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Experimenting and taking creative risks in 2022

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Experimenting and taking creative risks in 2022

Hellloooo and welcome back to the Montana Diaries Podcast, on today’s episode I’m going to be talking about experimenting and taking creative risks — I freaking knowww that creative business can slowly turn into factory work, especially with portfolio consistency and client expectations, so let’s talk about the who, what, when, where, and how of staying creative when you make money from your creativity. This episode is dedicated to Morgannnn, the owner of Elizabeth Samuel Photography, who suggested the topic on Instagram — she asked specifically about double exposures and creative edits. Remember, you can alwayssss let me know what topics you want covered on the pod!

When you make money from your creativity you need a different creative outlet lol

Okeyyy, let’s get into this — I’m obsessed with creativity and business and what it is to make money from creativity, so this topic gets me pretty fired up. Let me start by saying this: When you make money from your creativity, you either need a different creative outlet or you need to figure out how to continue nurturing your creativity that you’ve monetized — honestly, I think you need to do both things because I don’t think the second thing is 100% possible all the time. Let me explain.

I’m an avid reader. My real life, no bullshit, no irony involved dream is to be a novelist — I have stick figure self portraits from early elementary school with speech bubbles saying that when I grow up, I want to be a writer. Except I spelled “writer” wrong, with two t’s.

Soooo I went to college, and I studied english literature and creative writing alongside my more practical communication studies major which yes obviously that’s a joke of a major but don’t tell that to 17 year old me making life decisions, but oh my god did I do anything possible to avoid reading and writing once those things became obligations.

It became obvious to me that it wasn’t good for my brain to make reading and writing a job. Everyone gets so hung up on doing work that you’re passionate about because we’ve made what we do for a living such a huge part of our identity and personality — we’ve made what we do synonymous with who we ARE. Butttt here’s what I realized is true for me: I do like editing video and photos, I love aesthetics and I’m good at planning things while staying flexible because it makes me feel in control, which it’s always good when your occupation is well suited to your pathologies. I like business. It feels good to MAKE SOMETHING for someone that has an impact and makes them feel good and to be able to make money doing that.

But I can’t say my ego or sense of self or concept of myself as a creative or worth in general is tied to, like, wedding films. Thank God.

I have to be honest in saying that I think it’s a mistake to tie your finances to your creativity and, like, artistic ego. And I think that’s what we’re talking about here, when a creative turns their real hobby and their actual creative outlet into something that makes money…and then they lose the joy of play and experimentation and all of that good stuff because now there’s pressure and expectation and, yes, fear attached to doing the thing that they once did for fun. Because it’s a job.

Read big magic

Here’s where I tell you to read Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert. And, listen, I’m not the type to gatekeep books — if you’re not a reader or you don’t have time, then please consider buying the audiobook and LISTENING to Big Magic — Liz reads it herself and it’s beautiful.

I spoke on this in a recent episode about money, which I’ll link in the shownotes, but Big Magic made me realize that as long as I was supporting myself then I didn’t actually care how I made money. My number one obligation, for my entire life, is to the pursuit of creativity. To being interested and interesting, to creating more than I consume, to keeping my heart open to magic and ideas — to not being beholden to money and obligation and others’ expectations.

But, like, it’s nice to make money with creative business. Welcome to this entire Podcast.

Consume content that makes you want to create

On the back of that book recommendation, let me also encourage you to consume content that makes you feel the urge to create something. Start being critical of the state of mind you get in when you’re consuming — are you watching Netflix to shut your brain off and mindlessly consume? Are you scrolling TikTok to do the same thing? Or do you seek out media that inspires you, that lights a fire under you, that spurs you to action? If you’re feeling a lull in your creativity, if you’re tending toward burnout, all I’m saying is that part of the problem might be the way you’re consuming — not necessarily your creative process in general.

Systemizing your creative business

Speaking of the creative process — you should have one.

I’m sorry, I’m that guy that systemizes creativity. I know, I know — you want freedom and whimsy and inspiration, you’re an arteest.

But actually, I’m sorry, you’re the one who has made your creativity your job. You have a responsibility, for the sake of the health of your business and your own sanity, to come up with systems and frameworks to exist within so that the WORK part of your work can get done and then your creativity can flourish. Structure breeds creativity, I promise.

Here’s another writing example: Have you ever tried writing long form content, like an easy or a blog post, and the blinking cursor on the blank page was just way too overwhelming and you couldn’t write anything at all? Have you tried outlining instead? Have you tried setting a timer and brain dumping? Having something, ANYTHING on the page helps you write faster, spoiler alert. Take this podcast, for example — if I didn’t have a framework… it would never get done. Ever. I have an intro and outro format that provides structure. I usually have a topic, and then I set a timer for five minutes to brain dump points. I then bold those points and consider them mini topics. The one we’re on right now is “systemizing your creative business.” Then, I set ten minute timers to write without judgement under every bolded point. Just throwing up words on the page, everything I think about the bolded point. The timer puts the pressure on for work, but it takes it off for the words sounding good — I’m literally just typing how I talk.

