewhere else doing something else, and started enjoying the incredible peace and gratitude that comes with being present - at work, at practice, at home.
- I stopped making excuses for not making progress on my dreams, and started taking baby steps which over time have brought me farther than I could have ever dreamed in my passion work.
- I stopped feeling pressured to rush and be busy, and started slowing down to check my 'map' and make sure I'm on the right path to the success I dream of.
- I stopped wishing for the miracle of 'change' to show up in my life and make things better, and started claiming agency over my life.
- I stopped being distracted and disgruntled, and started being grateful for every opportunity to live, breathe, love, and choose.
I know a lot of what I'm writing about in this productivity series isn't unique to photographers, but it is fairly universal to human beings.
Could you not use an extra two hours a day to work on your self, your needs, and your dreams?
Would having some emotional and mental margin help you to spend more time choosing your life instead of reacting to it?
Do the distractions of life and technology ever take you off your chosen course toward your dreams?
Do you ever feel like there's somewhere else you should be, or something else you should be doing, to the detriment of your happiness and your relationships?
Do you stay busy rushing through life, but get no closer to your dreams each day / month / year?
Are you tired? Tired of feeling like everything isn't what it's supposed to be, and that universe conspires to stop you from making the art and launching the business and living the life you want?
Mindfulness, and all the practices in this productivity series, are what you need to heal yourself and thrive.
No matter how much you feel ineffective or like a failure, today you are wiser, and it's within your control to apply that wisdom to better your life.
We all have the same time, the same 24 hours in a day.
How you spend it is your choice.
So choose better.
“Andrew Carnegie famously put it. There’s nothing shameful about sweeping. It’s just another opportunity to excel—and to learn. But you, you’re so busy thinking about the future, you don’t take any pride in the tasks you’re given right now. You just phone it all in, cash your paycheck, and dream of some higher station in life. Or you think, This is just a job, it isn’t who I am, it doesn’t matter. Foolishness. Everything we do matters—whether it’s making smoothies while you save up money or studying for the bar—even after you already achieved the success you sought.” - Ryan Holiday
This is Part 4 of my series: 9 practices to increase your productivity as a professional photographer
Read more here:
1. Essentialism
2. Evening Routine
3. Morning Routine
4. Mindfulness
5. Five Minutes
6. Kaizen
7. Time Blocking
8. What Gets Scheduled Gets Done
9. Imperfect Action
Like this series? Subscribe at the top-right of any page of this site to get all of my best stories and ideas in your Inbox.
Next Steps
- SCHEDULE IT: Set your alarm 10 minutes early tomorrow if you're not already practicing a morning routine, and put on your calendar for that time, "Meditation."
- HEADSPACE: As the man in the app says, Get Some Headspace. I've tried reading books about meditation and then practicing it, but I had zero consistency in my practice until I got the Headspace app. The guided meditations were exactly what I needed to commit to a specific length of time and stay focused without allowing distraction (and a raging lack of presence) to carry my monkey mind away.
- CHEAT: Don't rely on your overtaxed brain to "just remember" to stop and smell the roses. Use your phone, use a browser extension, use an egg timer; whatever you choose, use it to remind you to check in with yourself on a regular basis. If you're easily distracted, set the timer for 15 minutes; if less so, try an hour or 90 minutes. Just keep asking yourself: "Am I living in the past (depression), future (anxiety), or present (gratitude)? And is this the most valuable use of my time?"
- BRAINSTORM SESSION: Get out your pen and paper. Think back on earlier today, or all of yesterday. What negative emotions did you feel? What triggered them? Were any the result of being stuck in the past, or anxious about something in the future (that may or may not ever happen)? Did you perceive someone slighted you? Are you feeling any negative emotions right now? What are they? Why are you feeling them? Are any of them rooted in a negative experience right here, right now, in the present? If not, why are you wasting your time and happiness on them? File this away in your Brainstorms folder.
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- DO THIS NOW: What's the biggest challenge holding you back today? E-mail me your answer (yes, right now!), and let's make a breakthrough.
Productivity for Photographers: Morning Routine
"We hit the snooze button and resist the inevitable act of waking up, unaware that our resistance is sending a message to the universe that we’d rather lie there in our beds—unconscious—than consciously and actively live and create the lives we say that we want." - Hal Elrod
What would you do with an extra 2 hours a day?
Two hours a day adds up to 18 workweeks a year.
How would your life - your health, your art, your business, your happiness - be different if someone handed you that kind of time to invest in yourself and your dreams? If your boss said, "Here James Michael, I want to give you the next 18 weeks off so you can make your life awesome - the very best it can be."
Here it is, plain:
You need to go to bed two hours earlier, and get up two hours earlier than you are right now.
(I can hear you screaming "Impossible!" all the way from here in Goldthwaite, Texas.)
To anyone who hasn't experienced it, the differences are profound.
Why are you dedicating your most powerful, focused, productive hours to everything EXCEPT your dream?
When all of your energy goes to rushing and reacting and meeting other people's ever-urgent needs, you have nothing left to invest in changing your life for the better.
I can't tell you how many years I spent staying up late, getting up late, rushing through my morning, resenting my work, being distracted around my family, and letting my dreams slip to "tomorrow" day after day after day. Maybe I'd steal a few hours on the weekend, or holidays. I was always playing catch-up; never satisfied, never feeling like I was where I was supposed to be. Not at work, not at home.
So much stress exists in our lives because we're constantly out of alignment.
When we're at work, we feel like we should be with our family. When we're with our family, we feel like we should be working on our passion project. Then when we finally find or force the time to work on our dreams, we're exhausted, stressed, distracted, even resentful.
With that misalignment constantly grinding against our hearts and heads and spirits, it's no wonder we're stressed out and seeking any distraction we can find.
Facebook. Netflix. Video games.
(All of which can be healthy recreation, so long as your dreams and priorities and life are already well-served.)
By day's end, we're spent.
So we default to the easy and low-yield. A couple hours of Call of Duty or Top Chef while scrolling through an endless sea of social media (scientifically proven to cause depression).
The average American watches five hours of television per day. That same 'average American' plays almost an hour of video games per day.
It's not that these activities are bad - all work and no play makes James Michael a dull boy.
But what if we flipped the script, and you and I spent five or six hours a day working passionately and productively toward our dreams?
Hell, what if we could score just one hour each day to work on our dreams?
Zig Ziglar quotes a study of the typical American factory:
The average factory line worker watched an average of 30 hours of television each week.
The person in charge of the line watched 25 hours.
The foreman watched 20 hours.
The VP watched 12-15 hours.
The president watched 8-12 hours.
The chairman of the board watched an average of 4-8 hours of television each week, with 50 percent of that time spent watching training videos.
The trend is obvious. Some invest their time in distraction, some in growth. That growth leads to success - personal, professional, social, and financial.
Recreation (from the Latin re: "again", and creare: "to create, bring forth" - important to consider) is powerful and necessary. But it should be purposeful, and in service to your dreams first; not in place of the work that makes those dreams come true.
Why practice early rising and a purposeful morning routine?
Because it's "the big secret" to success you've been searching and wishing for.
If your life is rocking, if you feel purposeful and productive and on track, toss my advice like a hot potato: as always, this is your business, your art, your life, and you're in control.
If not, allow me to double-dog-dare you to test this for 30 days and see if your life isn't changed for the better.
What Makes Mornings So Powerful?
"Never forget that who you are becoming is the single most important determining factor in your quality of life, now and for your future." - Hal Elrod
It's not the numbers on the clock that make the difference between early morning and the rest of each day.
It's what is, and isn't, found during those hours.
The early morning hours empower you with:
- TIME: When you shift your sleeping hours ahead by two hours, recognize: you're not losing a minute of sleep, nor a minute of waking hours. You're trading your least energetic, least empowered, unproductive late evening hours for two hours of purposeful, powerful, focused early morning hours. This is the time you've so desperately sought to Do The Work and make your dreams come true.
