7. Blurring Boundaries: An Exploration of Self-worth and Creative Success

Ever wondered how the evolution of photography and new media has shaped the way we view and appreciate art? Stimulate your curiosity as we traverse the fascinating journey of showcasing art- from classic galleries to the digital realm. We unwrap the potential of YouTube as a platform for artists to exhibit their work, the challenges of marrying different media forms, and the art of turning a chaotic home into a creative masterpiece. We also touch upon the importance of being content with your work, whether it gets released or not.

Struggling to juggle work and your creative passions? You're not alone. We share our personal experiences and insights about managing professional commitments and large creative projects like documentaries. Drawing inspiration from Steven Pressfield's 'The War of Art', we discuss the resistance to initiating big projects and the constant pressure of achieving. As we peel back the layers, we realize that the real joy lies in relishing the process rather than solely focusing on the end result.

Finally, we tread the complex waters of self-fulfillment and success. We look at the constant urge to achieve, the trap of 'retail therapy', and the strain of tying self-worth to creative success. We shed light on our personal experiences and explore the importance of finding purpose beyond material success. Embracing the present, controlling what we can, and finding solace in creative outlets like photography- all while separating our ego from our art- are key to our well-being. So, join us on this introspective journey as we delve into the nuances of art, creativity, and self-fulfillment. - Ai

Show Notes:
Joel Meyerowitz - https://www.joelmeyerowitz.com
La Jetée (1963) - https://www.criterion.com/films/329-l...
Ken Burns - https://www.pbs.org/kenburns/
Matt was wrong about the Ricoh camera he owns. It's the Ricoh GR Digital II -

If you enjoyed this episode, please consider giving us a rating and/or a review. We read and appreciate all of them. Thanks for listening, and we'll see you in the next episode.

Links To Everything:

Video Version of The Podcast: https://geni.us/StudioSessionsYT

Matt’s YouTube Channel: https://geni.us/MatthewOBrienYT

Matt’s 2nd Channel: https://geni.us/PhotoVideosYT

Alex’s YouTube Channel: https://geni.us/AlexCarterYT

Matt’s Instagram: https://geni.us/MatthewIG

Alex’s Instagram: https://geni.us/AlexIG

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

And it had been a golden afternoon and I remember having the familiar conviction that life was beginning over again with the summer and summer.

Speaker 2: 0:14

I was talking about sort of the evolution of how new media was arrived at, sort of its final exhibition format, right, so photography comes out in 1840s, whatever. I believe photography was invented and essentially we've settled on photography being exhibited in galleries and in photo books, and I would argue that I would assume that the gallery came first and magazines is another way. They're exhibited in print, let's just say print. Galleries was probably the first medium.

Speaker 3: 0:51

Maybe premium photography.

Speaker 2: 0:52

Yeah.

Speaker 3: 0:53

For the normal, probably, social media.

Speaker 2: 0:56

High art or art photography in galleries and then, probably motivated by commerce, like hey, we can sort of make this gallery available to the masses through photography, books and obviously some galleries of its tour. They go around the world and tour at different museums or galleries and whatever. So there's ways to try to bring a photographer's work, their work, to larger audiences. Cinema projected on a sheet and somebody's apartment in France in the late 1800s, and eventually we've settled at multiplexes, independent micro cinemas, a digital projector, film projector showing a movie to an audience and they're consuming it there.

Speaker 3: 1:46

I would even argue we've progressed to sit on your couch on a Friday night and pull it up on your TV, and so that's kind of what I'm talking about.

Speaker 2: 1:59

I'm kind of saying, like, photography typically is consumed, high art photography art photography is typically consumed in galleries, in a show, in photography books and, for photography specifically, is YouTube a place to create a new way of exhibiting that material, the way you know, where the artists themselves, just like they do at a gallery, working with the gallery staff or the museum staff, a curator, you know whatever like coming up with the show, right? Is there an opportunity for photographers to use medium as a way to exhibit the work Use?

Speaker 3: 2:38

YouTube as the medium.

Speaker 2: 2:40

Yes, and you know, maybe it's in a, maybe they have a gallery maybe they have a photo book or a zine and the YouTube, the YouTube video of their photos.

Speaker 3: 2:50

So let me, let me just play devil's advocate really quickly. Do you think you're trying to square peg around whole YouTube and photography because there's these two things that you are in love with right now and you're like these can work together? I know they can. I just have this feeling Like do you think there's a case to be made for YouTube just not being the proper?

Speaker 2: 3:16

I think so.

Speaker 3: 3:17

Yeah, you know next.

Speaker 2: 3:19

Yeah, but I don't know if we know evolution, and that's the thing, and that's what I'm almost like argue, because I'm not saying this form of negative.

Speaker 3: 3:27

I'm saying I want to hear it Arguably. Yeah, give me your argument as to what we feel like it could be the only argument I have right now, yeah, this is just all super fresh, this is a fresh, this is a pretty fresh.

Speaker 2: 3:41

Is. I see a finished piece in my mind that has photography, my photography in it, like edited, sequenced photos, like very intentional what I'm choosing, and, honestly, a sort of mixed media thing where there's a video, you know, still videos, some kind of video component to it, possibly music or most likely music, sound effects, that there's a you know and you could argue, well, that's not really photography. To me, the centerpiece of that piece of piece of art is the photography. Like, that is the thing that I want the audience to connect to most and I'm using video sound music to support that, just like you would a film, right?

Speaker 3: 4:28

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 4:29

Silent film. Then they added in dialogue then they had a score.

Speaker 3: 4:31

There's a film where it's almost like so Joel Meyerowitz has this quote about, like a novel of photographic novel, and I always, like, was fascinated with that idea. Basically it's you know you're telling a narrative through photographs that are taken at random, you know incidents and in a way it's, I think, you know, a similar format of that is the John Wilson thing I recommended.

Speaker 3: 5:02

But yeah there's this movie and I'm just I can't think of it right now. It's like in 30 minutes to an hour long and it's a film about time travel and like this person and the last moment of their life and it's essentially a photographic essay. Yeah, and it's so impressive and it's done as a movie you know there's sound effects.

