The Little Photography Habit With Unexpectedly Large Results
Have you ever wondered why change is so hard?
Why we say we want to do things but never do?
Why we make New Years resolutions but stop after the first week?
Well, if we want to improve our photography we must understand something simple about change:
You can’t think your way into a new way of acting; you must act your way into a new way of thinking.
The current you is stuck at this level because you probably think too much.
You’re too busy contemplating the best route or the perfect method and have stopped doing.
But true change comes from action, not necessarily belief.
If you act, so shall you become.
And if you become, then you’ll probably believe.
Therefore, improving our photography isn't simply about learning how to do photography - it's about becoming a photographer.
Today I’ll share with you this little photography habit with unexpectedly large results, why it works, and how to apply it to your life.
Let’s begin.
A New Season
Lately I’ve entered a new season of photography.
A desire to submerge myself back into the craft, really get down to the basics, and explore new places.
Which meant adjusting my life, changing my schedule, and going out and taking pictures once again.
It’d been a long time since I went on consistent photo sessions, so I knew I had to start small.
You see, when you’re starting anything new or making changes to your life, there will be a weird transitionary period.
Your mind and body are used to the current routines and systems you have now, but your goals and desires are different, so they aren’t matching up with your actions, which makes change difficult.
For me, the struggle was my brain telling me it was a waste of time.
I didn’t want to go out and take pictures, even though I knew it was good for me.
I know it sounds crazy, but I figured I could be doing something better with my time like going to the gym or reading.
So it took a lot of effort just to get out for a simple photo walk in the park - something I used to do every single day.
Not to mention a 30-60 minute commute to take photos - that felt like a huge hassle.
But I knew I had to buckle down and stick with it or I would revert back to my previous self.
The author James Clear once wrote:
“Every action you take is a vote for the type of person you wish to become.”
This transition period between seasons is why many people find it hard to make changes in their lives.
They want to change but try to make too big of a change too fast, and end up reverting back to their old selves without allowing the proper time to adjust.
But as James Clear also said, “Success is the product of daily habits—not once-in-a-lifetime transformations.”
So if you want to start building habits that give you unexpectedly large results, the first thing you need to do is start small.
Pick a habit you know will lead you to your goals and start integrating it into your life so you can enter this new season.
What’s the habit I chose you might ask?
It’s quite simple: 1 photo session a week.
It’s Not A Secret
So now you might be thinking:
“1 photo session a week - it can’t be that easy, right?”
Or maybe, “I already go on more than one photo session a week, so this won’t help me.”
Well, I’ll share with you why this works.
You see, a lot of seemingly big and complex questions have very simple answers.
People will like to flaunt and say there’s some sort of secret method to improve your photography.
But in actuality, it comes from one simple thing: go out and take more photos consistently.
Sounds obvious, right?
Sure, a grade schooler could tell you that.
But how many of us actually live by it?
You see, most people rarely take photos at all, much less consistently, yet they call themselves photographers or say photography is a hobby.
But I’m willing to bet that the average “photographer” goes out much more infrequently than they say they do.
Probably once a month or even less when he/she “feels like it”; maybe even once or twice a year when there’s a big trip coming up.
But never often and never consistently, and certainly not on a daily basis.
Knowing that, it’s no wonder why years go by and people don’t improve!
So it’s not like there’s a mystical secret to getting better - it’s that people don’t actually do the thing as often as they say or think they do.
I’m willing to bet if I actually tracked my number of photo sessions over the years it’d be much less than I thought.
Now I’m not saying you have to make photography your life or that you don’t have other priorities going on.
But by establishing a little photography habit, you can get unexpectedly large results in just a year.
We start at one a week because that’s reasonable enough for most people, is frequent enough to allow us to adjust to a new season (like we mentioned earlier), and will get us results.
Let’s do the math on this real quick.
If you go on one photo session a week, over the course of a year you’ll have gone on 52 photo sessions.
Compare that to one photo session a month or 1-2 trips a year.
I’m willing to bet that the person who went on 52 photo sessions will have improved much more, right?
Especially if they intentionally worked on something each and every time they went out, there’d be no comparison.
Obviously you can up the frequency to once every other day or even every single day, but I think once a week is doable for most people.
You can have a full day, get other stuff done, and still have a photo session with that time.
So although it might sound too obvious, it really is that simple.
Our brains just have a tendency to complicate problems when it doesn’t want to do the work.
Plus a bit of skepticism for stuff until we start to feel the benefits.
That’s why we need to rewire our brains slowly, to eventually think and become more like photographers.
The first few photo sessions will be tough.
Because when you’re not consistently going out and taking photos, going out and taking photos is hard.
But when you’re consistently doing it, it gets easier.
Quality Photo Sessions
Now, some important things to keep in mind when you go on your photo sessions.
Quality of practice matters, so how we do photography will also affect how fast we improve.
But at first, I’d recommend not to focus on results, rather focus on making photography a habit.