- ENERGY: I spent most of my life identifying as a "night owl." I loathed mornings. But I can now attribute 100 percent of this to late nights (refusing to give up the computer screen), too little sleep, poor diet, non-existent exercise, the limiting belief that I hated mornings, and having no Next Steps ready so I could go straight from bed to important work. Now that I practice better health habits and a consistent evening routine, my morning hours are by far my most energetic. I often wake with exciting ideas already stirring in my mind, refusing to let me go back to sleep, even if I wanted to. (An awesome problem to have.)
- WILLPOWER: Scientists have solidly determined that your willpower is like a fuel tank, and with every decision or temptation or challenge, your willpower drains throughout the day. That's why it's so hard to do high-yield, challenging (if purposeful) work late in the evening. By the time you're home from your day job, you're spent.
- FOCUS: Every person has the same 24 hours in a day. How come so few get amazing things done, and the rest "never have time" to tend their health, art, or dreams? Essentialism: they focus on high-yield, important, long-game activities. The Important but Not Urgent. With every text message, phone call, e-mail, family request, coworker problem, boss demand, client displeasure, messed up fast food order, second of traffic, doctor appointment, parent-teacher meeting, Facebook notification, trip to the gas pump... Your focus is being stolen. You face more distraction and carry more mental and emotional baggage as the day goes on. Sleep is The Big-Arse Reset Button. Every morning is a fresh start, especially early morning when the rest of the world is still sleeping.
- VICTORY: Rising early is a victory in itself. Everything you get done in your morning hours is a victory. Practicing your morning routine is a victory. Can you honestly say right now that you felt victorious on your drive to work this morning? Odds are you snoozed the alarm, woke late, rushed through the shower and a thoughtless breakfast, then cursed traffic and your job and the universe all the way to your desk. That never feels like victory. But this is exactly how most of us start our days, and live our lives - always behind, always out of alignment, always distracted and disgruntled, never present, never feeling like we're where we should be. When you take back your mornings, it sets the tone (and your attitude, and thus your experience of life) for the rest of the day.
- SOLUTIONS: When you steep your subconscious in your passion work each morning, your mind goes to work on creative ideas and solutions to problems while you go about the rest of your day. This is why your best ideas come to you in the shower, on a run or bike ride, or while doing something completely unrelated to your problem. Prime the pump of your subconscious each morning by spending time working on your dreams.
Your best energy, willpower, and focus are all found in the first hours of the day.
Stop rushing through this time and giving it all away; if you don't choose how you spend your time, someone else will.
Shift your hours to the early morning, get important work done, and leave what's left for everything else in your life.
But What About My Job? My Family? My Friends?
“If you are depressed you are living in the past. If you are anxious you are living in the future. If you are at peace you are living in the present.” - Lao Tzu
If you don't feel like you're kicking arse at your dreams, then I'd bet a dollar to a donut that you aren't kicking arse at your job, or with your family or friends.
I'm not saying you're a bad employee, mom or dad, or friend.
But I'd wager you don't feel like the best employee, parent, or friend you could be.
You have a problem with alignment.
And when your life is out of balance, out of alignment, it's nearly impossible to be present and to know peace. The people you love just want your presence; when you're with them, they want to feel like you're there, and that there's nowhere else you'd rather be.
When you start your day with progress toward your dreams, your heart and mind are opened up to the rest of life. You no longer feel out of place, out of time, disgruntled, distracted, or resentful.
Our day jobs are demanding. Our families are demanding. Our friends are demanding.
Not in a bad, selfish way - just in the attention they all need to feel and be honored.
It's impossible to serve those needs with your best self when you never make the time to serve your own needs. And a big part of your needs as an artist and business owner is doing work in service of your dreams.
There is zero chance you're reading these words right now if becoming a professional photographer is NOT important to you.
You've passed the test.
And now it's time to commit - to yourself, and to your dream.
Why You've Never Succeeded At Rising Early
"We do more before 9 a.m. than most people do all day." - U.S. Army
I tried a thousand times to become an early riser. I read about the benefits in books and blogs, heard countless examples of the super-successful and their morning routines.
Maybe one out of every four tries, I'd get up with my first alarm.
And every single time, I'd give up the next morning.
Then Michael Hyatt hit me with a baseball bat.
He talked about his Evening Routine.
Not just "go lay in bed and toss and turn until your normal bedtime" horsesh*t, but actual actions you could take and rituals to adopt that made going to bed earlier - and getting up earlier - not just possible, but pleasurable.
Since I started committing to a regular evening routine, no matter how imperfect my practice of it is, I've learned to fall asleep earlier, sleep better, and get up in the morning refreshed and ready to make good (sometimes great) things happen.
Quit trying to "just get up earlier." That's brutality. Sacrificing sleep by just setting your alarm two hours earlier and doing none of the other things you need to support that early morning is physiological and psychological terrorism. It makes you hate life, hate yourself, hate mornings, hate your job, hate everyone who talks to you, and even hate your own dreams. It's misery.
Stop.
Just... Stop.
Stop trying to brute force positive change in your life.
You're doing this because you want to, because you choose to.
Practice an evening routine that makes early mornings not just possible, but easy, empowering, and fun.
My Morning Routine
“It is well to be up before daybreak, for such habits contribute to health, wealth, and wisdom.” ~ Aristotle
There is no perfect routine for everyone, but here's mine:
5 a.m. - Teeth, Gym Clothes, Breakfast Shake (Athletic Greens and 30g protein from Optimum Nutrition Whey), Coffee or Tea
5:30 a.m. - Gym or bike ride, alternating strength work and cardio work
6 a.m. - Meditation, Affirmations, Visualization, Writing
7 a.m. - Shower and shave
7:30 a.m. - Prepping for day job work and motivational reading or audiobook
7:55 a.m. - Off to work!
A few tips:
- I love coffee, and I love tea. I try to alternate each day, but especially on weekends and holidays I love to start my day with a good cup of coffee to get my energy right. My relationship with making coffee has vastly improved with my wife's gift of a small, simple, one-cup Keurig. When I drink tea, I'll usually enjoy caffeine-free rooibos (Texas Gold variety).
- I'm a big skeptic when it comes to the benefits claimed by most supplements, but Athletic Greens came on Tim Ferriss' recommendation. It seems expensive, but I can't lie: I can absolutely feel the difference now that I take greens daily. I truly believe I have better health, more energy, get sick less, get less sick when I'm sick, stay sick for less time, sleep and wake easier, have less pain and stiffness, and just feel so much better than before I started taking greens. In the past decade I've tried to stay consistent with eating a wide variety of vegetables to get the same benefits, as well as drinking kombucha for the probiotic benefits and eating kimchi for the prebiotic support, but I've always found that effort mentally exhausting. I still eat a variety of veg, but Athletic Greens has made fueling my body so simple (and the results so tangible) that I can't deny its value.
- I used to think I had to work out for an hour to get any benefit from exercise. Which of course meant I never exercised. With a sedentary day job and lifestyle, I could go days - maybe weeks - without doing anything to break a sweat. My personal morning routine includes a half hour of exercise, and I get a heck of a workout in in that time. You can get a lot done in five, ten minutes, if that's all you have. Doubt it? Try doing five minutes of burpees straight - you'll feel the burn. If nothing else, take a brisk five- or ten-minute walk. Move your bones. Get your blood flowing and oxygen to your brain. Do some pushups. Do some air squats. A little bit can go a long way; not only does this practice change your physical body, it changes your mental state as well.