Speaker 2: 5:27

Yeah.

Speaker 3: 5:28

You've got kind of this like Ken Burns style thing, but it's all photographs. I think it's photographs, so it's like we're in a traditional film. You would have the, you know you'd have different shots, but it's just photograph, photograph, photograph, photograph. And yeah, creating this narrative.

Speaker 2: 5:48

It's really interesting and that's what comes to mind when you're and I think, yeah, I think, I think even Ken Burns, you know, there's an argument that so much of those documentaries is it is a photo book that you're, that you're watching. That's not the top level thing that it is. It's obviously a film first, the documentary first, because it has interviews and it has, you know, filmed interviews, all that.

Speaker 2: 6:11

But there's a strong photo element because usually he's choosing subject matter where they don't want to do reenactments, and it's historical nature, right, it's baseball, it's you know, but there's of course country music footage.

Speaker 2: 6:24

country music You're heavily dependent on photos. Yeah, and the risk here is, and just like any kind of type of mixed media photo book, you've had some photo books that try to do too much or they're combining photos with poetry or other writing or other stuff, and it can come off as I think you know, it's off center of the truth, it's it's, it's pretentious, you know, and I think this could be the same thing. The thing I can compare it to is almost like visual tone poems, you know, where somebody does like a weird voiceover and then there's like weird video footage and maybe someone has a photo in there, like I'm sure there's stuff out there that's evocative of what I'm thinking, but it doesn't feel right, it feels artificial or pretentious or just not the truth. And I'm just I'm wondering because I see something in my mind that I want to watch, like I see the video I see in my mind is something that I want to start watching on YouTube.

Speaker 3: 7:28

Well, tell me so I'm trying to figure out how would you feel comfortable sharing like the kind of what that moment, because I think we talked about a little porch, right? Would you feel comfortable sharing like what that idea is or where that came from?

Speaker 2: 7:40

So on my photography channel I've been kind of making these hybrids between what you would maybe normally see with a photographer that does a photo walk with like a GoPro POV or someone's filming them, take the photos and then they're showing the photos that they took.

Speaker 2: 7:57

Maybe some of the photos that they took they leave out, it's out of focus, it's underexposed, overexposed, whatever, just not very good photo and there is some editing or sequencing that's going on. I wanted to take the YouTuber out of the equation and just put together video still images, the photos that I took, kind of weird music tonal, atmospheric music and then the sound effects, the ambient sound effects of the environment where the photos were taken, and I kind of watched them and I enjoy them. I like them. I'm like this, I saw this and it works, but part of me is going. I still don't think this is the work. It feels like a hybrid between a little bit of the work but a little bit of like the look behind the curtain at the YouTuber making the work, and so I was at my house and I have all kinds of struggles with control and order and things being very neat and organized in my home and my wife-.

Speaker 3: 8:56

I don't relate. Yeah, you don't, my wife doesn't work like that.

Speaker 2: 9:03

I don't relate and my seven-year-old and four-year-old certainly don't. But when you have kids and there's birthdays and there's Christmas, your house fills up very quickly with tons of stuff, and you have tools for the kids and you have tools for your YouTube work and you have tools for all this stuff, just to you know, tools in the garage, just so much stuff that you have to amass to run a household, and then, on top of it, the stuff that you amass because you're self-medicating or you're filling a hole by buying shit or you're trying to keep up with the Joneses, whatever it is. And so I am starting to get overwhelmed by the amount of stuff in our house and I'm also getting overwhelmed by the disarray that sometimes happens at the end of the day or throughout the day, while kids are playing or your wife's making lunch and dishes and all this stuff. So I had just acquired a Ricoh GR Digital the original 8.1 megapixel CCD camera and the stuff everywhere was overwhelming me in the moment and I'm looking at all of it, and I sat there and had this epiphany or this realization, and I said, maybe what you need to do is you need to take these feelings and what you're seeing and turn it into work.

Speaker 2: 10:23

You need to come up with some kind of video, mixed media photo thing. I don't know what it's going to be and you need to capture this because this is something that you deal with a lot. It sometimes elicits behavior in you that you don't like impatience, irritability, frustration, no-transcript and eats at you. So how can you turn into a positive? Yeah, how can you see the towels all clumped up on the shower stall or the toys on the living room floor, the stuff on the kitchen table and and, and tell that story in whatever way? You're going to by taking photos and video. And so I started taking a bunch of photographs and they're low light and messy and whatever, and I'm like I don't know, maybe that's maybe maybe that's the way it has to be.

Speaker 2: 11:11

I started getting some video clips.

Speaker 2: 11:14

A storm came in that night and through the picture window you could see the lightning and the, the clouds moving in, and I'm like I don't know that that speaks to me in relationship to what I'm experiencing with all this crap in my house.

Speaker 2: 11:26

So I'm gonna prop my iPhone up. I'm like I don't even care if it's a good camera, I'm going to prop my iPhone up and just let let it roll. And then my kids were talking and I'm like there's something about like their child voices that makes me feel like maybe that could work in this. So I started recording them, just kind of talking, whatever they are saying, and I'm just going to amass this big pile of stuff that to me seems connected to that emotional state and whatever I'm dealing with, and I'm going to try to turn it into a to work. I'm going to turn it into something and I. The last thing I'll say about it was you know, we talked about this in another video titling your work. Well, I don't want to title all the photographs, but I think this piece of work needs to have a title.

Speaker 3: 12:10

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 12:11

And I was reading an article in the New Yorker and this word popped up and it was replete R E P L E T? E. And I looked up the meaning and I was like that's it, that's what this is. Our house is replete with all this shit and it's driving me crazy, and so that word speaks to me. So right now, that's the working title for this project and I am going to make that work. Yeah.

Speaker 3: 12:38

See it through to the end.

Speaker 2: 12:39

Yeah. So I make sure yeah.

Speaker 3: 12:42

And I mean you know you don't. You don't need to release it. That's the great thing about.

Speaker 2: 12:46

Yeah, I'm going to see what it is.

