Impulse

I’m really good at say­ing no. Fabulous at it. When an idea hits me, I can instantly think of a thou­sand dif­fer­ent obsta­cles to over­come, prob­a­ble imper­fec­tions, and rea­sons not to do it at all. It’s easy to say no nowa­days — infor­ma­tion over­load, time pres­sures, overly high per­sonal expec­ta­tions, George W. Bush (I’m don’t know the con­nec­tion, but I’m sure it’s there), how­ever, I’ve found that say­ing yes is a whole lot more excit­ing and fruitful.

I’ll be on an urban photo safari and see a cou­ple gaz­ing into each other’s eyes — a moment ripe for cap­ture. Thoughts leap to my mind — “With this lens, I’ll have to get really close. I don’t really feel like get­ting up close, and, I don’t want to dis­turb them. Plus, I’ve just walked by so I’d have to turn around to take the pic­ture and they’re sure to see that. Plus the back­ground wasn’t that great and this wide-angle lens will grab a lot of it. Besides, the moment’s passed any­way. That’s ok, I’ll get the next one.” Repeat until a state of Grumpiness is achieved.
I’ve found that my cre­ative ruts are almost always caused by hav­ing said no too much. Saying no to each cre­ative impulse. Saying no to each oppor­tu­nity to do some­thing inter­est­ing. It even goes beyond cre­ative endeav­ors — say­ing no to exer­cise, to going out, to being social, etc. Say no enough times, and uncer­tainty and doubt creep in. Presto — instant rut.
On the other hand, my best work hap­pens when I prac­tice say­ing yes. Saying yes to the desire to pho­to­graph the Bird Lady, even though it felt like she didn’t want me near. Or say­ing yes to the sun­bathers despite some old french­man yelling at me. Or the young cou­ple, or peo­ple on the bus. Or the desire to learn salsa danc­ing. Or meet­ing new friends (or, heck, even poten­tial girl­friends on the online per­son­als sites). Saying yes to things not only gets me what I want, but makes life richer. I’m hap­pier when I prac­tice say­ing yes.