- Your workouts don't have to suck, either. I'm blessed in that I naturally love to hit the gym or bike. But I taught myself to hate exercise early on because I thought I had to do too much, and that I had to do a specific, perfect routine. Do this, then this, then that, for this many reps in this way with this count and breathe right here but not there! and... What a drag. I fell back in love with working out when I stopped trying to be perfect at it. Just show up. Have fun. Feeling the treadmill today? Hit it! Elliptical? Glide on. Free weights instead? Get pumped. Want to use the machines instead? Push (and pull) it. Just have fun with it and let go of the perfectionism. Over time you'll learn more, balance your workouts better, and focus on the specific benefits you want from your workouts. But early on, dump all the responsibility and mental effort and just go have fun.
- Quit being skeptical and start experimenting and gathering feedback. I sabotaged my success in art, business, and life for years because I was always skeptical of this advice versus that. It was The Resistance, disguised as discernment, allowing my perfectionism to feed me excuse after excuse after excuse to "research more" and do not-a-damn-thing. Learn, then take violent action on what you've learned: immediately, tangibly, and with bold commitment.
- See below for my tips on meditation, affirmations, visualization, and writing or journaling.
My morning routine is a Frankenstein mix of guidance from Tim Ferriss, Michael Hyatt, and Hal Elrod's SAVERS system.
Speaking of which...
A Perfectly Imperfect System
"Don’t trick yourself into thinking your situation is permanent. That’s how it becomes permanent." - Michael Hyatt
Copy Michael Hyatt.
Copy me.
Copy Tim Ferriss.
Or, best, get a copy of Hal Elrod's fantastic The Miracle Morning.
His SAVERS system (along with Michael Hyatt's encouragement) was just the inspiration and structure I needed to finally become an early riser.
S: Silence. Meditation. I use the Headspace app for easy, enjoyable guided meditation.
A: Affirmations. The age-old self-help trick of affirming the best of yourself. Invaluable because it keeps you from getting distracted from your unique and wonderful Why. I keep mine in a starred Evernote note so I can read them off my phone every morning, and change them up as I change. The world has a bad habit of getting you down, about yourself and about life. Affirmations are the inoculation you need to stay positive and on the path.
V: Visualization. Reinforcing your Why. What would your perfect day look like? If you had financial freedom, what would you do with your time? If you had location freedom, where would you be? What tools would you enjoy using to make your art? What would it be like to work with only ideal clients whom you adore? What would you do today if you weren't scared? Like Olympic-level athletes, close your eyes and really visualize yourself being your best self and living your most perfect vision of life.
E: Exercise. Get your blood flowing. Get oxygen to your brain. Get a little health victory early in the day, to set the tone for the rest. Reinforce to yourself that you are conscious and purposeful in your health and wellness choices. I use the Sworkit app for quick, easy, variable, and short bodyweight exercises. Yoga is another great option.
R: Reading. Feed your mind, creativity, inspiration, and motivation. Give your subconscious good material to ponder on throughout the day. If you need a place to start, try Peace Is Every Step or The Practicing Mind for peace and presence, How To Stay Motivated for motivation, Essentialism for focus, Start With Why or The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People for purpose.
S: Scribe, or journaling. Write to get everything that's bouncing around your mind and weighing on your spirit down to paper. Get it out of your system. Brain dump. Your mind will desperately try to hold on to everything it thinks it needs to remember and figure out until you put that mental noise in a safe place where the brain can let go. (How many of you awesome PTP readers have written me an e-mail and at the end said, "Wow, just writing this down has made me feel so much better." Make this a part of your daily practice and multiply the benefits times 365.)
You can customize anyone's system to make it your own and serve your unique personality and needs, but you will enjoy so much more success faster if you adopt a proven system to start with.
Not knowing what to do will kill your morning motivation.
You'll waste all of the energy and willpower you earned by getting up early just figuring out what to do with your time.
Take imperfect action. Fend off perfectionism. Allow some blind faith, and follow the system of someone you respect. You can break it apart and rebuild it to a custom fit later, but especially at the start when every little win is so important, give yourself the best odds of success by copying someone else's successful routine.
And give yourself grace.
This is just practice.
You're just practicing being a better you, becoming an early riser, getting good stuff done early and starting your day with victory.
There's no perfection to achieve, no optimal system.
You'll do great some days. You'll blow it on others. But now you're aware, you're wiser, you're empowered. Next time you snooze your alarm to the last possible second, you'll now know why (stayed up too late, didn't honor your evening routine, didn't plan your morning to-do's, didn't reinforce your Why...). And you'll know what to fix tonight for a win tomorrow.
Now, you're not living by distraction and reaction; you're living by presence and proactive choice.
Morning Routine For Photographers
“Life’s too short” is repeated often enough to be a cliché, but this time it’s true. You don’t have enough time to be both unhappy and mediocre. It’s not just pointless; it’s painful. - Seth Godin
The first hour of your morning routine is all about you; about giving you the mental, physical, and spiritual fuel you need to be your best self.
The second hour of your morning routine serves your dreams, your passion project, your side hustle.
This is where you get to get important work done not just on yourself, but on your photography and business. This is the time you were looking for when you told me through my reader survey that, behind confidence and ahead of money, you needed more time to invest in growing your art and business acumen.
After an hour of self-care and self-betterment each morning, you'll be like a thoroughbred ready to break out of the gate and race. You will get more done in this second hour of your morning than you'll get done the rest of the day.
(Although with the kind of energy and motivation you'll get from this kind of morning, you're likely to have a kick-arse day all day long. The benefits only multiply.)
What you'll do with this power hour depends on where you're at in your photography journey.
- You can work on your Identity as a professional photographer, growing your confidence and defining your 'voice' as a working artist.
- You can work on getting legal, researching your DBA, sales tax permit, income and expense records and reporting, and liability insurance.
- You can work on your launch, setting your startup prices and policies, defining your ideal client, and determining how you'll market yourself to them.
- You can actively market your business: craft a marketing campaign, build your graphic pieces for it, schedule your social media and photo blog support, list potential co-op partners, run a contest, work your PR contacts, survey your clients or market, A/B split test your headlines, offer, promotions, copy, and landing pages, or take action on any of the countless ways to effectively and efficiently market your business (which is just connecting the dots between the value you offer and those who would be most blessed by it).
- You can study and practice your art, mastering one technique or pose or setup or style or lighting or any of the factors that make for a great, salable portrait. Don't forget the practice: figure you'll retain 10% of what you read and 100% of what you practice, so your time is ten times more effective when you put what you're learning into use. Learning is priceless, but you may as well be pouring water into a broken cup if you don't take what you're learning and apply it to your art and business with violent immediacy and commitment.
Not sure what to do next? E-mail me today, tell me where you're at in your journey and where you feel stuck, and I'll help you get back on the path to progress.
Do This, Not That
"I wanted Level 10 success, but my level of personal development was at about a two; maybe a three or a four on a good day." - Hal Elrod
When I began practicing my morning routine:
- I stopped sleeping in and starting my day with feelings of failure, and started taking advantage of my morning time to put wins on the board while the rest of the world was still asleep.
- I stopped my limiting belief that I was a night owl, and started getting important, productive, progress-making work done to start my day.
- I stopped committing hours of my life to low-yield distractions like drama series and cooking shows in the evening, and started getting those hours back with high-yield work on my dreams in the morning.
- I stopped going to my day job mad and resentful, and started being present and grateful at work because I'd already made tangible progress toward my dreams that morning.
- I stopped wishing I was somewhere else all the time, and started living in the present at my job, and with my wife, kids, and friends. All this because I started my day with victory, with self-care, with progress toward the dreams that are so important to me, putting me in a place of alignment for the entire day.
- I stopped never having time for healthy eating and exercise, and started prepping meals and energizing my entire day with a great workout every morning.
- I stopped letting my dreams slip to "tomorrow" day after day, and started making real, powerful, measurable progress up the mountain of success.
- I stopped feeling like I was fighting with life, and started dancing with it instead.
I'm telling you, no matter how loudly The Resistance is screaming in your head that this is impossible, that you'll never be an early riser, that you HATE mornings and will never ever stick to a morning routine and like it, you don't know what you don't know.