Speaker 3: 12:47

I don't think doing, you know, truly doing work is it's not an external relationship, right. It's something you know inside and as long as you're doing it, it doesn't matter if you're in. You know it's great to release it.

Speaker 2: 13:02

But. But I also know it's the work because I, like, I'm not impatient about getting it done, so I can release it.

Speaker 3: 13:09

Yeah, when I think you're on the right track, I think you just keep. Yeah, I keep going with it and I, you know, if you get to a point where you have something and you say I want to release it, I would almost say and this is just me thinking right now, but I would almost say, put it on your main channel. Maybe, and you know, and just maybe I don't know how you approach that Maybe just in the, because you don't want to add a, because then it you're, you typifying it.

Speaker 2: 13:37

Yeah, an intro.

Speaker 3: 13:38

Yeah, right, but maybe you know, in the title description you're just like, hey, this is look, this is what happens. Or you put a post up in your feed or something like that, and then in the description you say go to my P, my feed, for the full story. But I think that would be the challenge too, because then you're, and it's interesting, because it's like what game are we playing, but you know, who knows, then you're giving it an audience, right, and you're, you're letting it live in the world and you're kicking back at that notion a little bit that your audience dictates your livelihood or your, you know, your livelihood dictates your work, right? I think that could be a healthy exercise.

Speaker 2: 14:21

Yeah, you know, I don't know what the you know what the correct path is for exhibiting it. You know my instinct is to put it on my photography channel because it feels like a yeah, a natural extension.

Speaker 3: 14:32

That was my first thought too.

Speaker 2: 14:33

And then I was like this is interesting, because but I think what I'm going to, I know that I'm going to know that I'm going to really take my time with it, not rush it.

Speaker 2: 14:44

I may even show it to people and just just just see what their reaction is. So, without going down another rabbit hole, when I was at home for fourth of July, my brother who you know cuts grass during the day and then toils in his home studio on an old iMac making these 3d animated films, and he had like 20 minutes of a like not finished, finished, but like a 75%. There needed some extra dialogue, scoring, whatever and he showed this thing and he's he's testing the waters, he's seeing what the reaction is when people watch this thing for 20 minutes. And I watched this thing and I'm like I don't know what this is Like it makes sense, knowing my brother, I don't know what it is I couldn't not watch it and I watched the whole thing and it felt like five minutes went by and it was done and I'm like I wouldn't hate watching it again Now.

Speaker 2: 15:41

I'm biased, it's my brother I love him supported. You could watch and be like what the fuck is this.

Speaker 2: 15:47

Then he showed it to my niece and nephew and my niece literally watched it in silence. She's I don't know 11, 12 years old, 10, 11 years old watched it in silence the whole way through and my brother went. I know I've got something because she didn't disconnect from it the entire time and even if it's only gets 5,000 views or you know whatever, because who knows, you know, or it goes crazy when he finally releases it and he intends to on YouTube on a dedicated channel.

Speaker 3: 16:16

Or he does. I think that's just, that's something that you know, that's I don't think maybe it's a personal thing, but I almost want to step in and be like, or if he doesn't release it you know, vivian Mayer worked her entire life Does it discredit the work she was doing because they were in a box? Yeah, I would argue it doesn't. I know we've had that exact discussion on this, you know, on this podcast before. But it's like you know, the work is some. It's between you and yourself. Yeah.

Speaker 3: 16:56

And that's it. And then it's always great to put it out in the world, Sure, and you know, then you can do more, you can move to another thing. But I'm sure there's other people out there that you know toil at a craft every day and don't have a public display of that Sure, and I don't think that takes away from it.

Speaker 2: 17:19

No, not at all, especially if that's their truth. If their truth is, I don't want to share this. I don't know what the end result will be of this, the work that I've done, but you know it's not in me.

Speaker 3: 17:33

And you're just doing it because because of it's giving you something internally, and I think that's the metric that differentiates it is you know, you know when it, when you're checking that box.

Speaker 2: 17:48

Now this is related. We touched on something. I held the thought in my head and I want to just touch on it. You know sort of like like why YouTube?

Speaker 3: 17:56

Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2: 17:59

There is something that draws me to YouTube. I don't know if it's empowerment. If it's, it's the path of least resistance. I don't know what it is, but when I think about creating a body of work in photography and let's say I've referenced this fireworks project, I had an impulse during the fireworks season, which in Iowa and Nebraska you know, this part of the Midwest where fireworks are legal for a small period of time because they're big money there are these fireworks tents that pop up all over the place and grocery store parking lots and empty lots and we're all over literally everywhere.

Speaker 2: 18:39

Yeah, and there are everywhere that like these seasonal workers that I don't know if they own the tent, if they're employed by somebody who owns it. I don't know what the story. But I have endless curiosity about the people and there is something fascinating to me about that time of year when, everywhere you drive, you see these like circus tents filled with fireworks and I was like I want to photograph these. I want to go to each one and have this wide angle shot that just photographs the scene where this fireworks tent is.

Speaker 2: 19:12

Yeah, and then in a perfect world I would go into the fireworks, tent talk to the people inside, sort of earn their surface trust to say, can I take your photograph and have that be a project, have that be the work?

Speaker 2: 19:29

And if I made a zine out of it, a photo book, a video on YouTube, you know, I think about like trying to present it to a gallery, because again, that's sort of like in my mind, that is the high mark of exhibiting your photography work. Is that a gallery or a museum or someplace in New York or whatever goes? Holy shit, this is like the world needs to see this.

Speaker 2: 19:55

Yeah or this area needs to see this. Whatever. That to me seems incredibly inaccessible. And and there's contracts, I'm sure, and co ownership, or if they charge admission, all that stuff, and that's even assuming that they would they would like my work.

Speaker 3: 20:13

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 20:14

I love the idea of making a finished piece, a digital photo gallery, a photo video, which is what my channel is called, whatever, it is and just putting it out there and seeing what happens, yeah, and if it, catches on.

Speaker 3: 20:29

You know, it's the lack, of lack of direct gatekeepers. Direct gatekeepers.

