One of the main reasons I moved from a small town to a big city was for the opportunities it would give me. I wanted to be on the streets, shooting every minute of every day. The reality has been very different. I just can’t stay of out of coffeehouses - I mean I’m sitting in one right now writing this very blog. The problem is I have become way too comfortable.
It’s become my routine to walk out of my apartment everyday and head straight to Bean, where I end up chatting to the staff and not getting any work done. I have now decided to stop going to Bean and to force myself to leave my iPad at home. Instead I will head out with nothing but my camera. I need to focus.
I cannot fathom the opportunities that I’m missing. There’s nothing wrong with stopping for a few minutes to have a rest and drink, it just needs to be minutes and NOT hours. Liverpool is massive, so I can’t have seen more than 5% of this incredible city and that has to change. I have to start to learn more about the city and its people. Cambridge and London I knew like the back of my hand, I knew which street to be in at a certain time of day and a certain time of year, I knew how the sunlight behaved in both cities. The problem is that I haven’t taken the time to learn those details about Liverpool. This is just one of those situations where I have to put in the foot work and focus.
I’m going to restrict myself to one day a week of sitting in a coffeehouse with my iPad to edit and write. The rest of the week will be spent walking the streets of Liverpool, armed with only my camera.
Hopefully, we’ll soon be moving into a new apartment in the city centre, closer to the bars and restaurants, which will leave me with no excuses for not sticking to this plan.