Every failure you've experienced with becoming an early riser is tied tightly to a lack of support.
By way of stubbornness or ignorance (again, give yourself grace), you haven't given yourself what you need to have the best odds at an awesome early morning.
That changes right now.
Set an alarm for tonight to start your evening routine before bed.
And set an alarm to rise equally early tomorrow.
Commit, persevere, have faith, and test the results over the next 30 days.
Just think about it:
Two hours a day. Eighteen workweeks of time a year. Is the leap of faith, the challenging of your limiting beliefs, the effort to try not worth it?
What dreams can you make reality with this kind of time, energy, focus, and willpower on your side?
Let your imagination run, then set your alarm, and make it possible.
"Our outer world will always be a reflection of our inner world. Our level of success is always going to parallel our level of personal development. Until we dedicate time each day to developing ourselves into the person we need to be to create the life we want, success is always going to be a struggle to attain." - Jim Rohn
This is Part 3 of my series: 9 practices to increase your productivity as a professional photographer
Read more here:
1. Essentialism
2. Evening Routine
3. Morning Routine
4. Mindfulness
5. Five Minutes
6. Kaizen
7. Time Blocking
8. What Gets Scheduled Gets Done
9. Imperfect Action
Like this series? Subscribe at the top-right of any page of this site to get all of my best stories and ideas in your Inbox.
Next Steps
- SLOW DOWN: This is a massive post because this is a massively powerful change you can make in your life. Becoming an early riser and practicing a purposeful morning routine has been one of those most powerful changes I've made to better my life. I can't emphasize the point enough: this is powerful, powerful stuff. Take the time to go back through this post, and craft your own list of action items and next steps.
- START TODAY: Start with setting an alarm for tonight, three hours before you usually go to sleep. Take that first hour to practice your evening routine. Set another alarm for tomorrow morning, two hours earlier than you usually rise. Maybe save this for a weekend when you don't have anything big going on. That'll let you snag an afternoon nap (try for just 15-20 minutes) and help your body ease into this new sleep schedule. But commit, stay consistent, test for 30 days, and see if you aren't getting more, and more important, things done toward your best life and your dreams of becoming a professional photographer.
- RTFM: Seriously: Hal Elrod's book The Miracle Morning is THE manual to becoming an early riser. It's a super-fun read, Hal's personality is fantastic, the writing is excellent and inspiring, and I can't even begin to cover in one blog post all the methods he presents to make early rising and morning rituals easy, fun, effective, and sustainable. This is the kind of investment will change the story of the rest of your life.
- BRAINSTORM SESSION: Get out your pen and paper. I'll bet you didn't do this exercise from my Evening Routine post, so I'll offer it again (this Why, this vision, is important enough to bear repeating): What would you do if you had an extra two hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year, to work on your health, art, business, and dreams?
- SUBSCRIBE TODAY: It's my calling to help you earn your first $5,000 to $50,000 as a part time professional photographer. Don't miss out on my best stories and ideas: subscribe to my e-mail newsletter today at the top-right of any page of this site.
- DO THIS NOW: What's the biggest challenge holding you back today? E-mail me your answer (yes, right now!), and let's make a breakthrough.
Productivity for Photographers: Evening Routine
"When you arise in the morning, think of what a precious privilege it is to be alive - to breathe, to think, to enjoy, to love." - Marcus Aurelius
The first question people ask me when I talk about my evening routine is:
"Wait, don't you mean morning routine?"
I didn't have a morning routine until I learned about evening routines. I thought you just set your alarm an hour or two early then exercised herculean discipline to not hit snooze and roll over...two times...okay, seven times...
Like most of you fellow artists, I've always been a night owl.
And I've tested almost every method of balancing sleep and life (except polyphasic sleep).
As a kid, I slept most of the day until the after-school cartoons would come on, do my homeschool work as efficiently as possible, then play video games all night. My parents thought there was surely something wrong with me. They even had me tested by the doctor for...what? A broken circadian rhythm?
As a teenager in public high school, I woke around 15 minutes before the bus came, skipped breakfast, slept on the bus and through first period History, played basketball until the sun went down then played video games until my eyes hurt.
Early in my career when I was young, single and mindlessly wandering, I'd go to work at noon, write and photograph to nine, then play Battlefield 2 until my coworkers showed up the next morning.
In sum, I've spent most of my life sleep-deprived.
Getting out of bed when that first alarm rings is still one of my biggest challenges in life.
But what a difference a morning makes.
When I follow my evening and morning routines:
- My productivity on what truly matters (the Important but Not Urgent) goes gangbusters.
- I feel rested, awake, sharp, and focused.
- My alarm, while not beloved, becomes the sound of opportunity.
- I have time to prep meals and hit the bike or gym, vastly improving my health and how I feel all day.
- I'm able to start my day with motivation, through reading, audiobook, podcast or video.
- I start each day with a series of victories, setting the tone for the rest of the day.
- I feel in control of my day, my choices, and my life.
The morning hours, when most of the world is still asleep, are magical in their power. I'm fresh. I have a full stock of energy, peace, and willpower. I've not yet become drained, distracted and reactionary from the ever-pressing needs of the world.
My mornings are my best time.
Even as a lifelong night owl.
One of the worst ways I fooled myself early in my career was believing my late night hours were my most creative and productive.
Oh, I read a lot of blogs, played around with a bunch of Photoshop actions and tutorials. I watched lots of educational videos. I processed and reprocessed thousands of photographs.
But I didn't realize I was working almost exclusively on the Not Urgent and Not Important.
I was busy, but not productive.
I wasn't creating value; I was neither making valuable things nor making myself more valuable.
Schedule It
"The key is not to prioritize what's on your schedule, but to schedule your priorities." - Stephen Covey
What gets scheduled gets done.
Especially early on, commit to maintaining your evening routine every single night.
There are few things harder to do in life than build a new habit without daily practice. This makes new habits easier, just like getting out of bed, brushing your teeth, leaving for work on time, and the route your drive to and from the office. They're mindless routines at this point, right? To make good habits this easy, you need to give your new, better, story-changing habits the consistency they need to take hold.
The more you do it, the easier it gets.
(And no joke, I am one of the most rebelliously cynical people when it comes to these kinds of commitments, even though I know from over-and-over-again experience that this is the best way to build a better life.)
- Put your evening routine on your calendar for every night at the same time.
- Start your evening routine at whatever time you need to get it all done before lights-out time. Early on, give yourself half-as-much-again time as you think you'll need. Give yourself the best odds for early wins.
- If your evening routine involves any electronics (journaling, a look at your calendar, updating your to-do list), schedule that first in your routine. You want as much off-screen time as possible before lights-out.
- Lights-out means lights-out: no book light, no phone or tablet, no television. Close your eyes, rest your mind and body, and let sleep come. If you suffer some insomnia (even several nights into your new routine - and getting up early each day), check out Tim Ferriss' suggestions for what works best for him: 1, 2, 3, 4. More tips here from Michael Hyatt.
- Ask your family for help. My kids go to bed at the same time I start my evening routine. When there's a straggler - usually the 5-year-old - my wife is wonderful about tending the flock while I get into my evening routine and off to sleep. (protip: I often start my evening routine with my kids, listening to a good audiobook in the dark while everyone gets settled in for the night. Their favorite and mine for positive bedtime listening is Zig Ziglar's How To Stay Motivated.)
- Commit, even if you're hesitant. Until you test how these routines affect your energy and productivity, you don't know what you're missing. Give this the investment of time, patience, and effort it deserves - it may be what you've needed all along to make progress toward your dreams.
My Evening Routine
"We must all suffer one of two things: the pain of discipline or the pain of regret or disappointment." - Jim Rohn
My routine won't necessarily look like your routine, just like my art, business, marketing, sense of humor, and life won't look like yours either.
Experiment and measure what works uniquely for you.