Speaker 2: 20:33

Yeah, it's, there's something about. You know, in my channel. I have some views on my channel. You know videos that have over 2000 views and I've, you know, in three months gotten 120 subscribers. I had, I think, two, two or three came on today and to me that is. There's an indication there that something is connecting with the right people. Yeah, now, if I was in the video. Hey, I'm at, I shop we're under here in this cool neighborhood and, oh man, this morning light and all this stuff, I could have 1000 subscribers.

Speaker 3: 21:11

You might do yeah, you might do better yeah.

Speaker 2: 21:14

But I'm okay with me because my my vision of the work, even if it's a kind of hybrid teaching, whatever. Well, we talked about it. It's almost like, is it a lot more work to make them when you're in. Oh, it's tough.

Speaker 3: 21:27

But it could be, you know, what you're doing right now can almost be a prerequisite to the work right. Yeah, it could be a prerequisite to where you're doing, the process of what you're doing right now, but you're not doing it with a video in mind. Yeah.

Speaker 3: 21:41

And you're doing it, you know, 30 different times over two years, and you're making a trip and you're just cataloging it. But and then you know, you sit down when it's all said and done and you turn it into, yeah, this project, it's like, well, this was 30 trips here and I was in a different emotional state every time. And you know, on this one, my, you know, my daughter was sick while I was gone. I was worried the whole time and I was photographing. You know, maybe how did that work its way into the washer this time, you know, we had a tornado and it was crazy, and you know it was the whole town shut down the next day and I was there in a motel and like, how did that influence it? Or like, you know it's driving up and the truck broke down, and how did that, you know?

Speaker 3: 22:28

And then all of that builds on itself and I think, but you, to get to that point, you have to have a starting point, yeah, and that you, you're almost you're doing that right now and you're getting the vision and you're refining it already, you're already starting to figure out like, oh well, this is great, but I see something even better. How do I get to that and so I'm interested to see how it. I mean, I think I'm interested to see how that journey plays out. Yeah, because you're. You know, you have the gut feeling of like I'm not doing the work but I'm close, kind of, and you're going to find it eventually If you keep an open mind and you keep challenging yourself.

Speaker 2: 23:12

And there's something too about you know, and this is very. This is part of what I don't like about why I'm drawn to photography and these sort of mixed media photo videos that I'm conceiving of there are there. Sometimes I feel like a bit of a compromise. Sometimes I sit there and think about the video I just talked about making about my house being messy and it driving me crazy and I think like that's at the top of the pyramid of the things I want to make right now, because that's the only way I can express how I'm feeling.

Speaker 2: 23:53

Like that's it.

Speaker 3: 23:54

It's not a script.

Speaker 2: 23:55

It's not a poem, it's not a sculpture, it's not a painting. Like it is that thing that I see in my mind versus like the documentary with Ted Snow. Part of the thing in my head that makes that inaccessible to me right now is the sheer quantity of work that would go in to making anywhere from a 10 to 30 minute documentary out of all of that material. And I think I sit there and go. That is such a massive undertaking that once I start it it's going to be so all consuming that I'm going to want to set aside the stuff that earns me money and helps me pay my bills and support my family until I get it done.

Speaker 2: 24:37

Even if it's a vomit draft or a polished draft, and so I'm almost resisting working on it because of that thing.

Speaker 3: 24:47

I put in my head. It's funny. You said resisting and literally the thing that came to mind when you were describing that is that I think I even got you ordered a copy of this a couple of years ago, or I sent you, I don't remember. But the War of Art, the Steven.

Speaker 3: 25:00

Pressfield book where he talks about the resistance. You have this thing that you're supposed to be doing, and how do you know it's what you're supposed to be doing? Because when you're not doing it, you feel like disgusted, which I think we would, in this, actually defined in this episode as the work. And when you're not doing it, and like whenever you want to be doing that thing, everything conspires to make you not do that thing. Yeah, adult, like that's just the nature of the beast, right, you have a thing that you're supposed to be doing. Everything in the world is conspiring to keep you from doing that. And it's interesting because you mentioned this. You know you feel like, kind of what you're doing right now is almost this quasi work. And you know, I don't necessarily know if the Ted Snow thing is the thing, but maybe that is the thing for you.

Speaker 3: 25:56

You've expressed to me a couple of times that you do feel like that is the thing and it's like is almost. You know, you're like I'm gonna start another channel, I'm gonna do this. Is that the resistance kind of hitting you, pulling you away and being like, yeah, no, this is work too, this is very important stuff. And then you're, you know you should be doing that thing and when you shift and you start doing, you know, the firework project or this or that, is that gonna be? Suddenly is something else going to come in and be like yeah, well, I mean that's going to be. I've got like 3000 photographs. There's no way, if I sit down and I go through those photographs, I'm just going to take away time from this and this and this. So it's like where do you draw the line? Absolutely yeah, and I think this is. I'm saying this is 100%.

Speaker 2: 26:48

I'm gonna struggle with this myself and I want to get into your point of view on this with your work and not work. The thing for me is I feel like I'm drawn to because you could argue everything I've done on this second channel, all the photography excursion and all that time that I spent doing that. If you had put all that time towards Ted Snow, it's possible that you could be done with it by now. The thing with the other stuff is they're all these little, they're all the it's like I'm trying to think of what this is. They're all these bite size completed projects that start to finish. For me to go out and shoot and to have a finished video, photo video for my second channel, the total time commitment from the idea I have of what I'm going to photograph and take video of to the finished thing is maybe two days.

Speaker 3: 27:48

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 27:49

Maybe two and a half, three at most. Yeah, If I took on Ted Snow right now and I know this about myself two to three months two to three months. If and my thing is I get so obsessed and consumed with it that I cannot do anything else until it's done. And I don't mean like the finished thing that's going to exhibit in a film festival or whatever.

Speaker 2: 28:14

But I mean, even if it's just what I think is a solid draft, and that means there's music, there's voiceover if we had to record it there's I know what extra footage I need to get. I need to go film that footage and get it, even if it's like me getting some just establishing shots around Council Bluffs that I can just do by myself. I'm going to have to have something that feels like a finished film, even if it needs more work.