Remember, our short term goal isn’t to get amazing photos - it’s just to stick to this quota and then things will get easier and easier.
I wouldn’t tell a new weightlifter they need to stack 20 pounds of muscle in a month - just that they need to start getting in the gym consistently.
Everything else follows downstream.
Now when I say one photo session a week, I don’t mean bringing your camera along with you to run errands.
You can definitely start with that but it doesn’t count to the quota.
By “photo session”, I mean intentional photography.
Going to a designated place you picked out specifically to take photos with a focus or idea in mind.
You have something you want to work on or test whether it’s manual exposure, fixing your compositions, or trying out a new film simulation.
Or you saw some place cool online and you just want to capture that.
The time is reserved just for photography and you’re working on something specific.
Just doing that alone will greatly improve the quality of your photo sessions because you’re actually learning something new each time you go out.
For example, the past few months I’ve been sticking to this habit to get my mind and body back into the rhythm of photography.
And every photo session I picked a different place to explore and different things to work on.
I started with walks in the park and then worked my way up to larger, more out of the way spots I’d never been to before.
And each time I learned something new, tried something different, and found more things to work on.
It’s different from just bringing your camera along and taking pictures randomly.
Most people never go out and intentionally work on something and that’s why they don’t get better.
But if you start changing not only the frequency of your photo sessions but also the quality of them, you’ll start seeing more better results.
And over time, certain things will begin to click and make sense.
Let’s talk more about that.
The Hidden Benefits
It’s been almost 3 months since I started consistently going out once a week to take photos, and I’ve benefitted greatly.
At first it was hard, but around one month in, momentum started to build.
Getting out there became routine and I felt accustomed to the process.
Furthermore, my thoughts and views around this photography habit changed.
Before, it was a waste of time and took a lot of effort to get out.
But now, since I’ve had a couple of good photo sessions and have been positively reinforced for doing so, I’ve become much more optimistic about photography.
And lately, photo sessions have become the day of the week I look forward to.
Because it’s fun, every time I get explore somewhere new, I get to test out a lot of the things I spent the whole week thinking about, and it feels like a mini adventure.
It’s also a great break for my brain to mix things up from editing videos and writing.
My entire perspective on photography and motivation has shifted, and that’s not insignificant.
It really feels like my brain has been rewired.
Again, this is not something you can think your way to, you must act.
Similarly, my photos themselves have started to improve.
Shots I used to find hard are now easier to get.
Things I never noticed before I notice now.
And because I’m doing more photography, I’m thinking more about photography.
All of this adds up in the long run for more and better results.
In the process of habitualizing photography, comes great photos.
My brain, habits, and routines have changed and I’m once again oriented towards a lifestyle of photography.
All of this came from sticking to “one photo session a week” for just a month or two.
Imagine if I stuck to this for a year or even a decade.
So, if you’re stuck in your old ways, old habits that once served you are no longer serving you, you just need something new, or really want to get better, here’s my recommendation:
Get your *ss outside and go on one intentional photography session a week.
Stick to it for at least 1-2 months and you will see changes.
Ignore your brain, your lack of motivation, your “burnout”, your gear acquisition syndrome.
Just get out there and get moving.
A big problem many of us have is we just think too much.
All of our worries, our anxieties, our complaints, our excuses - they all get in the way of us doing what needs to be done.
But we can’t live life in our heads.
And we can’t get better watching others take photos and never doing it ourselves.
This is a big pill we have to swallow if we want to create any change in our lives.
If we keep doing the same things we’ll get the same results - and if you’re not satisfied with your photography or life currently, you’ve gotta switch things up.
Remember: You can’t think your way into a new way of acting, you must act your way into a new way of thinking.
It doesn’t matter if your brain says you can or can’t.
Or if you don’t live in a big city or whatever.
Those are all just excuses we make to get out of doing the things we don’t want to do.
But when you finally do the thing, realize it’s not as bad as you thought, and start getting positive benefits from it, you begin to reshape how your brain sees reality.
It’ll no longer view photography as a waste of time - but rather an important necessary part of the process.
And you’ll become more willing to go to further and further lengths to keep up with that quota.
Before you know it a year, two years, or three+ will go by and those first seemingly inconsequential photo sessions have really begun to add up.
You’ll be able to look at your old work and be both surprised and proud of how far you’ve come.
And before you know it, you’ll realize you didn’t simply learn how to do photography better - you actually became a photographer.
That’s how we get unexpectedly large results with one little photography habit.
Don’t believe me?
Try it out for yourself and prove me wrong.
So I hope you found this useful - if you have a friend who’s always trying to “get started”, send them this, it might help.
If you want to learn more about the psychology, the process of improving your photography, build some systems, and create real change like in this article, you can do so in Photography Systems.
It’s a full guide to getting better, by learning how to shoot more and stress less - if you found this useful I think you’ll find that useful.
Thanks for reading, happy shooting.