Here's what works for me:
8:00 p.m. - I get my kids off to bed and start my evening routine. I jump on the computer and write a quick journal entry for the evening. How do I feel? What's on my mind? What three things am I grateful for from today?
8:10 p.m. - Consider my calendar and to-do list for tomorrow. Often this is just a glance at what's coming up, blocking any time I need to prep for upcoming commitments, and making sure my to-do list has purposeful, progress-making baby steps on it. (I live by my Google Calendar.)
8:20 p.m. - Wash up, brush my teeth, and floss.
8:30 p.m. - Lay down and read by book light or Kindle Paperwhite. I don't avoid non-fiction at bedtime like some folks suggest, but I do know what books I have to avoid: those that give me so many great ideas and action steps that I can't stop dog-earing, highlighting, and brainstorming from.
9:00 p.m. - Lights out.
A few tips:
- I use a simple Chrome extension for my timer. It helps me stick to the budgeted time for computer work during my routines, and to apply the Pomodoro technique when I've got some ugly frogs to eat.
- I never do this routine perfectly, but I do a good job at getting close. It's not about perfection, it's about taking imperfect action toward my dreams. I sometimes blow the whole routine. I sometimes get ornery and rebellious and stay up until midnight, then hate myself at work the next morning. But then I return violently to my routine.
- Cheat your way to consistency. Leave yourself sticky-note reminders. Don't ignore your daily calendar reminder. Give yourself extra time. Ask a friend to call or text you every day for a while to help you stay honest.
- If you're like me, you have a problem with feeling bad when you feel good. Anyone who knows that feeling knows what I'm talking about here. It is 100-percent okay to take care of yourself. The list of things you can (and feel like you should) be doing for everyone else is endless. You will never get to your needs if you don't get your needs to the top of that list. If you're a people-pleaser, this is a big step, but you have to give yourself the care and fuel you need so you have a full tank when it comes time to serve your family, friends, clients, and community. They deserve your best, and to give it, you have to feel well taken care of. That will always start with you.
- The Resistance is going to do everything it can to make you think this is stupid, a waste of time, selfish, not for you, not worth trying for. Know this in advance, and fight back when distraction and discouragement creep in.
Do This, Not That
"Be miserable. Or motivate yourself. Whatever has to be done, it's always your choice." - Wayne Dyer
When I began practicing my evening routine:
- I stopped staying up late with low-yield activities, and started waking up with energy and kicking butt at high-yield work. I used to stay up late getting nothing important done, wasting time on brainless work because by day's end I had no energy or willpower left to do what mattered...only what was easy and 'looked' productive.
- I stopped hating mornings, and started getting real work done. Those first 10 minutes post-alarm are still super hard to push through, but once I do, the value of my entire day is multiplied. I get more important things done with greater ease, peace, patience, and clarity, all day long. I have more mental and emotional padding, I'm less reactionary, and not to be discounted, I'm flat out more happy.
- I stopped dragging out my nights with braindead "relaxation," and started investing in rich re-creation. No more reality TV, cooking shows, or Facebook into the wee hours. I don't need to relax so much now that I'm getting the sleep my body and brain need, and when I do relax, I can do so hardcore: long walks or bike rides, coffee in a bookstore, a great movie, a favorite book.
- I stopped having excuses of "not enough time" for the important stuff, and started getting things done that I'm proud of. There are few greater feelings of victory than walking of out the gym, sweaty and the best kind of sore, at 6 a.m. "I can't" and the ten-thousand diseased excuses it breeds just goes out the window. And "I can" is damn powerful mojo.
- I stopped believing myself to be a hopeless night owl, and started claiming agency over my life. I can have control over my life when I Do The Work - on my work, my art, my business, and my self. When I do the work to maintain and honor my evening routine, I earn access to one of the most powerful tools in life: the morning routine (the next post in this series).
Evening Routine For Photographers
“If you could kick the person in the pants responsible for most of your trouble, you wouldn't sit for a month.” ― Theodore Roosevelt
How does having an evening routine (and the earlier morning it enables) help you as a part time professional photographer?
When I surveyed you awesome PTP readers earlier this year, Time was the second biggest challenge holding you back behind Confidence and ahead of Money.
What if you could get more important, dream-enabling work done in those morning hours than you do the whole rest of the day?
Are you getting almost ZERO work done on your art or business, because you don't have time?
What if the reason you're making so little progress is because you're stacking all the odds against yourself?
What if always putting your dream off to "later" is leaving you doing your most important work when you have the most distractions and the lowest energy?
What if you dedicated the most valuable and productive hours of your day - your mornings - to doing the important work that will change your story for the better as a professional photographer?
Listen:
It is almost impossible to earn those morning hours if you don't set yourself up for success the evening prior.
It's almost impossible to do the same amount of important work after your day job as before it, because in the mornings, you're fresh off a good rest, your willpower fuel tank is topped off, and the rest of life hasn't yet savaged your attention, time, spirit, or energy.
Why are you investing your best hours toward someone else's success?
Guarantee your dream gets the best of you by preparing for success every evening.
This is Part 2 of my series: 9 practices to increase your productivity as a professional photographer
Read more here:
1. Essentialism
2. Evening Routine
3. Morning Routine
4. Mindfulness
5. Five Minutes
6. Kaizen
7. Time Blocking
8. What Gets Scheduled Gets Done
9. Imperfect Action
Like this series? Subscribe at the top-right of any page of this site to get all of my best stories and ideas in your Inbox.
Next Steps
- Start Tonight: Tonight is the first step toward adopting story-changing evening and morning routines. Go to bed early. Get off-screen time. Get a workout sometime during the day, which will help you sleep better tonight. Give yourself time to relax and then close your eyes and let sleep come. Get yourself a solid eight hours of sleep (everyone has different sleep needs, so you'll need to experiment here), get up early tomorrow, and make productive use of the extra time. If you need a nap midday, take 15. If you hit snooze in the morning, you're making it that much harder to fall asleep on time at night. Don't sabotage your own success.
- Cheat: Cheat your way to habit. If getting up early to work on your dream doesn't motivate you (maybe you don't know what your next step is, or you haven't articulated your Why, or you lack confidence because you don't yet identify as a professional photographer), cheat like hell: roll out of bed, hit the bathroom, the do something that delights you. Play your favorite video game (Rogue Legacy is an outstanding game to wake up to), read a fun novel, eat your favorite sinfully-delicious breakfast pastry, watch an episode of an awesome TV series, take a hot bath with scented candles, go for a brisk walk or bike ride... Anything that you normally have to 'steal' time for. Pamper yourself; reward yourself in these early morning hours, at least to start. As your evening routine and an earlier wake time become habit, you can shift your morning routine to more purposeful and productive actions.
- Brainstorm Session: Get out your pen and paper. What would you do if you had an extra two hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year, to work on your health, art, business, and dreams? That's equivalent to over 18 WORKWEEKS A YEAR. How would your life, your happiness, be different? What if you could earn those two hours a day just by trading in your low-yield, low-energy, low-production late evening hours?
- Subscribe Today: It's my calling to help you earn your first $5,000 to $50,000 as a part time professional photographer. Don't miss out on my best stories and ideas: subscribe to my e-mail newsletter today at the top-right of any page of this site.
- Do This Now: What's the biggest challenge holding you back today? E-mail me your answer (yes, right now!), and let's make a breakthrough.
9 practices to increase your productivity as a professional photographer
There are a smidge over 85 million productivity tips on the Internet.
(I Googled, just to be sure.)
There's a trap here:
When confronted with overwhelming options, what do our brains do?
Nothing.
We lose focus, we lose inspiration, and we fall back on routine.
"What got you here won't get you there." - Marshall Goldsmith
Success boiled down to its most base practice becomes habit. What we do daily lays stone in the foundation of our dreams.
When I asked you awesome PTP readers to describe what's holding you back, Time was well behind Confidence and a step ahead of Money.
