gdanmitchell
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Hodie wrote:
I go through this cycle pretty regularly. The cycles don't always come in the same shapes or sizes.
For me, the cycle issue is more interesting than the gear questions. (Even our OP, who begins with a gear-related question, later confirms that this is more about sustaining interest in the medium of photography.)
As a person whose entire career has been in so-called creative fields (music and photography) I learned years ago that this cycle is almost inevitable. With variations, it runs something like this:
1. You aspire to be good at some form of creative work because you are fascinated by it. Initially, that world is full of exciting, new things — people, activities, equipment, events, discovery. Every thing is new and exciting, and it is exhilarating!
2. As you get more engaged with the creative endeavor, at some point you start to feel a level of competence. In fact, you probably do something that you feel quite good about, and perhaps you even get some positive feedback from others. “Hey, I think I’m pretty good at this!”
3. But there’s a “problem.” Once you do that the goalposts move, and whatever quality of work first brought that reward begins to seem… not that amazing. The ante is upped, and it takes more to achieve the same degree of satisfaction. Achieving the “creative high” that you experienced before not comes at a higher cost.
This is the pivotal moment, a point when frustration can take over, with feelings of “maybe I’m not as good as I thought I was” and “this isn’t as fun as I remember.”
This is actually normal and a predictable aspect of creative work. There are exciting periods when everything just seems to come easily, often alternating with periods of doubt and difficulty.
What happens next is the key.
There’s no right answer, and in some cases, quite honestly, that initial experience may be the end of the engagement with the activity. That’s not necessarily a bad thing — we all travel down dead end paths on occasion, reverse course, and head in a different direction.
But for creatives who really want to grow that isn’t an option. So you have to find a way to come to terms with this cycle.
I first “got it” some years back at a presentation by photographer Huntington Witherell at the Center for Photographic Art in Carmel. He had a show there and did a presentation on his work, and afterwards took questions. Someone asked, more or less, “now what?” He said that he was done with the particular work in the show, that he wasn’t sure what would come next, but that given time he was confident that it would reveal itself.
Accepting the cycle and continuing to “do the work” can get you through these low periods in the cycle and on to the next positive phase, and it helps to know that this is a normal thing.
Good luck.
Edited on Oct 02, 2025 at 09:49 AM · View previous versions
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