Afterward, I edit and then when I’m recording I’m likely to riff a bit and expand on some things, but the process and structure BREEDS the creativity. The freedom of a blank page just causes paralyzation and overthinking and procrastination. This applies to all creative work, I really believe that.

We like to romanticize creativity, and trust me, I believe there’s plenty of room for the romantic side of creation…but it isn’t all that. It’s work. It’s process.

Experimenting when you make money from your creativity

Now, back to the main point of this episode, experimenting when you make money from your creativity. Is it possible to stay creative, to experiment, to grow, to innovate when you have paying customers and clients that expect a certain thing from you?

Sure. But with caveats.

You do need to deliver work that’s consistent with your portfolio but idk there’s nothing wrong with putting weird experimental artsy shit alongside that other work — this is honestly where being a human comes in and curating your personal branding to make people expect that out of you. During sessions when I’m trying something new I’m literally like “k imma get a lil weird now” and then I lay on the ground usually for some dope ass sick ass angles idk, also the original question that made me think of this topic in the first place was about double exposures and creative edits for video and how I use fractals… you guys, I’m not techy or particularly talented or anything, I try weird shit and have fun and figure out how to stay sane in my job — I don’t ask for permission to try things out or over research or over think, if I want to do something and I don’t know how to do it then I Google it and then just freaking do it, creativity is NOT THAT SERIOUS — if you feel anxious about a client complaining about the experimental stuff you delivered alongside the regular stuff, here’s a fun blanket response, this is for photographers but feel free to shift it to whatever creative service you do: Oh my goodness, I’m so thrilled you loved some of the photos in your gallery more than others! It’s such a huge brand value of mine to deliver content that is consistent with the rest of my portfolio and I’m over the moon you found a few in your gallery that suit you — I also understand you noticed the experimental stuff I included! How fun are those!? Thanks so much for letting me get weird during our session, it keeps me creative! You’ll prolly see the fun ones on my social media, and I’m so pumped to see what you do with the others! Message me when you print them so I can see!

See how I’m coming from a place of positivity, of service, and reminding my client that they don’t have to love every photo in the gallery and I’m fulfilling my contractual obligation by delivering the amount of photos promised in my signature style? There’s no need to be defensive because you didn’t do anything wrong.

If you absolutely do not want to get weird with clients, then you need to style your own shoots and get creative on your own time. The only thing I’ll say to this is I do have a friend who does this often and then shoots and edits super clean with her real clients but thennnnn sometimes feels frustrated that she doesn’t book more creative clients. See the disconnect there?

In conclusion, you guys, creativity isn’t serious idk why we make it life or death, I don’t mean to be blase about your insecurities but maybe that’s something you need — like idk, nobody needs what we do and we aren’t performing surgery or anything and I don’t think you need to overthink this just create create create and put pretty things into the world and weird things and things maybe only you will like because we’re going to die eventually, maybe soon, and your legacy shouldn’t be cookie cutter generic bullshit. Was that helpful?

I’ve been talking about Liz Gilbert too much, I sound like a fangirl and I’m sorry, but there was this great moment in her podcast she used to do where she and her guest, I’m so sorry I don’t remember the exact context — but they were talking about a musician they loved that put out this batshit album that sounded nothing like his previous work, and the guest hated it but then came to admire it because it was experimental and weird and he acknowledged that he wasn’t put on this earth to be a song writer monkey. A modern day example would be Ed Sheeran — I know he’s kinda considered white bread as far as singer song writers go but I do find him brilliant, and he put out that collaboration album where every song was a collab and nothing fit together and it was experimental and odd, and truly I think I skip every song when it comes up on shuffle because it’s just not my thing but — goddamn, good for you Ed Sheeran. You aren’t my song writer monkey.

And to you, my dear listener — you aren’t a factory. You aren’t a photography monkey or a jewelry designer monkey or a painter monkey or a graphic design monkey or any kind of monkey at all besides the bit of genetic makeup we share with monkeys, you’re a creative being. You make money from your creativity so you have contractual obligations and an obligation to your clients to produce work they hired you to do with the expectation that it will look similar to your other work, but other than that? It’s not that serious. You WON capitalism, you’re making money out of nothing, out of things you make. You make a living with creativity. You survive and feed yourself by playingggg — you have to nurture that bit of you that needs to create, to play, to be free so you can avoid burnout and keep winning. Hooray, you’re doing the thing, friend, now don’t ruin it by getting too serious. You’re not a monkeyyyy.

I’m dying, that whole metaphor didn’t really work but ya know? I’m trusting that the spirit behind it might. Leave it to me to mix creativity with competition, you’ve unlocked the exact reason I’m exhausting to everyone who loves me.