I sat down and identified the 9 most powerful practices I employ daily to enjoy peace and productivity while balancing family, friends, day job, photography, business, writing, coaching, and re-creation.
Kicking off this nine-week series with practice numero uno:
1. Essentialism
No amount of recovered time or increased productivity matters if you don't get important things done.
The Covey Quadrants give you a visual method to judge actions and reactions: Urgent to Not Urgent, Important to Unimportant. The story-changing stuff happens in the Important but Not Urgent quadrant; getting practice behind the camera, handshake marketing, volunteering, self-care, healthy meal planning and prep, physical activity, meditation - all the things we know we'd benefit from if we did them, but we rarely prioritize.
Because of other people's urgency, their crises become our crises if we let them. This is where the Urgent and Unimportant meet, and where we spend the vast majority of our time. This is where we live a reactionary, stagnant, disappointing life.
The practice of Essentialism - and this is all just practice, there is no perfection to achieve here - is the pattern-interrupt I needed to get off the hamster wheel of life.
You practice saying No. You practice defaulting to No for everything except those rare opportunities that come along where your heart screams, "Hell yes!" You create margin in your life so you can breathe, so you can think, so you can grow and act with purpose.
Have you ever felt overworked but underperforming? Are you busy all the time but make little to no tangible progress on your life goals?
Essentialism is the medicine you need.
Greg McKeown wrote the book on Essentialism. His is the most succinct explanation of the purpose and practice of Essentialism.
At its core, Essentialism has you ask of every investment of your time no matter how large or small, "Is what I'm doing the most productive, valuable use of my time?"
Here are some examples of how Essentialism looks like in my life:
Say No To Everything
I now say no to everything by default. Do I want to judge the county fair barbecue contest? No. Do I want to go to the movies Saturday? No. Do I have time to talk about XYZ report? No. Can I make the 10 a.m. meeting on cyber security? No.
Let me be clear: I'm not a horse's arse about it. There are many ways to say No in a way that redirects the question or gives you breathing room to properly consider the request:
"Oh man, you're killing me. I love barbecue; but the Fair is Saturday, right? I'd love to, but I have another commitment that I can't get out of... I know, I'll see if I can get out of it, but as of right now I have to say no. If that changes, I'll get in touch with you."
"Movies Saturday? I know I've got another commitment. Let me get on my calendar at the office tomorrow and see if I can move it around. I'll let you know by lunchtime, is that alright?"
"I can't right now, I'm elbows deep in Project ABC and if I let go it's going to take me an hour to get back up to speed. E-mail me the report and your questions and I'll get back to you faster, or we can schedule some time tomorrow; either way, e-mail me and I'll take care of it."
"Can you e-mail me the agenda for the meeting? I'm deep into Project ABC right now, and if I break away from it, it's going to delay the project by that much time. Let me look at the agenda and get back to you this afternoon."
Default to No. The more you do it, the more practice you get at deftly redirecting or declining the request. You can always defer to your schedule and blame previous commitments.
Your photography study and practice is a commitment.
Your gym time is a commitment.
Your "you time" is a commitment.
And it's nobody's business what your commitments are. You are committed to your self, a lifestyle of your design, and the dreams you're working toward.
If you don't choose what you do with your time, someone else will.
Learn so say No to the good so you can say Hell Yes to the great.
Do This, Not That
Once I took back my time by learning to say No to the unessential, I had to figure out what is essential to living my best life.
There's low-hanging fruit in everyone's lives: mine were television (so many great series on Netflix, so little time...), non-quality time with the family (usually in front of the TV again), and mindless scrolling through Facebook and Instagram.
- I stopped watching television, and I started watching classes and tutorials on CreativeLive and YouTube. Everyone learns differently, and different media engage different parts of our brains; don't limit yourself to just books, just videos, or just podcasts.
- I stopped watching a dozen YouTube videos in a row without even thinking, and I started watching one video at a time and taking violent action based on what I learned (immediately practicing, testing, experimenting, changing, bettering, writing, sharing, growing).
- I stopped checking social media and living vicariously through my "friends," and I started living a life worth talking about: meeting people, making art, collaborating with other artists and makers and dreamers, and using social media with pinpoint purpose to reinforce those real-world relationships (protip: "unfollow" everyone, then add back only the people who inspire, motivate, and change you) (protip #2: how about you only 'check' social media every time you have something awesome to share, first?).
- I stopped reading any book, and I started reading THE book; the book that holds the most promise for story-changing growth in my life as an artist, business owner, and human being. I love to read three books at one time, but they're three exceptional books recommended by my heroes and mentors on topics I most need to make breakthroughs in my work and life. The Half Price Books clearance rack and local library book sales will fill your shelves with books that never change your life for the better - speaking from experience, here.
- I stopped reading blogs every day, and I started reading books to inform my art and business strategies, then referenced blogs for the most efficient and effective tactics to execute on those strategies. Instead of reading one book for every 50 to 100 blog posts I'd consume, I'm now enjoying one to three blog posts building upon every book I read.
- I stopped listening to every episode of a few podcasts, and I started listening to a few episodes of a lot of great podcasts. Kind of like with my books, I've become very picky about which episodes of which podcasts I listen to. It's a consumer's market: there are way more amazing podcasts out there than one person can listen to, so only listen to the very best episodes of the very best podcasts that change you for the better.
- I stopped listening mostly to podcasts, and I started listening evenly between podcasts and audiobooks. Like my shift from reading too many blogs and too few books, I've balanced my listening between the best of the best of the podcasts I love and audiobooks that extend my knowledge far deeper in the areas I'm trying to improve in my work and life.
- I stopped prioritizing everything but my health and wellness, and I started scheduling meal prep and exercise on my calendar and honoring those commitments like I would in service to anyone important in my life.
- I stopped spending mindless time with friends and family, and I started scheduling quality time with them. By now we all know that the quality of our relationships makes the biggest impact on our happiness and human beings. Going to dinner and the movies or playing video games with your besties is always a good time, but it's too easy to default to these low-engagement, low-yield activities that eat up an entire Saturday night. Double-down on your activities: go hiking or take in a workout class together, cook a great meal together, road trip or travel together, go camping together, go hunting or fishing together, go volunteer together, and take your camera every single time. Make memories, not excuses.
- I stopped wasting my life on anything that I would regret on my death bed, and I started living a life I would be proud to look back on in my final days. As Dr. Stephen Covey teaches, start with the end in mind. What do you want written on your tombstone? What do you want people to say at your funeral? What will be the legacy that you leave behind? What should you do today - small, purposeful baby steps - to get closer to those life goals?
For my list of all the best books, podcasts, magazines, audiobooks, people and places I turn to to inform my life for the better, subscribe to my e-mail newsletter at the top-right of any page of this site and you'll get your free copy of my eBook, The 101 Resources I Wish I Had When I Started As A Professional Photographer. If you're already a subscriber, just drop me an e-mail and I'll send you back a copy of my ebook.
This is Part 1 of my series: 9 practices to increase your productivity as a professional photographer
Read more here:
1. Essentialism
2. Evening Routine
3. Morning Routine
4. Mindfulness
5. Five Minutes
6. Kaizen
7. Time Blocking
8. What Gets Scheduled Gets Done
9. Imperfect Action
Like this series? Subscribe at the top-right of any page of this site to get all of my best stories and ideas in your Inbox.
Next Steps
- Read Up: Grab a copy of Greg McKeown's Essentialism. The topics of productivity and making the best use of your time are age-old, but nothing has helped my adopt these vital changes in my life more than Greg's book. He lays out the Why and How with wonderful, motivational clarity. It takes the concept from the clouds into our modern, to-do-list-driven lives.
