oh, am i ready for the earth to open up and make me change things...
i'm getting emotional about my inability to make the things i want to have happen in my life happen. i'm getting emotionally unsettled. pressure is building. the kettle is nearing it's boiling point. i really need something new to happen and if it doesn't come about soon of it's own power i'm going to have to break something on purpose to make it happen. idle threat? maybe, maybe not. i don't think it has to be a drastic break or destruction, maybe just a rewrite of some of the precepts i have that i live by... i mean, i always do this, all the time anyway, don't i...
okay, so here is the issue of the day. i'm really frustrated with my so-called-career as a photographer. as far as i'm concerned, i gave photography a try, got some pleasure from the experience, but i did not succeed in becoming a professional. i have developed no marketable skills that anyone will hire me for and no one will buy the "art work" that i have already created. so the cross-roads decision is this: spend the next few years developing some new skills, business skills to learn how to develop and operate a business as a professional photographer that people will want to hire for weddings and portraits. that is the logical next step. will i take that step? how i feel today, the answer is no. how i feel today the answer is i am too depressed by a sense of failure. i really feel like a failure after what i attempted to do this past year. its a combination of failure and fatigue. maybe in three months i'll feel refreshed and ready to start up fresh again, but what i'm afraid of is making decisions i cannot recover from now while i'm moving into dark depressions. namely that i'm considering photographic suicide; selling all of my camera gear.
taking this deeper, to find another answer, remedy to my malaise in this sense of disatisfaction with the work i've done as an artiste, and this is what i feel i am actually moving towards more logically towards right now is to find a way to make my art better. to take a little bit of a rest, contemplate, rethink, and recreate my project. that is what i have taken major steps towards doing right now with the exiting from the social networks and going into hiding. and this is where i am going with my descent into November with Nanowrimo. I am going to do the 30 days of novel writing next month for damn sure. but here is what i am thinking could change, what could become different, how a new day may dawn.
what if i really do sell the cameras? what if i do make a full descent into doing nothing but being a writer? it's what i've been threatening to do for years now. why not fucking well just do it?!! this is where i feel a little bit of sadness. and fear. the photography over the past 5 years has been the thing that has given me the most joy in my life of anything i've ever done, maybe in my entire life. the time i get to spend with my models, (and even before that - the time i spent doing concert photography) was the most satisfying work experience i've ever had in my lifetime. that i could not get paid for doing it maybe adds a little bit of flair to it too... even more so, the time i get to spend with my models is the only social interaction i get to have with any people at all. that is a really sad confession to expose about the isolation i suffer from due to my bipolar madness, but it's true. if it weren't for my photo shoots and my models i would never go out and spend time with anyone.
that, is what scares me the most about giving up photography to become a full time writer. if i become a full time writer i am going to become such an extreme recluse. and i know November proves it. what scares me from past Novembers though is the intensity of what i produce when i get serious about writing. the emotions i pull up, the emotions i feel when i pull up this material that i create is so intense, it wears me out... that is partly why i have not been able to go back and edit or rewrite what i wrote last November yet. i'm afraid to look at it.
if i change the rules though. if i make it so that i have nothing else to do. no more photography to fall back onto as an escape, as an excuse, as something else to do instead of writing then i will HAVE to write. and all the creative energy that i put into the photography will just have to get morphed into something new inside the writing. and i will finish this novel that i first started imagining writing back in January of 2005.
this is what i am thinking today. in black and white terms. walking the razor's edge.
okay, so here is the issue of the day. i'm really frustrated with my so-called-career as a photographer. as far as i'm concerned, i gave photography a try, got some pleasure from the experience, but i did not succeed in becoming a professional. i have developed no marketable skills that anyone will hire me for and no one will buy the "art work" that i have already created. so the cross-roads decision is this: spend the next few years developing some new skills, business skills to learn how to develop and operate a business as a professional photographer that people will want to hire for weddings and portraits. that is the logical next step. will i take that step? how i feel today, the answer is no. how i feel today the answer is i am too depressed by a sense of failure. i really feel like a failure after what i attempted to do this past year. its a combination of failure and fatigue. maybe in three months i'll feel refreshed and ready to start up fresh again, but what i'm afraid of is making decisions i cannot recover from now while i'm moving into dark depressions. namely that i'm considering photographic suicide; selling all of my camera gear.
taking this deeper, to find another answer, remedy to my malaise in this sense of disatisfaction with the work i've done as an artiste, and this is what i feel i am actually moving towards more logically towards right now is to find a way to make my art better. to take a little bit of a rest, contemplate, rethink, and recreate my project. that is what i have taken major steps towards doing right now with the exiting from the social networks and going into hiding. and this is where i am going with my descent into November with Nanowrimo. I am going to do the 30 days of novel writing next month for damn sure. but here is what i am thinking could change, what could become different, how a new day may dawn.
what if i really do sell the cameras? what if i do make a full descent into doing nothing but being a writer? it's what i've been threatening to do for years now. why not fucking well just do it?!! this is where i feel a little bit of sadness. and fear. the photography over the past 5 years has been the thing that has given me the most joy in my life of anything i've ever done, maybe in my entire life. the time i get to spend with my models, (and even before that - the time i spent doing concert photography) was the most satisfying work experience i've ever had in my lifetime. that i could not get paid for doing it maybe adds a little bit of flair to it too... even more so, the time i get to spend with my models is the only social interaction i get to have with any people at all. that is a really sad confession to expose about the isolation i suffer from due to my bipolar madness, but it's true. if it weren't for my photo shoots and my models i would never go out and spend time with anyone.
that, is what scares me the most about giving up photography to become a full time writer. if i become a full time writer i am going to become such an extreme recluse. and i know November proves it. what scares me from past Novembers though is the intensity of what i produce when i get serious about writing. the emotions i pull up, the emotions i feel when i pull up this material that i create is so intense, it wears me out... that is partly why i have not been able to go back and edit or rewrite what i wrote last November yet. i'm afraid to look at it.
if i change the rules though. if i make it so that i have nothing else to do. no more photography to fall back onto as an escape, as an excuse, as something else to do instead of writing then i will HAVE to write. and all the creative energy that i put into the photography will just have to get morphed into something new inside the writing. and i will finish this novel that i first started imagining writing back in January of 2005.
this is what i am thinking today. in black and white terms. walking the razor's edge.
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