I’ve noticed a blindingly obvious pattern in my confidence, where my work is related, lately. I go do a shoot, I happen to feel fucking awesome about it, I go home, download, back up, back up again, back up again, then have a quick look through. If it’s not 3am, I might even do some quick edits. And if there’s anyone around, I’ll post a few here and there.
And then, I’ll hate everything I just did. I’ll the images, I’ll loathe my processing, and I’ll spend an awful lot of time wondering why the fuck I am trying to survive in this industry. Why I’m pretending to be a photographer. And I know I’m not the only person to go through those processes.
One thing I have noticed lately, is an awful lot of people telling me what I shouldn’t be doing while I’m going through my working process. Don’t pull that face looking at your images. You shouldn’t post your images anywhere for at least a week. Turn the computer off, leave them alone. Don’t look at them yet.
However, I often think it’s important that people remember these are my processes which make up a part if who I am. I remember constantly being told off for pulling different expressions when I was performing on my cello. So one time, I purposely kept the most dead pan face face you had ever seen, for an entire concert. Ironically, members of the audience AND the orchestra came up to me and asked what was wrong with me, did I not enjoy playing, and that my performance was a bit soulless.
Nice.
Thing is, being passionate, being expressive, being emotional is all a part of who I am. I’m not perfect. Jesus I’m so far from perfect, I may deserve a whole other (not so forgiving) category of my own. But it’s how I deal with stuff. It’s how I deal with life. It’s how I get through. I don’t bottle things up; I can’t. I can’t live my life, literally, trapped in a bottle.
I guess if I were to contain the negatives, then supposedly that would force out more positives, right?
Wrong.
Because there is the need for balance. No person in the world survives solely on being positive. There is always some negative, even just the tiniest bit. It might be minuscule, microcosmic, but it’s there.
And the same is said vice versa.
I like my balance. And as much as I will cry and whinge and fret and stress about shitty stuff, I will, just as much, sing and shout and laugh and squeal about awesome stuff. We are a world who focuses on negatives, I know not why. But I like to think I come in reasonably equal measure. Sure, when I’m happy I’m over the fucking moon, and when I’m down, it’s often rock bottom. Middle ground is hard for some people. For others it’s a natural way of life. I’m not perfect. And I won’t spend my life trying to be perfect for everyone else. Because that stops me from being me.
But most importantly? I’m willing to bet I don’t function the same way as the majority of others. And that’s a bloody good thing. Because the world would be a desperately shit place if all our emotions were tied to the exact same levels, eh?