- Clean The Slate: Go over your schedule and list every time commitment you've made outside of your day job responsibilities. List every project you've agreed to help with, every church play, every non-profit function, every weekly poker night, every social function, every party, every musician friend's show... Everything. Now, what if you eliminated all of it and invested that time into making your dreams come true? Just look at the list, look at the time you're spending on everything but your dreams, and consider the progress you could make if you had all that time back. I'm not saying volunteer work and poker nights aren't important - I absolutely believe in the holistic cycle of creation and recreation - but rebuild your schedule from a clean slate, and work your way out of every commitment that isn't truly serving your purposefully-designed life.
- Brainstorm Session: Get out your pen and paper. Taking inspiration from my Do This, Not That list above, in what arenas of your life can you upgrade how you invest your time? 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. Don't miss out on my best stories and ideas: subscribe to my e-mail newsletter today at the top-right of any page of this site.
- Do This Now: What's the biggest challenge holding you back today? E-mail me your answer (yes, right now!), and let's make a breakthrough.
Is photography really 90% business and 10% art?
“You all laugh at me because I'm different, I laugh at you because you're all the same.” ― John Davis
All the business gurus will tell you: success comes with knowing and communicating your Unique Value Proposition (UVP).
But, as a visual artist, you look at your value from a solely visual perspective:
"My art looks just like that guy's over there. And it sure as heck doesn't look as good as this guy. I love his work. I look at my work and get so discouraged. How can I pretend to be a professional photographer? Why would anyone pay for my work?"
Why are you valuable?
That's a powerful, priceless question.
I know you've heard the line that the photography business is 10 percent photography and 90 percent business.
There's some truth to that. And some untruth.
It's really more of a scale that tips to one side or another depending on your artistic and business acumen.
As a startup photographer, your art is at a startup level, so to be successful you invest heavily in the business side: low barriers to entry, minimized risk, affordable pricing, creative marketing. You seek clients. Your hustle defines your success.
As your art grows in quality, style, vision, uniqueness, polish, salability, desirability - the scale tips more toward art and away from business: higher pricing, screening leads, ideal clients, word of mouth referrals, a boutique experience. Your clients seek you. Your art hustles on your behalf.
It's as true for the most valuable company in the world as it is for you.
Apple sells underpowered and overpriced computers, from the one on your desktop to the one in your hand. [Spoken by a huge fan of Apple and their products.]
They can do this because of their Unique Value Proposition - because of their story.
"We are creatives. We are artists. We are makers. Just like you."
People who love Apple, those people who identify with the value and culture and story that Apple stands for, are totally at peace paying more for what is technically less.
It's not just the product. It's not just the technical specifications. It's not just the sum value of the component parts.
Your art is not the only value that you create.
Your art is not your identity.
You are not your art.
You are the artist.
You are the business owner.
You are the crafter of your clients' experience.
You are a wholly unique human being, with your own lifetime's worth of experiences, stories, moments big and small and wonderful and tragic that altogether make you who and how and why you are.
Your experiences are value.
Your stories are value.
Your humor is value.
Your perspective is value.
Your values are value.
Your ethics are value.
Your honesty is value.
Your personality is value.
Your struggle is value.
Your bravery is value.
Your vulnerability is value.
Your truth is value.
You are value.
Your Unique Value Proposition is so, so much more than the subjective comparable quality of your art held side-by-side against that of tens of millions of other photographers on this planet.
If you want to discover and step comfortably and confidently into your Identity as a professional photographer, I would invite you to sign up for my free e-mail newsletter at the top-right of any page of this site, and join me and my dear friend and storyteller Steve Arensberg on December 12 when we will launch our Identity course for photographers.
“If you celebrate your differentness, the world will, too. It believes exactly what you tell it—through the words you use to describe yourself, the actions you take to care for yourself, and the choices you make to express yourself. Tell the world you are one-of-a-kind creation who came here to experience wonder and spread joy.” ― Victoria Moran
- James Michael
Next Steps
- Claim Agency: Take your phone somewhere private, and say this out loud: "I am a professional photographer. The value I present to my clients grows with every day that I grow as an artist and business owner and human being. I stay conscious, purposeful, and mindful in order to make small daily changes that lead to awesome change over time. My people are out there, waiting to be blessed by my art and the experience I craft for them. I get better every day because I have agency over my choices and my actions, and thus, my future." Feel it in your bones. And if you don't yet, repeat it daily until you do. The truth, and the power, is within you.
- Brainstorm Session: Ask a friend what your three greatest strengths are; you may be surprised by their answers. Take these three strengths and brainstorm all the ways these strengths inform and empower you as a professional photographer, and the unique value and experience you create for your clients.
- Subscribe Today: It's my calling to help you earn your first $5,000 to $50,000 as a part time professional photographer. Don't miss out on my best stories and ideas: subscribe to my e-mail newsletter today at the top-right of any page of this site.
- Do This Now: What's the biggest challenge holding you back today? E-mail me your answer (yes, right now!), and let's make a breakthrough.
The no-affiliate-link, no horsesh*t guide to Black Friday for photographers
I was showering this morning (you're welcome!), and as I am wont to do, I was brainstorming ideas to help you guys make more art and more money with more comfort and confidence.
Confession time:
I'm about as anti-marketing-BS as anyone, but even I couldn't resist loading SlickDeals last night to see what was hot for Black Friday.
Like any red-blooded professional photographer, I lusted over a few deals that would be so sexy for my business. Laptops, tablets, big TVs (for proofing sessions, of course!), and always, cameras and lenses and kit.
Sugarplum primes danced in my head.
Then I remembered a couple e-mails I got from respected photogurus yesterday, both Black Friday buying guides, and both having almost all the same affiliate programs featured.
Affiliate programs let people with an audience (authors, bloggers, celebrities, thought leaders) sell someone else's stuff and get a commission. Sometimes a percent or two, sometimes 50 percent or more.
Many of the products and services on offer in these e-mails, I'd never heard of before. Some, such as online proofing and sales sites, fly in the face of what's become the best practice of in-person sales (IPS). This struck a bad chord with me.
Listen, I know you've got your wallets out and those credit cards aren't going to swipe themselves...
But hear me out:
Stop.
Just for a moment.
Break the FOMO pattern (fear of missing out) that makes Black Friday so gratifying, exciting, and "fun."
Recognize: You have everything you need.
It's not everything you want - we'd all enjoy more megapixels, more ISO room, more wireless flash action, more processing horsepower to push Photoshop along, more actions, more presets, more of the things we think we need to make our dreams come true.
But in our hearts, we know we haven't maxed out what we have. We haven't learned all we can. We haven't mastered the gear in our hands (or more likely, sitting on the shelf...ouch).
Take the time you were going to spend today salivating over big deals (which aren't that big anyway), pick up your camera, and go make some art. Be seen with your camera. Shake hands. Hand out business cards. Be compassionate. Serve.
Will Rogers has got your back:
"The quickest way to double your money is to fold it in half and put it back in your pocket."
If you've got a little budget set aside for today, here are the places you'll get the most growth for your dollar:
(And though I normally do use affiliate links for products or services I've used and recommend to you guys, I'm avoiding them today, just to err on the side of authenticity.)
- David duChemin's Craft & Vision - Beautiful, powerful, and educational photography eBooks by photogs for photogs. If you haven't visited, you don't realize how inexpensive these eBooks are, with titles that make my heart glad: The Next Level - 25 Insights for Building a Successful Photography Business, Making The Image - The Creative Path to Stronger Photographs, The Natural Portrait - Making Beautiful Portraits in Natural Light, and many more. Fill your cart during this 50% off sale, and then commit the time daily to study and practice what you've invested in. This is where I will be spending my Black Friday money today.
- CreativeLive - 25% off all classes today. I've learned more story-changing skills from CreativeLive videos than I have any other educational video site (including YouTube, Lynda, and Craftsy). The quality is there, and founder Chase Jarvis is just an amazingly cool dude.
