Not sure why, maybe it's because we just passed through another May the 4th, maybe because I just finished reading another Star Wars expanded universe novel, maybe because the next installment of the Star Wars films just started production today, maybe something else entirely, but I have had Jedis on the brain lately and yesterday as I was finishing up a run I had Yoda on the brain.
There are lots of Yoda quotes out there, but one of the most famous is his admonition to Luke, "Try Not.... Do or Do Not, there is no Try," really stuck in my head. I have written before about going all in and betting on myself with this photography endeavor, but hadn't really thought about it in Yoda's terms before. What does this mean really?
There are lots of interpretations out there, but here is how I have decided to take it. I think that when you say, either to yourself or someone else, "I'll try," you are making room for failure before you even start, which means you are not fully committed to what you are doing and don't really have the deep seated belief that you can succeed. Entering a new endeavor with this mindset is almost a guarantee of failure as you will not truly be giving your all and throwing yourself full tilt into your work. When faced with a challenge, I believe what Yoda means is that you should commit yourself fully to the task at hand, throw everything you have at it. Leave no room in your mind for failure. Maybe you will do, maybe you won't, but there is no middle ground- and even if you don't reach your goal, you still DID something. Even if you fail, you made an effort and you can learn from that and decide whether to do again, or move on to something else.
The most obvious example I can think of in my life is my first attempt at riding a tall bike my first year at Burning Man. Back when I had more free time in my life I was a triathlete. I raced one full Ironman, a couple of half IM races and lots of shorter triathlons. I was spending a lot of time riding bikes around training and racing. During this time, I wound up with a recurring nightmare in which I was strapped to a bike which somehow grew to incredible proportions such that I was riding with my head in the clouds. My feet were clipped in and I could not stop because I would fall over and it was so high I wouldn't survive. Read what you will in the symbolism, but I woke up many times in a cold, sweaty terror because my giant cloud bike had fallen over and I was heading to the pavement really fast. If you happen to know me in real life and know more of my history, there was lots more going on in my life that could have played a role in that dream and its' meaning, but it doesn't matter in the final analogy. Bottom line is I got to my first Burning Man with a lot going on in my life and a lot to issues I was trying to move past. As I went around, there were lots of people riding tall bikes all over the place. I decided that as part of dealing with my fears I would try to ride a tall bike and get over the fear from my recurring nightmare. I found someone with a bike that was willing to let me try, and went at it. Turns out the hardest part of riding a tall bike is getting started. I tried several times and failed miserably. Finally, I realized that what was holding me back was fear or failure. I was "trying," but not fully committing because I was afraid of falling. I was going slow and leaving myself a safe out in case I fell, which guaranteed I wasn't going to make it. Finally I committed and decided in my head I was going to get up on that bike and ride or I was going to wind up in a bloody, broken dusty heap, left caution to the wind and threw myself fully into the attempt to get up on the bike. Sure enough, when I could breath again I was riding a tall bike around the playa. Stopping was another bag of fear, but once I was going, I had to stop sometime so I had no choice but to face that fear of falling and get off the bike. When I stopped "trying," I DID, and it was awesome.
So how does this apply to my photography? Lots of ways actually, but thinking of Yoda finally gave me the angle I needed to finally talk about a shoot I did a few weeks ago, which is what I will focus on here. I have been on Model Mayhem for a while not, using it to connect with models and network. Usually, I am the one sending out the messages, but about a month ago I got a message from a model saying she would be coming down to my neck of the woods and wanted to shoot with me. I looked her up, and I have to say she has quite an amazing portfolio. The quote from her profile was that she only took paid shoots and did not do anything on trade unless she thought your work was exceptional, but here she was asking me to shoot her on trade. I have to say that I was a little intimidated, much like back when the first model I was going to shoot casually mentioned that she was one of Helmut Newton's models earlier in her career. I had a couple of good locations in mind, but no clear idea of what I wanted from the shoot. But I decided to "try."
Like I mentioned earlier, one of the reasons that there is really no such thing as "trying" is that as long as you make the effort, you did something, even if it fell short of your intentions. Although we did get some good images from the day, I can't help but feel that there was more "not do" than "do" in the day and I wasn't able to really capture any great, stunning images to compare with what the model already had in her portfolio. Anyway, the images throughout this post are from that shoot, and the whole gallery is available here, so you can let me know what you think. I could come up with plenty of excuses about distractions from a full audience of homeless people under the bridge and too much wind to use any of the lighting setups I had in mind, but really I just wasn't able to deliver and make some super awesome shots happen. Maybe it was intimidation, maybe it was just laziness, I don't know, but while I got good shots, I didn't get great shots. The shoot did end on an interesting note through, we had corresponded using only my first name and her stage name, when we were done and filling out releases with out whole names we finally figured out that we actually knew each other from a past life and had actually last seen each other about a decade ago. Small, strange world.
It seems like the last few months or so have been full of too much try and not enough DO. I need to get my head around fears of failure, worries about not being good enough or talented enough, wondering whether I will be able to make a go of this, even when I haven't really been able to define where I want to take it, or what success will look like. Outside of photography there are a few areas of my life that could stand to have a bit more DO and a lot less TRY these days. In many areas I have felt stuck despite my half assed promises to "try" and turn things around. I need to get over the fears of failure that are holding me back and just DO; let the results fall out however they will, because the alternative of Not Doing is not where I want to be anymore.
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Luckily, there is no shortage of DO to be done. I will be traveling a lot this summer for my full time job, whenever I wind up in a port I am going to try and connect with locals and do some shoots. I have also decided that while I am stuck on a ship with nothing to do I am going to write a couple of ebooks. I may not know everything, but I think I have some good ideas to throw out into the world, and it'll just be fun to call myself an author. Worst case it falls flat, but at least I am going to DO. Lots of people with nothing meaningful to say get rich saying it every day, watch Fox "news" sometime if you doubt that. Time to stop trying, it's Jedi time. (and for the record, Han shot first!)
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