What do you want in your life?
That’s a loaded question isn’t it.
How you answer it may determine how you spend your time, your success and failure, whether you feel good or bad about yourself, and a host of other potential issues.
Yet it’s one of the core questions of personal (or corporate) identity. When I clearly define what it is that I want from my life my story is different. Kia and I talked about what we were looking to learn, hear, get out of attending the Storyline Conference in Portland, Oregon last week. I wasn’t completely sure, but I knew I was looking for something – something more.
During the first session with Donald Miller, I wrote down this thought, “More. What is the more of The Collective?” The overall purpose of The Collective is to help small business owners and specifically photography business owners find life through their art and business.
This means I post (or find others to post) on 3 core topics: Photography, Business, Life. One of the things I am realizing about myself is that I want to spend more of my time writing on bringing life to your business.
That’s the more. Living life intentionally has been what is missing. Interestingly, it has been missing not just from this blog, but from my own life.
…enter conflict…
When we define exactly what it is we want the door opens for conflict. Conflict can be internal or external. It can be people, circumstances, time, finances, etc. By stating that I want to write more about how to bring life to your story (business and art) I become internally conflicted.
I get scared. I worry that no one will want to read about how to have a better life. I worry that people will simply not click on the new post notification if it’s about something touchy-feely. Making money from a blog is all about increased readership (no matter what your business plan is it boils down to that).
It’s easier to write about something “safe.” By safe, I mean branding, marketing, technology, etc. These are subjects that people want to read about. People want to know more about these topics, but they are also safe to read. The challenge you feel when reading about branding or technology isn’t the same as worrying about being encouraged to be a person who is leads a meaningful life.
So over the last few months I’ve wimped out too many times. I don’t even think it has been conscious, but I’ve gravitated toward topics that are safe.
Will I continue to write about the safe stuff? Sure, because I am interested in all that, but I’m now challenging myself to challenge you. Challenge you to build a better, whole life. Because at my core, I believe you will build a better business when you have a better life.
Last thought.
I’m just like you, I work better when I hear positive feedback. Quite honestly, I think we work better when we hear any feedback. So, if you have a thought or idea or have enjoyed or been ticked off let me know. Email, comments, twitter, Facebook, smoke signal or your favorite way of communication.
Andy:
When I was younger, I struggled with the questions you are asking — a lot. It lead me to a lot of places, including church, the pop psychology section of the bookstore. I was definitely struggling for answers and I wanted specifics.
In truth, I had always hoped for a mentor. I wanted someone older to guide me toward success and happiness. I wanted foundational guidance and I wanted specific insight. What I discovered is all of it simply leads to despair. For me it meant a constant measuring of myself for satisfaction and happiness.
After a long while, happiness became a word I mostly detest. Reason is happiness is imbued with all these outward signs and manifestations. Being happy means being bubbly, grinning, and just tickled with everything. And satisfied people are content — at least in my mind.
I finally decided it was all B.S. I was driving to work one day and just thought — “I’m going to just quit thinking about it.” I stopped reading those books; stopped pondering my state of being.
I don’t want to sound fatalistic — but life is a struggle and in a lot of ways is little more than a series of constant setbacks. For me, it is battling those things that defines a life. How one battles is what produces the results — integrity, honesty, loyalty, perseverance produce the tangibles that lead to a better life — however better looks to you.
Recently, I read a book called “Bounce.” I didn’t realize it at when I picked it up but it’s about sports performance and there is a lot of sports psychology in its pages. Here are a couple of take-aways:
1) Great athletes practice to the point of failure. Meaning, they are constantly striving to master the next plateau.
2) In competition, they refuse to consider defeat. It takes a ton of mental training to do this. People are logical — for the most part. Athletes have tools to help themselves with this process.
3) When they suffer defeat, their first mental adjustment is to take the positives from whatever happened. So, “I will grow from this experience,” would be an example. Or, in golf for example, my drives were good, I did what I wanted with my putting, I was happy with how I played the first nine holes.” Tiger Woods is often used as an example of someone who does this.
4) When athletes get back to practice — they start to consider options for overcoming problems in the areas that caused their loss.
That’s a very simple pragmatic process. I’ve only read the book on an airplane — and it’s worth rereading. Overall, the book is written to dispel the myth that success comes in the form of genetics — instead,it’s really hard work — and hard work that is focused on attaining new plateaus in both sport and academics.
In a way, I think your safe topics lead to the “life” quests you have. Better pictures, better marketing can be measured and focus our efforts. Increased performance leads to new opportunity. New opportunity opens the doors to a different life.
You’ve done a wonderful job with your blog. Perhaps getting more people to share their beginnings in business and photography (biography) will add the element you are seeking. Incidentally, it does feel quite uncomfortable to share this publicly. But, I wanted you to know you have an audience of at least one. Good luck.
Mark –
As always, I love your responses (even if they do take me hours to read :).
I see what you are saying, but I don’t know if I believe that life is as fatalistic as that. In my late teens and 20’s I do think I was looking for “happiness,” but I’ve realized that happiness is dictated by my circumstances. I now strive, no hope for joy. Joy, I believe, is possible no matter how I feel or the world around me.
Part of where I think I can find joy is achieving greatness. Not greatness in the Lebron…errr…Tiger…err…Michael Jordan sense (how’s that for a sports analogy…) where the world looks at me as great, but having significance in the eyes of my family, friends, and in general those I come into contact with – both physically and virtually (online).
I do believe that the “safe” things can have great significance for a struggling business owner, but I also think that I have to look to what I believe my purpose is. Which goes back to the 3 core subjects – photography, business, life. Life being what I avoid to deal with in depth too often. I believe that part of my purpose is to challenge photographers/business owners to living a more whole life.
I like your idea of having people share their own stories of getting rolling in their photography businesses. Newsweek magazine has been running a weekly article asking well known people their “Favorite mistakes” – it is really cool to see people most of us would consider successful to take initially negative decisions and show how they were in fact super important points in their lives.
Again thank you for your continued support and tell a friend 😉