- DiscountMags - Where I get all of my magazine subscriptions. I know magazines aren't as cool as they used to be, and "you can find everything on the Internet," but the value magazines bring is in the serendipity and presentation of both the content and the advertising. Every month I thumb through the latest edition of Bicycle and come away with five to 10 new ideas for marketing campaigns for my photography business. Train up your business vision, and you'll find magazines to be a treasure chest of ways to market your business in your community. If you want to get started with magazines, invest around $12 total for a subscription to one photography magazine, one business magazine, and one hobby or topical interest magazine.
- Slickdeals - If you're looking for the real deals (please, don't believe the discounts the retailers are claiming), the deals at Slickdeals are voted on and vetted by the community. It's rare that I buy anything over a few dollars at retail anymore, because I can find a way better deal by watching Slickdeals. Just be careful: there's a lot of camera gear on sale today. If you haven't mastered what you already have, back away from the Buy button.
- Amazon - If you're going to die without buying some kit today, here's my boring, practical, but honest recommendation: grab a used Canon 40D for around $150, and a used Canon 50/1.8 for around $65. Tack-sharp photos that print beautifully to 30x40 and beyond. By the time you master this combo, you should be doing enough business to afford any camera gear you want. Seriously: my pair of 40Ds are still my primary cameras today for all of my portraiture. It's not sexy, but it'll earn you a hundred times what you pay for it.
That's it.
Just imagine how far you could take your art and business with one new book, one Creative Live class, one magazine subscription, and one basic dSLR with one basic lens. Or any combination of these. If you think it's not enough to make a difference, see what your fellow photographers are creating with that "cheap" 50/1.8 over on Flickr.
A little bit goes a long, long way when you're willing to #hustle.
- James Michael
Next Steps
- Put It Back: As Will said, fold your money over and stick it back in your pocket. My family has a Rule of 10's: if something costs up to $10, you wait 10 minutes before buying it, just to let the instant gratification wear off a bit; up to $100, wait 10 hours. Up to $1,000, wait 10 days. Above that, 10 months (because odds are it'll have dropped by half in price).
- Buy Your Life Back: What's your time worth? Whatever you're about to spend on Black Friday purchases, what if you bought that much time back from your day job? Would it buy you a day? A week off without pay? What if you put that time into your photography and business to make your dreams come true? Always be aware of the time you're trading for the money you're spending. Be sure it's worth it.
- Shoot: Get out your camera. Go take some pictures. Do some street photography. Set up an impromptu photo shoot. Get some creative time in. When you come back to your computer or tablet or smartphone, see if the marketing hype hasn't worn off. Back to basics. Back to fundamentals. What really makes a difference?
- Brainstorm Session: Get out your pen and paper. Make a list of everything you want to spend money on, or wish you had the money to buy. Don't be humble, this is supposed to be a big list. Now rewrite the list from least expensive to most expensive. Now rewrite the list from highest priority (what will make the biggest difference in your experience of life) to lowest priority - and be honest. See what the lowest-priced investments are that will make the biggest different in your life. Rewrite your list from best bang for the buck to least, and start saving your money toward #1 on that list. You may have it in your pocket right now, but in the Black Friday frenzy, you'd have spent way more to get far less return on your investment.
- Subscribe Today: It's my calling to help you earn your first $5,000 to $50,000 as a part time professional photographer. Don't miss out on my best stories and ideas: subscribe to my e-mail newsletter today at the top-right 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.
This five-minute practice will change your story
"Five minutes are enough to dream a whole life, that is how relative time is." - Mario Benedetti
I used to block off a minimum of four hours to get anything creative done on my passion projects.
Guess how much I got done that way?
Holidays were my only friend. When I woke up on a weekday and didn't have to go to work, I'd be so dumbfounded that I actually spent some time working on my dreams. About four to eight times a year, I'd actually get something done that took me closer to the art, business, and life I wanted.
I thought this was the only way to work creatively.
Then I learned about kaizen, the Japanese philosophy of small daily improvements making awesome change over time.
But I didn't truly practice kaizen until I was enlightened to the possibility held within just five minutes.
What are five minutes worth?
Five minutes a day translates to over 30 hours a year.
The Resistance convinces us that if we can't get those 30 hours in a row, or spread over just a few days, that the time is worthless.
The Resistance is incredulous:
"Five minutes a day? That's stupid; what can I get done in just five minutes? I won't get anything good done so I'm not even going to bother."
The Hustler is challenged:
"Five minutes? If that's all I've got, I'll get more done in those five minutes than most people do in an hour."
You can take outward-facing actions - phone a client to say thank you for your business, send an e-mail with an article related to a past client's hobby, make a personal connection on social media - but the most powerful actions you can undertake in five minutes are inward-facing.
I'm like everyone else: I make a bunch of 'little' mistakes on a daily basis, and they all add up.
But the best way to interrupt that pattern is to get control of your mornings.
Even just five minutes.
Especially if I didn't follow my evening routine or go to bed on time or get enough sleep, my mornings start with sleeping as late as I can and then rushing to get everything done that I absolutely must before I head out the door for work.
This is such a crappy way to start the day. But almost everyone does it, every single day.
Give me five minutes.
Take five in the morning to:
- Watch a video (on photography, on art, on marketing, on business, on motivation)
- Listen to an inspiring audiobook
- Read a motivational book
Doing this every morning steeps your spirit and subconscious in your art and business, and it puts your creativity to work on your dreams all day long.
Have you ever gone to sleep with a problem and woken up with a solution? Or maybe it came to you on your morning commute or during your evening shower. That's the power of your subconscious at work.
Why not prime the pump with something that will move the needle on your dreams?
- Meditate
- Recite affirmations
- Visualize your perfect day
- Do a set of burpees, squats, or push-ups
- Write a thank-you note and mail it
These five minutes can fuel a day's worth of inspiration.
Never underestimate the power of putting your subconscious to work on your dream.
I'm not convinced that fear alone is the greatest threat holding us back from our dreams.
Distraction is a more subtle, nuanced, insidious form of The Resistance. It's what pulls us, day by day, morning my morning, choice by choice, disappointment by disappointment, inaction by inaction further away from our dreams.
Fear demands attention and action.
Distraction lures.
Locking down as little as five minutes every morning, with as much habitual and absolute commitment as brushing your teeth or hauling your butt to work each day, is powerful inoculation against distraction. If you can't make five minutes a morning happen to make your dreams come true, you've got much more important work to do on your vision, your perfect day, and your unique and powerful Why. First things first, right?
Set your alarm five minutes early for tomorrow.
Commit to five minutes of victory, of progress, of kaizen each morning. Give your dream the due it deserves.
In three months you'll look back and be amazed at the progress you've made.
"A few minutes ago every tree was excited, bowing to the roaring storm, waving, swirling, tossing their branches in glorious enthusiasm like worship. But though to the outer ear these trees are now silent, their songs never cease." - John Muir
Next Steps
- Set your alarm for five minutes early for tomorrow.
- Get yourself a big year-at-a-glance wall calendar, and apply the Seinfeld Method of productivity to your five minute morning sessions. For every day you make it happen, put a big red X on that day. See how many days you can string together into a streak. Remember: Don't break the chain.
- Get a copy of Hal Elrod's Miracle Morning when you're ready to take your mornings - and life - to the next level. It's one of the books that has most changed my life for the better in recent years.
- Brainstorm Session: Get out your pen and paper. Make a (massive) list of things you can do to make your five minute sessions rock. Give me ten. Then give me ten more. Make your brain sweat. Then as many more than that as you can. No idea is too absurd when you're brainstorming. The more five minute sessions you do, the more of a ninja you'll become at it. You'll know exactly how to search YouTube to find a motivational video. You'll know exactly whose videos or audiobooks to enjoy during your sessions. You'll have handy three (or more!) great books to grab off the shelf and dig into for five minutes. If you don't know where to start, start with the inimitable Zig Ziglar.
- 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!