Photographer Mindset

Two Tiny Notebooks That Killed My Phone Addiction (And Made Me a Better Photographer)
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Two Tiny Notebooks That Killed My Phone Addiction (And Made Me a Better Photographer)

I shoot with my phone sometimes on purpose, just to prove it’s not the gear that matters. But here’s the thing I had to admit to myself last year: I wasn’t picking up my phone to shoot. I was picking it up to scroll. To check notifications. To fall into a thirty-minute Instagram hole when I should have been editing the shoot from the weekend before. My phone had quietly become the biggest obstacle between me and my actual creative work, and I didn’t even notice until my Sunday photo walks started feeling distracted instead of meditative.

You're Already a Photographer — Here's How to Stop Talking Yourself Out of It
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You're Already a Photographer — Here's How to Stop Talking Yourself Out of It

I started teaching photography because a stranger at a coffee shop asked how I got a particular shot on my phone. Not my camera. My phone. I almost deflected the question with “oh, I’m not really a teacher” before I caught myself. Here I was, someone who had spent years shooting professionally, about to tell a complete stranger that I wasn’t qualified to explain what I had literally just done. That moment stuck with me, and it’s exactly why I kept coming back to this video.

Why Encouraging Other Photographers Is One of the Most Powerful Things You Can Do
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Why Encouraging Other Photographers Is One of the Most Powerful Things You Can Do

There’s a version of photography culture that feels like a competition. Whose gear is better, whose edit is cleaner, whose follower count is climbing faster. I spent my first couple of years shooting in that headspace, quietly comparing myself to everyone and saying very little to the people around me. What changed things wasn’t a new lens or a Lightroom preset. It was a stranger at a coffee shop asking how I got a particular shot, and me actually sitting down and explaining it.

The Business Side of Photography Nobody Teaches You: Joel Grimes on Human Behavior and Creative Drive
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The Business Side of Photography Nobody Teaches You: Joel Grimes on Human Behavior and Creative Drive

I’ll be honest with you: when I first started teaching photography, I assumed the hardest part would be explaining things like exposure triangles or composition rules. What I didn’t expect was how often students would ask me questions I had no good answer to, things like “How do I actually get clients?” or “Why do I feel so stuck even though my photos are getting better?” Those aren’t technical questions. They’re business and mindset questions, and most photography education just skips right past them.