Life as an artist is like living on a roller coaster.  We create.  We grow.  We celebrate success.  We beat ourselves up.  We tell ourselves that our work is crap.  A little voice in our head tells us to quit. 

Welcome to the crossroads.

This is a place that you will find yourself regularly…..and I wish that I could say that it gets easier each time you find yourself at that place.  But it doesn’t.  Because the stakes are higher. 

I know that you’ve been there.  I’ve been there too.  I’m there right now.  At the crossroads.  I’m at a place where there is work in my head dying to be created, but what I’m producing is not matching up to the vision in my head.

It’s frustrating.  It happens to EVERY. SINGLE. ONE. OF. US.  If someone has been creating for a while and they tell you they’ve never been to this place, I venture to say they are lying to themselves. 

What you do at this crossroads matters.  There are two options….quit or persevere.  Which will you choose? 

Quitting doesn’t necessarily mean quitting in the way that you may think.  Quitting in this scenario would mean that I decide to play it safe.  I keep producing the work that I have been producing.  It’s good work.  My fall calendar is about to burst at the seams.  But in my heart, I know there is more.

The other option is to roll up my sleeves and keep creating.  Keep trying new things and figure out a way to make my vision a reality.  It means booking model sessions just to get out there and create what I want to try to create without the need to produce salable images.  It takes time and it takes you telling that voice in your head to shove it. 

I came across this video by Ira Glass some time ago and thought it was very fitting today.  This message isn’t just for beginners, it’s for anyone that’s ever taken a leap and tried something new. 

THE GAP by Ira Glass from Daniel Sax on Vimeo.

I hope that you find some encouragement in this post…and I can’t wait to see what you create.  As for my new work, it will be ready in good sweet time….after the prerequisite amount of cursing.