Introduction
As this is my first article, I wanna start by introducing myself and this blog. My name is Alan, I started taking photos four years ago because of a school project (maybe I can tell that story later), but it quickly became something important in my life.
In early 2020, I decided to try make some money by taking portraits of people, but after a few sessions, I realized that I wasn't getting the same satisfaction as if I just take photos of my friends or street photography. Then the quarantine came, I took advantage and cancel the last sessions I had pending.
Something good about all this Covid crisis is that I had some time to think about what I really want to do with my photography. I haven't decided everything yet, but one of the things I want to do is to communicate more with my photos, and I think this blog will help me get there.
Welcome to The Photography Journey, in this first entry I will try to share with you some ideas I found in the last year, and that inspired me to start this project. Hopefully, it will help you in some way.
The two halves of life
The idea of the two halves of life was popularized by Carl Jung, a psychologist, also known as founder of the school of analytical psychology. It says that a human life, like a day, has its morning and its evening, each one with its tasks and goals.
The first half of life is spent building our sense of identity, importance, and security, your ego structure. In the second half of life, the ego still has a place, but now in the service of the True Self or soul, your inner and inherent identity. Your ego is the container that holds you all together, so now its strength is an advantage.
The transition between the morning and the evening starts when you realize that your conscious self is not all of you, but only the acceptable you. This often comes with a big failure or a significant lost.
The two halves of the creative journey
I heard of the two halves from Sean Tucker, he's one of the photographers who had inspired me since I met him a few years ago. In his video The Two Halves of your Creative Journey, Sean talks about this idea from a creative perspective, he says that in our creative journey, we're also gonna face the morning and the evening.
During the morning, we learn the basis of our area (photography in my case), the different techniques and formalities, exploring every one of them, and every variant of our interest with the goals of establish our own style. We look for perfection, visibility and recognition.
In the evening, we realize that what we believed is a lie. We use all the things learnt and built in the morning in order to create meaningful stuff, with the only purpose of fulfil ourselves.
My own journey
When it comes to my own journey, I have no doubt that I'm just starting the morning. I recently took a course about visual narrative, and as soon as I can safely return to the streets, I'm gonna start making the kind of photographic series I learnt there. I still have a lot to learn and explore, like for example buying a camera (I photograph with my smartphone for now), printing and selling my work or take photos of the Milky Way.
I don't know if in a few months or years, this blog will still exist, but I do know that this is what I wanna try now. I had the fortune to met photography early in my life and with time I'll find the lines to drive myself into a wonderful evening.
Conclusions
Where are you in your creative journey? Either you're in the morning or the evening, it doesn't matter. The important thing here is to not try to rush it, each one of the two phases have it's own purpose, and you're gonna get there. So slow down a moment, enjoy the view, the sounds, and be happy, because the day it's just starting.