ellipsis…

i’ve been waiting for this day for a while now. kinda. maybe not waiting, more like anticipating. 2009, the year when everything will change. and obviously way faster than i can even take in. up till now it’s seems like i’ve been in a bit of a dream world. dreaming of the day when i’ll wake up and start doing everything i’ve always wanted to do. clock chimed 12, and i’m sitting on the side of the road wondering what to do with a giant pumpkin, a couple of rats and a dress that… well, we won’t go into that. it kind of just hit me that i have to get a move on things that i need to get done right away.

1) start putting together a new book
2) lay down the ground work on new marketing (which is going to be awesome, you’ll see)
3) with putting together a new book comes updating my website
4) a big four, start seriously looking for places in Vancouver

my dad gave me Malcolm Gladwell’s new book for Christmas, it’s called The Outliers. the basic premise of the book dissects how really successful people become really successful. i’m only 2 chapters in, but Gladwell has already referred to a number that is consistent with success and is ridiculously daunting; 10,000 hours. that is the number of hours that is consistent with the brilliant people of the world. the Beatles, hockey players, Bill Gates, that number is the amount of time initially invested into playing together, on the ice or programing that has propelled them to their success. on top of that, you can’t discount that fact that everyone of those people are brilliant naturally, but 10,000 hours seems to come up time and again.

i figure in the last 5 years i’ve invested 2,000 hours off and on into photography. i would say a lot of it would be from this past year alone. as of now i’m starting on my two-thousand-and-first hour. it’s a long way away from 10,000 but i’m determined to get there. wish me luck.

Happy New Year Everyone!

my buddy justin la favor, who is also a fantastic realtor in edmonton (plug plug plug), is huge into marketing. he’s probably read, bought and watched almost every new marketing strategy in the last two years. that said he’s in the know on who’s the top guys out there. when it comes to the marketing industry it’s directly linked to the photography industry. on first thought it’s because the marketers are the guys who find the ad firms, who find us so that we can make some money and eat. on second thought, it’s because we need to also market ourselves as photographers, which directly links us back to the former point. i digress.

in my search for a latter rung to get me out of my creative gap, i realized after tonight’s little webinar (web-seminar. didn’t even know that was a word), that i’m bored. i really am. and i’ve known it all along, but it really hasn’t slapped me in the face until tonight. on justin’s blog he links everyone to a webinar from one of the top copywriters in the states, John Carlton, who interviews his good friend, and guru marketer, Eben Pagan. If you have an hour i would recommend a listen. right at the beginning of the interview Eben quotes John, he actually used this point as a building block for his multi-million dollar productivity program.

“people are bored out of our minds. people are bored. they live boring lives. they wake up, they have a boring morning routine, they have a boring breakfast, get in a boring car, and take a boring commute, to a boring job, that is boring, with a boring boss. and then they have a boring commute home, and watch boring television, and they go to sleep bored… not only are they boring and not exciting, but they don’t know anyone that’s even interesting or exciting, they don’t even know anyone who knows anyone that’s interesting and exciting. they just kind of live in a boring bubble for most of their lives. and if a little excitement comes into their life, it’s really amazing.”

that kinda hit me pretty hard. and maybe not everything there describes me. i know interesting and exciting people. and i watch interesting tv. since cutting my hours at the store, i still haven’t been able to shake the boring routine. working at a camera store for the last couple of years has really put a damper on my life, almost sucked me dry. you’d think it would be an easy job, ironically that is what killed me. i found that i became less and less motivated to do anything. – boring morning routine, boring breakfast, boring job… – i’d get home and just not want to do anything.

i need to bring some excitement into my life. it’s a bit harder now, most of my friends (come to think of it, all of my friends) are married, everyone has careers, and people just don’t have as much free time. not that any of that is bad, just not a easy as say 5 years ago when most of us just finished school and were single.

so let’s unbore myself. tonight is the first A Photo Evening i’m hosting. a bunch of friends and fellow photogs gathering to enjoys some wine and chat about photography. should be interesting, more on that after the evening. i’m also hoping to join the subcommittee for the ACE Awards, an award show for the best and brightest of advertising in edmonton. a good way to meet some new people, network and have some fun putting on a show (it’s been a while since i’ve done that). i think that’s a fairly good start. the theory behind unboring myself is that it will motivate me to be more productive, give me more energy and creativity. i want that.

are you bored?… if you are, let’s get you unbored. you might have to get a little creative and look outside of your circle of friends. meet exciting new people who are doing big things. join a club. or maybe start one. a lot of this isn’t new information, it just is a matter of having it put in a way that will hit you aside the head. most of what Eben and John say in the webinar is exactly the same as what Keith Ferrazzi says in his book Never Eat Alone. get motivated not by sitting at your desk plotting new deadlines or warming up that microwave dinner. let other people inject some excitement into your life, so that you can start feeling more alive, and inturn become more productive. turn down the suck, turn up the good.