Speaker 3: 28:39

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 28:40

But it and it'll take me two to three months. Yeah. And I will set aside the stuff that makes me money. I won't reply to emails in a timely manner for brand deals and all the stuff with my channel, and I will at least this is my fear. I will damage what I've worked so hard to create, to make this big fucking thing in a short documentary.

Speaker 3: 29:04

Well, so you're perfectly describing what I've been essentially battling with for the last like personally for the last couple of years, to where I had these projects that I were this bigger thing and I was. You know, you, you put off making progress on them and you almost say to yourself I have to do this in spurts or I'm not going to make any like. This just has to be one big effort, gargantuan effort, and then it never gets, because it's almost I almost liken it to you know, you go to the gym to work out, yeah.

Speaker 3: 29:46

And you're like I just want to lose weight, and what are they? Everybody that's like oh, I want to, you know, get in better shape, or whatever they say. All right, commit to like five minutes a day. Yep Just put your shoes on, show up and go home.

Speaker 2: 29:59

Build.

Speaker 3: 30:00

And you know, do that for a year and suddenly you're the person who you know goes to the gym every day or whatever, and I was always the person who would be like I'm going to get in better shape. And then you go for two hours a day for two weeks and then you don't go for a year. And that was my relationship to the work, you know, to the things that I felt like I wanted to be doing for a long time until I finally just got in this, this mindset, and I don't even know if this is permanent, but this is where I am right now and I've been in there for for enough time to feel comfortable. You know expressing it. But just sit down. Yeah, you know, every morning you can, and you know, try to get an hour in If something else comes up or whatever. You know, just try to get some words down for the like the thing, like writing, try to get some words down, photographing. You know, try to get a step, make a step forward.

Speaker 3: 31:04

It's not almost not setting some gargantuan expectation on it, and I wake up, it's Tuesday and I don't sit down to write and I can't kill myself over that. But I also can't look at Wednesday and be like well, you miss yesterday, you know it's just get back down there, do you gotta make? Take a step, get half a page, get a page. Sometimes you get four pages, five pages, six pages, and you're like, oh man, this is. And then you come back two days later you're like all that was shit, we gotta go back and do it. And for the first time, though, I feel like I've made progress in writing, and the progress hasn't been made in photography, because the project I am passionate about right now that I want to see through is it's in Nashville, and I just haven't made the effort to book the plane ticket, figure out the logistics, and I'm just playing it up. Is this hard thing?

Speaker 2: 32:03

And really what, for you, are the forces that are playing upon that?

Speaker 3: 32:09

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 32:10

What, like you know, is it? You know I've gotta work, I've gotta nine to five jobs.

Speaker 3: 32:15

I don't wanna make the financial commitment or I don't know, I don't wanna what if something comes up that weekend, or what if I need to do this or when in reality it's just like book it, get it on the schedule and like go Does, does-.

Speaker 3: 32:31

Work for it's just like this you know it's just get a page, yeah, get two pages. Or you know like we just sit down and record an episode with, like the, and that usually builds momentum, and like with Ted Snow, you know it's like would it be in that case? Maybe it's like sit down and edit for 30 minutes?

Speaker 3: 32:55

Yeah, Then sit back down tomorrow and edit for 30 more minutes, and then you miss two days. And then you sit down Friday and you edit for 30 minutes and it's like you put in an hour and a half of editing that week.

Speaker 3: 33:07

it's like you know, that's almost the way that I have to look at it, because I very much. I mean, I think we just think similar a lot of ways in terms of, yeah, I built it up as this huge boogie man in my head Right and you build that scary and you just avoid it at all costs, and then every time I make a lot of progress with something, it's just because I got into that habit of yeah show up consistently.

Speaker 3: 33:36

And plus, I talked to you earlier about when we were outside and we were talking. I was telling you and we gotta wrap up pretty soon because we're at like an hour five without the extra stuff. But I basically said, like the work is just, it's a collection of moments over time, but it's that funneled through a specific medium and then distilled down to its essence and then that creates something new. You can scrapbook that whole process and like that's we have secondary or whatever. But I used to look at it as like you have to sit down and create this thing. And then, especially with the projects I'm working on right now, with the film I'm working on right now, it's like you sit down and sometimes you're like, ah, I can't, really nothing's coming to mind right now. You move to something else and work on it for a little bit and then you see something and you had that experience and maybe you read something in a book or you hear somebody say something, you see something in a movie and it inspires some connection. And then that connection goes into the work and instead of just this thing, this culmination of like three days of intense effort, but it's pretty singular in its thinking, you have this great collage of the last 12 months worth of experiences and it fits into this new entity almost, and then, once you carve it down, it becomes something else entirely. So it's this collection of little ideas that have come to you and have been expanded upon for 12 months or whatever, and then you take that and distill it and it becomes its own new idea.

Speaker 3: 35:23

And I think the same happens with photography. Right, you go out and you can just like shoot and you shoot and you shoot, and you shoot, and you shoot, and you shoot and you shoot. And every day there's something like we talked about the motel project or something like there's something slightly influencing you every time. Then, when you come back and you look at all the work, suddenly it's like, wow, look at all these weird connections. And then it comes together and I think right now that's how I look at the work or that's how I look at the process, and who knows, that might change. I can never say it's for sure, but right now that's kind of my thinking on it.

Speaker 2: 36:03

So as we wind down. This is a little bit more for me and maybe for the audience as well.

Speaker 2: 36:13

You know you have the stuff that you're doing just like me, I have my YouTube channel that teaches Final Cut Pro and talks about filmmaking and what hard drives you should use and all that stuff right, and that's sort of like the thing that I compare it to being like the university teacher. That's teaching, you know, writing, creative writing or poetry or screenwriting or whatever. And then there's the work. So for you I know you have a nine to five job and you are working in advertising, marketing and you have your YouTube channel what, for you, is the work and what is like the sort of order of importance to you, whether it's a short film?

Speaker 2: 36:56

a photography project, a book or a screenplay whatever you're writing like what ways does the work, what format does the work embody and what's like the order of importance to you.

