Just Keep Showing Up
I’m pretty sure I’ve officially entered the grind zone of photography.
The initial excitement of getting started again has worn off, and now the real work has begun.
Over the years, I’ve learned something about myself: when I stop doing something consistently, it slowly fades away and gets replaced by other things competing for my time.
If you truly love something, you have to protect it at all costs.
I remember hearing Matt D'Avella say years ago that he never lets himself miss more than two days in a row of something he’s trying to build into a habit.
That idea stuck with me.
Two days feels like the tipping point.
I’ve seen it happen over and over in my own life. It’s happening right now with jiujitsu and running.
(Side note: I went for a run today. It was tough… but it felt great.)
I stopped showing up consistently, and little by little those things faded out of my daily routine.
What’s interesting though is that the opposite is also true.
If you do something for two days in a row, it becomes easier to keep going.
You build momentum.
You start wanting to protect the streak.
That’s where I am with photography right now.
I’m on a streak that I can’t afford to lose.
Not because of numbers or posts or algorithms, but because I know how easy it would be for photography to slowly disappear from my life again if I stopped showing up.
And honestly, I don’t want that.
I’m really enjoying carrying the camera again and looking at life through a photographer’s eye, but doing it every single day has been challenging. At least at the level I want it to be.
Some of the images on busy days have been lackluster. A few have honestly been slightly embarrassing.
Deep down...honestly not even that deep down...I’m a perfectionist.
I always want to present my best work.
But this process is forcing me to accept something I don’t naturally like to accept:
You can’t be at your best every single day.
Sometimes showing up has to be enough.
This whole process has also put pressure on other parts of life.
It hasn’t been uncommon for me to disappear into my office late at night working on photography-related things. For me, it’s always family first, so what this has turned into is very late nights, less sleep, and being tired a lot of the time.
It’s a sacrifice I’m willing to make, but I’m constantly trying to optimize my time.
It’s affected other things too, like working out.
Staying in shape is something I struggled with for years. Around 40, I started running again and got into the best shape I’d been in since my teenage years. I don’t want to lose that either.
At the end of the day, it all comes down to hours… or the lack of them.
There’s so much I want to do and never enough time to do it all.
Family.
Kids sports.
The dog.
Hunting.
Jiujitsu.
Running.
Working out.
The day job.
Photography.
It’s a lot.
Ideally, photography becomes the day job someday, but right now that feels very far away.
So for now, all I can really do is keep going.
Anything meaningful in life requires sacrifice, and that’s exactly where I find myself right now.
The good thing is… I’ve been here before.
I know what it takes.
If I were in my twenties, maybe this would slowly slip away again like it did before.
But not this time.
This time feels different.
I need to keep marching forward.
I need to keep showing up.
Good or bad.
The growth will come.
No experiment this week.
Just consistency at all costs.
Some images from last week.