here’s the link to John Carlton’s interview with Eben Pagan.
http://www.simplewritingsystem.com/blog/2008/10/16/eben-pagans-million-dollar-writing-insights/

if you’ve read my blog before, you’ve come to realize that i do my best thinking in my car, driving. best time: at night. best weather: raining. it just makes for a very pensive, reflective state of mind for me. once again, tonight was one of those nights, and it was perfect; 12:30am, raining, and everything going by seemed like cinema.

i was over at my best friend’s house. as per usual we were sitting on his couches, drinking wine. it’s what we do. ever since we came back from europe, we’ve crack a good bottle of wine and just talked life. tonight was a bit different though. steve is getting married on saturday, and it was the last time i’d be cracking a bottle with him as a single guy. not an overly momentous occasion, but it still has it’s significance. we covered every topic, as per usual; relationships, jobs, faith, where we were both going life. it was a good night.

months before we had talked about if i wanted to be in his wedding or if i wanted to shoot his wedding. i told him it was up to him. at the time i wasn’t overly eager to shoot friends weddings, but now i rather enjoy it. after some thought, steve asked me to shoot his wedding. not because i can or because i was a photographer, but more because he wouldn’t trust anyone else with the job. and i would agree, i wouldn’t trust any other photographer with the job of photographing his wedding. to be honest, i wouldn’t know what to do with myself standing up there infront of everyone.

as i drove home, i started to realize that this will probably be the most important wedding i would shoot thus far. it is the closest one to me, with the most meaning. things have to be perfect. they have to be more than perfect. all of the technical is there. and i know how they are since i’ve photographed them before. but the feeling, the emotion has to be there, though the lens. that’s the more than perfect part.

i can’t help to think that in some way this is a turning point for both of us. up till now we’ve both had the freedom of being, well, not married. since europe, where we were kind of in the same place in life, we’ve gone and carved our unique paths, both about to do things that will change our lives. steve getting married and me, well, i’ve got somethings in store that are going to start altering my life in ways that i can’t even predict yet. but that’s for a different post. i remember getting off the plane in venice with steve and smelling the sea breeze, it was amazing! it doesn’t help that my girl is currently in italy racing. -GO KITTY!- but the memories we’ve shared are experiences that i will never forget. and from here on in i will have to make some room for his wife. which won’t be too hard, she’s one of my sister’s best friends. we kind of set them up LOL. but you know what i mean.

things start off tomorrow and will most likely be a blur till i get home saturday night. good friend, best friends, are hard to find in this life, they are gifts that only come around ever so often. so this wedding will be an honor and priviledge to shoot. i would not want to be doing anything else that day.

oh, and mental airplanes is a matthew good song. if you know it, there is absolutely no relevance between his song and this post, other than the fact that it was the song playing in my little blue rav4 on the way home.

what would you do if you were the second-riches man in the world? give it to the riches man in the world?…. it kind of caught me off guard, but that’s exactly what has happened. warren buffett, the second-richest man in the world, is donating roughly $37 billion dollars to the bill & milinda gates foundation. huh. who would of thought that wealthest men in the world would actually see more than just dollar signs, and realize the emence power they have on global humanitarian issues.

there has been a change in what our so called rich and famous have been using their money for. i guess the first major network chasing event would probably be the whole “live strong” campaign from mr. armstrong. and then there is bono, and now bill gates. which if you think about it is kind of funny. gates being this high school computer nerd, who was probably beat up and stuffed in lockers, is now on the same celebrity list as the guy who can ride a bike better than anyone else, and the biggest rocker of the 21 century.

hollywood has definitely caught on, if not just to boost their celebrity status. we’ve got angalina and brad, mr. clooney, the oh so “spiritual” harpo (oprah backwards if you haven’t figured that one out yet). all who have given money, themselves and their time. all on camera i might add. which kind of bugs me.

do all of these good things have to be a public service announcement to boost an images, a “ooooh, look at me, look at me” rally. i hope not. i hope that all these outing are the real deal. a true push to serve the people who they can help; with their wealth, and their fame. not just the newest fade in hollywood that just happens to do something good, and will fade in a year or so. what a incredibly huge waste of time is this has been, if that is all there is. sad.

i guess in the meantime, i’ll be glad that these celebrities have realized that they can do something. and when it ends there will still be the ones who have been in the background serving long before a celebrity decided it would be “fun”. good on you warren buffet. keep up the good work gates foundation. i applaud you on what you dream to accomplish. i know what i’d do with $37 billion, and giving it away wouldn’t be high on the list.