Speaker 3: 37:12

So like, if you're asking like, what am I working on right now? There's and this has pretty much been the story for the last, you know, 18 months or more, but there's, you know, there's one feature project, a feature screenplay, yes, okay. And then there's, and you know, I, you don't. My thing is always don't talk about it, if you don't talk. If you talk about it, then it's like out there. And there's an external expectation, that's applied. Yeah.

Speaker 2: 37:45

But yeah no, it's.

Speaker 3: 37:46

I mean it's. You know there's a feature screenplay, there's several, you know short stories that you see through to fruition. It's more of an exercise and sometimes maybe it works into the piece.

Speaker 3: 37:59

But this would be fiction writing pro you know pros yeah pros I wouldn't call it pros, but yeah, you know, and then and then, so that obviously you finished that that would turn into the production of the film. You know you change hats, but I really, you know I'm at the point where it's not a financial thing, it's not like I'm oh, I gotta get this done.

Speaker 3: 38:23

So, it's just something that I'm interested in and I, you know, it's this culmination of all these different things. So I am treating it as just, you know, when it's done, it's done right, and we're going to get there eventually. And, you know, there are external motivations that have been applied in certain aspects and it's like that's always doesn't feel like a good thing, yeah, so there's that. And then there's also, you know, this, this short story, and then there's a photography project which is, you know, undefined, but this, the screenplay, is related to Nashville and the project is related to Nashville.

Speaker 3: 39:06

Okay, they're not the same, right, but the idea, the inspiration was the same, okay, and I think the questions in myself that I'm trying to answer are the same, but there's, you know, there's a broad range of them, and so each one is just, you know, helping me explore that right now. And, yeah, when they finish, you know they'll be finished, and you know I'm open to other projects. It's not like those, but like that's my North Star right now. Yeah, you know, and I think that's why you know, there's certain choices I'll make with, you know, the day job or, you know, doing whatever where it's like as long as I'm making progress on those things. And then obviously you know there's a lot of other things that come. But yeah, that's, that's the North Star, that's the guiding. I also try to keep it. I don't let too much stuff pile up on my plate.

Speaker 2: 40:10

Yeah, because I just can't you know I'm gonna do this and then I'm gonna do that, and that's on the work side.

Speaker 3: 40:16

Yeah, Like you know, if you're not, you're not writing five screenplays.

Speaker 2: 40:20

you don't have six short stories. You don't have seven projects, one yeah.

Speaker 3: 40:24

And then there's one photo project. And then, you know, I love to go out and take photos, yeah, Sometimes like that's more of its own thing, but I like to treat projects as projects and you know, I sure I get the idea for oh, I can write something about this, or about this, or about this.

Speaker 3: 40:42

And usually when I, when that happens to me, I'm like yeah, you have to, almost okay, does this? You know, I think this is interesting. What do I think is interesting about this? Once I identify that and we had like one of those moments earlier where I was like this is what I think is interesting about this I'm writing to figure it out and then, once I identify that, I'm like okay, does this work into a scene? That you know is kind of a progression of where I am right now? And if it's not, you have to just throw it away. Yeah, you know, write it down, put it somewhere. You can come back to it later. But I mean, that was something I did when I was younger is I would just do project, new project, new project, new project, new project, new project. It's like you have 53 projects going and that's a classic and you're gonna finish none of them.

Speaker 2: 41:26

That's a classic thing, especially with writing, I'm sure other disciplines. But you know the exciting part the beginning of a project is always sort of the most exciting, thrilling, fulfilling whatever. And then you hit a roadblock where things get difficult. You're not sure what to go. Most people, this is the war of art as well. But most people you know the discipline trained writers, experienced writers push through that.

Speaker 3: 41:49

Yeah, you just have to sit down Others abandon it and move on to something else.

Speaker 2: 41:54

And we certainly done that in my past and could do that on my photography journey, yeah.

Speaker 3: 41:59

I don't think you will, but yeah no, like where I am in both. Of the things right now it's. We're just deep in the throws. Yeah. And it's not, you know it's, there's nothing exciting about it. Yeah, it's just sit down and do it. And if, if I continue to put on the shoes every day, yeah, eventually we'll be at a point where it's like, Okay, this is, you know it's at a finished point, or it's at least at a point to share, and then you know you add another, so layer.

Speaker 2: 42:26

One last question how do you feel about how the work is going when it comes to the screenplay, the short stories and the photography?

Speaker 3: 42:36

if you had to sort of like you know screenplay, love it, I'm doing every, you know I mean you know, like I mean it's, you know, I just I feel satisfied, I'm in a good place. I think Like there's. I can't say, like you know, I'm not sitting here thinking like this is going to be the greatest fall of all time.

Speaker 2: 42:55

But you're also. This film is going to make me just like bankroll a bunch of money from this job. Like in six months I can quit and then I'm going to just get this script, I'm going to write it, I'm going to finish it, I'm going to get it out there. I have some contact.

Speaker 3: 43:07

You know what I mean. Like no, because that's not, I don't know, maybe, and maybe that's, maybe that's bad.

Speaker 2: 43:16

I don't, I don't, I'm basically. What I'm trying to do is I'm trying to find comparison to what my perception is of the work I'm doing.

Speaker 3: 43:28

This hasn't been the case the whole time, but no, I'm at peace with it for once in my life. It's almost to where. You know we have this. This serves a, this serves a want. I can make a YouTube channel or a video for the YouTube channel if I want to right, I have things that I enjoy doing. You know I have hobbies. I have things that my you know, my wife and I do, and you know we have our dog and trying new things. You know I'm financially fine. You know I'm not struggling, but with that comes a tradeoff, right, obviously.

Speaker 3: 44:11

But but you don't, and every once in a while, you know, I get it like oh, you try to do like a retail therapy type thing or something, and more and more I'm catching myself and but no, I don't feel you know, every day I like to, I try to read a little bit.

