Trees at Laupahoehoe Beach

Over my few years as a photographer, I have made over 50,000 images. Most of them will never be shown or used in any way. But the making of these photographs is important. It is in doing the work of making and editing these photos that helps train my eye and my abilities.

Time, practice, study, more practice, feedback, still more practice, and more time have brought my skills to where they are today. Yet there is much more to learn and to create. My vision always exceeds my ability.

I am more often satisfied with my work than I was when I first started but it still disappoints me frequently.

Therein Lies the Creative Gap.

This is the creative gap that Ira Glass describes so well:

“Nobody tells this to people who are beginners, I wish someone told me. All of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap. For the first couple years you make stuff, it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you. A lot of people never get past this phase, they quit. Most people I know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this. We know our work doesn’t have this special thing that we want it to have. We all go through this. And if you are just starting out or you are still in this phase, you gotta know its normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week you will finish one story. It is only by going through a volume of work that you will close that gap, and your work will be as good as your ambitions. And I took longer to figure out how to do this than anyone I’ve ever met. It’s gonna take awhile. It’s normal to take awhile. You’ve just gotta fight your way through.” — Ira Glass

I have found that it is true what Ira Glass says above about the gap between what we want to create and our abilities. But what he doesn’t talk about and I have found equally true, is that while we move closer to closing the gap by continually creating a volume of work, and improving our skills and ability, the gap never quite closes.

We get better but the gap remains

At the same time that I am practicing and learning and improving my skills, my perception of what is possible and my eye for beauty is also growing. The gap never closes.

For there to be no gap would mean that I have nothing left to learn or improve upon, nothing better to create.

My Bedroom Window view at Akiko’s Buddhist B&B

But, oh, my friends, there is so much left to create.

I recently had a week where I was feeling disconnected from my muse and from my all consuming love of photography. Briefly I considered that I might be done with photography. There might be nothing more to say.

But then I went out into the woods with my camera and realized that it was just the discouragement of long winter days indoors that was speaking, not my true self.

Further reflection has helped me to pinpoint that a project I am working on that I call The Scarf Project has been disappointing to me so far. In this project I have been making portraits of women of all ages wearing or playing with scarves. I have not been happy with the process of making the portraits, editing the portraits, and the results of the portrait shoots. And it definitely stems from my own personality, skills, tools, and studio limitations, not with the beautiful women I have been photographing.

I believe it is a gap problem—my vision and imagination far exceed my abilities and available tools and it doesn’t have that “special thing” I want it to have—but I am also entertaining thoughts that this just may not be my kind of photography. It could be one of those big mistakes that we all need to make in order to learn.

“I hope that in this year to come, you make mistakes.

Because if you are making mistakes, then you are making new things, trying new things, learning, living, pushing yourself, changing yourself, changing your world. You’re doing things you’ve never done before, and more importantly, you’re Doing Something.

So that’s my wish for you, and all of us, and my wish for myself. Make New Mistakes. Make glorious, amazing mistakes. Make mistakes nobody’s ever made before. Don’t freeze, don’t stop, don’t worry that it isn’t good enough, or it isn’t perfect, whatever it is: art, or love, or work or family or life.

Whatever it is you’re scared of doing, Do it.

Make your mistakes, next year and forever.”
― Neil Gaiman

Discerning between a lack of skill/ability versus trying something that just isn’t my thing is tricky. Is this a big mistake I should just let go or is it an opportunity to keep creating a body of work and see where I end up? I’ve not given up on the project but I am taking a sabbatical from it until the weather warms enough so that I can do outdoor portrait shoots instead of in my makeshift downstairs studio.

My instincts tell me that this is going to land in the big mistake category as in, it was an idea I thought up and it sounded good to my ego, but it isn’t truly where my heart lies. Stay tuned as I play with it some more in the coming months.  I am leaning into the creative gap to see where it leads me.

This past week I spent countless joyful hours reworking photos from my Hawaii walk-about 2 years ago. I am amazed at how beautiful some of photos are, with what I now know about photo editing. This is another way of seeing how the gap has shifted. All of the photos in today’s post are re-worked Hawaii photos from my trip 2 years ago.

Are you experiencing the aching beginner gap where your work doesn’t meet your expectations? If so, please be gentle with yourself, and please keep creating and leaning into the creative gap. The gap may never close but it does shift, and seeing how your work grows and changes is so encouraging.

May you walk in beauty.