Speaker 3: 44:26

I, you know I watch films whenever I get the opportunity. I mean, you know kind of my reading habits and my, yeah, I'm always like listening and watch. Yeah, just, I'm constantly kind of taking stuff in Yep and you know, I've really it's almost this therapy. I mean, really, the writing of the screenplay has kind of become like the podcast you know and.

Speaker 3: 44:47

I'd never had that relationship. It was always its own thing. And yeah, I just I feel it. I mean, you know it's like I could work on it for five hours a day, but would I get any more enjoyment out of it? Right, if I know I'd probably just burn out.

Speaker 2: 45:00

And see, the thing for me is there is something in me that feels very impatient and very pressured.

Speaker 3: 45:09

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 45:10

And I think you know we've talked about this in previous and let's not open up this whole big other thing. But you know, for me, for the most part, it's a cliffhanger for the next episode.

Speaker 3: 45:19

I just feel like I'm. Next week, same bat time.

Speaker 2: 45:22

And this could go to another conversation we might have about you know, culturally, how you know and I understand that, on the feeling like you're behind, because I've felt that before- and I even felt that when I was your age and I was in LA writing screenplays, I was like I felt like I was in a race to like get this financial burden lifted of student loans and being broke and you know we're not broke right now, but I don't like that. I still have my student loans. I don't like that. You know, we owe on a car. I don't like that. I have a 18 year old Mazda. I don't like that.

Speaker 2: 46:02

You know, certain things that pop up financially. Although we can pay for it, it feels like a setback and saving for retirement, all this stuff that starts creeping in in major ways when you're 44 and also going. I keep jumping from thing to thing. I went to acting school, then I went to screenwriting school, then I moved to Omaha and I started, you know, filmmaking and corporate video and I kind of did some documentary stuff. But now I'm doing photography, like all this stuff, and I like I don't, you know, and yes, there's success with the YouTube channel, but it's still like the revenue isn't there for me to like feel like I can breathe a little bit and have a little bit.

Speaker 2: 46:42

You're still fighting, yeah there's still a fight and there's still pressure and impatience to like.

Speaker 2: 46:49

I don't know Alex O's talked about like and people have talked about like getting a piece of work out there that has an impact or has significance. Or, like you know, when he released his photography book on his adventures down the Mississippi, in the photography that he took Like it changed his life. People knew him, they wanted to get in on it, they wanted to exhibit his work. You know like it opened up his world into going into that path even more in a good way, and I'm sure there's, you know, some negatives to it, pressure, and you know living up to that work. Whatever you know, whatever I'm like you gotta like I want, like I you know, and I keep all those forces keep putting me in a place where I'm just like unsettled all the time.

Speaker 3: 47:40

Yeah, I totally understand that too, but I think, at least in my perspective, two of the things that that kind of cause I felt that we're, you know, there's this constant push, and I don't so much right now, and who knows, you know, I can't speak for myself in six months, I can't speak for myself in a year, but I don't so much right now. And, yeah, they were killing me too. The reflection she's still, um, I don't feel that so much right now, and I think part of it might be that there's hi Doug, hey puppy.

Speaker 2: 48:14

Um, it's dinner time, dad, come on, wrap it up. I'm messing up your camera. Get out of here.

Speaker 3: 48:19

Um, I think part of it. The reason that I don't is because one with with what we're talking about, with the work, you can't look at it as an as a means to an end. Yeah.

Speaker 3: 48:33

So the work can't like in the example you just gave with Soth, like it changed his life, like those are, those are great stories to listen to. But if you take that for what it is and you you try to project that onto your own um, your own narrative, then suddenly that work is a means to get that security and you have to the relationship for the work to be honest, for the work to really express in my and this is just an opinion, but I think it has the work is the end. Yeah.

Speaker 3: 49:02

It's also, you know, similar to the Jim Carrey quote, where it's like you could you know, you could try your whole life and I've taken away it's like this is my twist on that almost. It's like I could, you know, spend my whole time, you know, trying to, to build something. And you know, just constantly just like, oh well, once you make it, you can breathe, Once you make it, you can breathe and make it Right, yeah, and I might never make it, so I might as well, I can control that, I just breathe now.

Speaker 2: 49:37

Yeah.

Speaker 3: 49:38

I can't control if I'm going to make it or not. Yeah. All I can do is control my state right now. So if I'm, you know, if I just sit here and enjoy sitting down at the typewriter in the morning and clacking away and my insignificant whatever yeah, it's like I then I'm getting that right now. I'm getting that joy. Yeah.

Speaker 3: 50:01

And I can't control if it's going to turn into a great film or if it's going to turn into a great script or if it's going to even be worth anything when I'm done with it, because but I'm not focused on that and at one point I think I was, and then the work never got done, Yep, so I had you know, it was just like.

Speaker 3: 50:20

Eventually I was like I got to change some thinking on this and I started digging deeper and I was like look, you can just breathe right now, or you can keep holding your breath and be like, as soon as I make it, then I'll breathe. Yeah, and it's like well, what, if you never make it, then you just wasted your whole life and you never breathe, like took a deep breath.

Speaker 2: 50:37

Well, I think that point about if you're creating the work because you think it's going to be this thing, that that gives you that space, that gives you that take some of the anxiety away, it takes some of the financial uncertainty, all that stuff the work, you're not doing, the work for the right reasons, yeah. And then it makes me wonder, as we've talked about in the past a little bit about like ego, death and ego making you make pretentious work, and like creating work that you think makes you look like you're an artist or will impress this person that you want to impress. If your ego is the thing that's driving you towards wanting to control your life, to where you don't have fears, anxieties, you feel like you're ahead in the race, you've got savings, you've got your whatever the in-laws, like like hey, we think you're doing great, like you've done a good job.

Speaker 3: 51:50

You're successful.

Speaker 2: 51:51

Yeah, you're successful all that stuff, then are you just and is my life an indication of me just testing all these different things that I gravitate towards, these different ways of sort of winning the lottery?

Speaker 2: 52:07

Well, I'll be an actor and I'll get discovered and I'll be famous and I'll have money and I'll get to be this I'll have all this stuff taken care of or I'll have made something significant. Well, that didn't work. I'm gonna do screenwriting. I'll sell a screenplay. My name will be on the screen. People will see that I did something impressive, that I'm special, that I'm significant, that I have money, that I have all these things, that I'm keeping up with what society expects of me. And now, okay, well, that didn't work out. Now you're gonna punch the clock and be a post-production supervisor and pay down your credit card debt from your time in LA, and you're gonna then set the stage for you to try a new thing, and that new thing is YouTube, and you've got some success there, but it's not quite enough. So you're gonna keep that channel going and now you're gonna branch off into something else with photography, because you're watching all this photography.

Speaker 2: 52:58

So if you see this photography, that's what it is. They have all the things that you want. Now you're trying to figure out how to. I don't think it's that selfish.

Speaker 3: 53:06

In your case, like, I think, photography you just have a genuine interest. It's clear when you talk about it. There's not. If there is, you're doing a really good job. I just hate the acting school head off Right, right, right, like.

Speaker 3: 53:22

This is your best acting ever is convincing everybody that you genuinely will like photography, no, I mean, no, I think you just everything builds up, but it's all about the perspective, right, you know? And I think the biggest thing is just realizing that every day we're here it's a good day, and don't throw that away for some grand vision of the future, because this might be the grand vision of the future and you're gonna get to some point in the future and look back. Is this grand, nostalgic?

Speaker 3: 53:52

you know beauty of the past and it's gonna be nostalgic then. But why not make it nostalgic now and just take it in and get lost in it a little bit and play around and whatever happens happens. Maybe eventually your channel blows up and you have a million subscribers and you're you know I made it out.

Speaker 2: 54:14

Because of that, somebody buys all your screenplays.

Speaker 3: 54:16

Like you know, everything could work out, and then, in the same case, everything might not. You know you might. Just you could have 50,000 subscribers. Does that change your worth as a person at all Right?

Speaker 3: 54:29

No, you know, you're like we're still sitting and having conversations and you know I don't want to see you know you constantly feeling like you're missing something because you keep chasing and you're like, oh well, I, you know, I made 16 Apple videos last year, yeah, and you know I only got 5,000 subs out of it, or 10,000 subs out of it. Well, make you know three Apple videos and I want to see your fireworks project.

Speaker 2: 54:58

Yeah.

Speaker 3: 54:59

And I think that's you know. I think you kind of feel that way a little bit too, because I really I just think you caught the bug Like I think photography is like a bug and it ripped like, just bit you and you know Well, and I think you know, the foundation to all that has just been just this endless curiosity and wanting to explore all that stuff.

Speaker 2: 55:27

And photography is a tool to connect with other people and hear their story and you know sort of like look beyond the surface of things and see what's you know going on underneath. Yeah, and you know I keep accessing that stuff with different ways, in different ways photography, or documentary film or screenwriting.

Speaker 3: 55:49

And, ironically, everything in your life is informed.

Speaker 2: 55:52

Yeah. But the photography 100%, yeah, yeah, absolutely. I just I wish I could understand what I'm trying to understand, why I have to feel so impatient about all these metrics of success in life. I really think it's.

Speaker 3: 56:19

We're almost brainwashed to feel that way. That's just part of being an American in a lot of ways, unfortunately.

Speaker 2: 56:24

I see this in my brother too, and I feel like part of it too is there's some illusion, a mirage that makes me think if I get all that stuff taken care of, then I can do the work completely unencumbered.

Speaker 3: 56:44

There's some freedom that I fantasize about. It's the control freak. It's the same reason that we like to have everything orderly, or?

Speaker 2: 56:51

Well, it's the same thing with the Ted Snow project. If I could sign a couple brand deals and I had $30,000 in the bank and my business account, I could feel like it's okay to take a month off and just edit the rough draft of that video and I wouldn't lose a moment of sleep going. Am I falling behind financially? Or like turning off the brands I'm working with and all that?

Speaker 3: 57:14

stuff. It's funny too, though, because there's somebody somewhere that's thinking their dream scenario is being in your exact scenario right now.

Speaker 2: 57:23

Absolutely. Yeah, that's right, Dude, you don't even know.

Speaker 3: 57:26

If.

Speaker 2: 57:26

I had 27,000 subs in a channel like that. I had a wife and two kids and a half. Blah, blah, blah. Like you're living the dream, dude, and you don't even know it.

Speaker 3: 57:34

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah yeah yeah, yeah, 100%.

Speaker 3: 57:36

I think that's the biggest thing is like I don't know, like you know, with the control issues and everything, I think the biggest thing, the biggest lesson that I'm trying to learn, is just to control what you can control. Yeah, and I, you know, it happened today, which is everything I want to control, Everything. I want to control the world. It happened today, like, and we got to, and soon, because these cameras are about to die but it happened today where I got flustered and, like you know, the ocean got a little bumpy and I was like, oh, and like you talked me down and I mean it's just, but you know, control what you can control and let the rest happen. And then, you know, hopefully over time, we all get better at dealing with that rough water and that's kind of, you know, that's I don't know.

Speaker 2: 58:28

So here's what I can control. I can control doing the work Absolutely, and so Sitting down, whatever that means. If anything.

Speaker 3: 58:40

Matt's going to come back next week. I can't edit it. An hour and a half at Ted Snow, I can't Suck it, I can't like make my family keep the house the way I want it to.

Speaker 2: 58:52

I can't make the audience make every video a viral sensation. I can't do any. I can't control.

Speaker 3: 59:00

I think that was a. You had that. You had that recognition unconsciously where you were, just like I just I think I need to take photos of this. Yeah, 100%.

Speaker 2: 59:07

And that was that. You know, I was realizing you're like ah, this control is killing me.

Speaker 3: 59:12

And then you were like but I can photograph it.

Speaker 2: 59:15

Yep, yeah.

Speaker 3: 59:17

And that's yeah.

Speaker 2: 59:19

And that's where we, in the episode.

Speaker 3: 59:20

And it's been a golden afternoon.

Speaker 1: 59:23

And I remember having the familiar conviction that life was beginning over again with the summer. I remember having the familiar conviction that life