Behinder

When I was at my most impressionable age, there was a fad among upper-middle-class women of my mother's age for needlepoint. My mother was decidedly not a knitting/sewing kind of person. Some of her friends were unabashedly upper class—one family had a very elegant separate house on their property for their full-time servants. Yet for a while they all needlepointed. In the boutiques of the quaint little towns where we summered, needlepoint supplies were common in the gewgaw/fripperies shops, and needlepoint pillows were displayed in some of the windows. My mother successfully completed one very nice small needlepoint pillow (now lost, sorry to say) along with several unfinished starts.

Many of these needlepoint projects took the form of samplers, and I still remember some of the homilies I saw then, writ in needlepoint—"Too Soon Old, Too Late Smart"; "So Many Books, So Little Time," "My Favorite Thing to Make for Dinner is Reservations," "Too Much of a Good Thing Is Wonderful," "The Hurrier I Go the Behinder I Get," and so on.

That last one stings a bit. I am getting behinder as I go hurrier, and I don't like the feeling. With every day that passes I seem to fall a little further back. Yesterday we'd had four wet days in a row and the day broke sunny. I knew I could do nothing but get cranking on the grass, which was perilously close to being out of control.

I feel like I have too much to do. Writing TOP; moderating comments; writing for the magazine (I have a deadline on the 24th); working on my book; housework, which is in a state similar to the way the grass was yesterday; laundry; cooking (which, when you're trying to eat plants, consumes a surprising amount of time, and ditto for the shopping); feeding and exercising and paying attention to the dog; yard work; all my obligations for my 12-step program; exercise; reading; correspondence; research. And, where I live, driving. Up here, everywhere is a drive from everywhere else. Plus all the little quotidian details of running a life, from sorting mail to medical appointments to selling stuff on eBay. I seldom get out photographing.

And I don't even have kids! Or a commute. How do people get it all done? Who has time? I didn't even play pool much yesterday, which is the best indicator of how badly I needed to get to the yard.

Warren and Steve know everything
A pithy quote from Warren Buffet made the rounds a few years ago. I found it on Yahoo Finance, Inc.com, Forbes, Money.com, and so on. "The difference between successful people and really successful people," he (allegedly) said, "is that really successful people say no to almost everything."

Since it appeared all over the Internet, I think we can assume that Abe Lincoln, Albert Einstein, and Shakespeare are all nodding their heads in agreement too.

The double whammy, though, to drive the point home, was that Steve Jobs (allegedly) agreed. "People think focus means saying yes to the thing you've got to focus on. But that’s not what it means at all. It means saying no to the hundred other good ideas that there are. You have to pick carefully."

Oh, well then. If they both said it, then it must be one of the Big Secrets of success, and (not coincidentally at all) wealth. (Everyone wants the secret to wealth.)

"Notice that Buffett said almost everything," explains Forbes, helpfully. "What he is speaking to is our ability to master decision-making and time management. He says we must choose, with intention, what we say yes to and what we say no to. It all comes down to simplifying, prioritizing, and focusing our attention on what matters most."

Well, that's nice work if you can get it. But no one else is going to do my dishes or my laundry. If I say no things get ugly fast. One of the most pressing tasks I need to get to? Making a list of all the pressing tasks I need to get to.

I have 1.89 acres, and if I say no to yardwork it sure gets away from me in a hurry, this time of year. I'm happy to report that I got a lot done yesterday—finished cutting the whole yard, did a lot of raking and mulching, cut some brush, pumped up the tire of the wheelbarrow, cleaned up around the mailboxes, got the two-gallon fuel container for the lawnmowers topped up with ethanol-free gas (ten dollars for two gallons!!), even swept out the shed. I was a goin' fool. And so far, no consequences either (I have to be careful of my back).

As a bonus, the pileated woodpecker let me see him. He was inspecting a number of fallen logs on the hillside, investigating with his powerful beak. He let me walk to within 40 feet or so, hopping around in plain view (him, not me). Then he took off and flew to the backside of a tree. They almost always stay on the backsides of trees from humans; if you look very diligently for a long time at the spot where you know they are, you will eventually see them peeking around the edge of the tree to check up on what you are doing. But once they see you, they nip back into hiding.

Yes!
I do think the Buffet/Jobs admonition makes sense for photographers. Successful photographers either decide what they want to do or determine what they're best at, and then say no to everything else. We used to refer to it in art school as our "personal work." You might do everything, but there was one specific kind of thing you really said Yes to, and you gave that one thing your all, whatever else you did. The way I used to put this was to say "never have one wedding photograph in your portfolio." What that meant was: either specialize in wedding photography or don't do it at all. You're not going to sell a potential wedding client with only one sample shot in your book.

Of course, for AdAms (advanced amateurs), hobbyists, and enthusiasts, the opposite is the case. We happily say yes to whatever we feel like doing. An AdAm seldom meets a picture opportunity he doesn't like. And if you're like me, you take a lot of pictures that aren't even pictures; we pretend there's a picture there because it's fun to go through the motions. It's Yes at all times. Shoot it first and sort it out later. Ralph Steiner once published a book called In Spite of Everything, Yes. And if our work ends up as a motley of different styles and subjects, well then, "It's About Process, Not Results." (I did two weddings in my life, and both were very successful projects.)

Because that's the thing about needlepoint-worthy homilies: For every pithy saying, there's an opposite pithy saying. There's "The Love of Money Is the Root of All Evil," but there's also "Money Makes the World Go Around." There's "Clothes Make the Man," but also "You Can't Judge a Book by its Cover." "Birds of a Feather Flock Together," but "Opposites Attract." I'm not saying they all have the same truth value, of course—for the most part, opposites don't attract. All I'm saying is that you can make the needlepoint pillow say anything you want it to say.

So anyway, saying Yes! to pictures you know you shouldn't take might not be the road to success, but if it's more fun, then, you know, "Follow Your Bliss."

Mike

Another thing I really have to do is pick a new Book o' the Week

B&H Photo is Where It's At

Original contents copyright 2020 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

(To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below.)
Featured Comments from:

Keith Cartmell: "Ordinary people sometimes remark how a famous person they happened to meet was so focused on them. They have that luxury because they have staff that will catch their eye and murmur some polite variation of 'your next appointment is in X minutes.' These staff often take care of all the pesky details relating to a particular task so the famous person can concentrate on just the task. Plus, in the crass commercial sense, they can pay someone to take care of the tasks they don't want to do, like several items on your list."

Mike replies: A long time ago, Oprah had an expert on cleanliness on her show. He claimed that the average person cleans and changes their bedsheets just four times a year (which I still find shocking). He detailed a long litany of the microscopic critters, creatures and germies that live in dirty bedsheets, and urgently recommended laundering them at minimum every two weeks, with once a week being much better. But when Oprah mused that she thought fresh sheets every two days was best, the expert dismissed it with a wave of his hand, saying, "real people can't do that." Oprah's feelings were hurt!

Grant: "TOP is to blame for my 'behinderness.' Do you realize how many hours were lost to watching the snooker links? Then I had to spend hours trying to understand the complexities of a game called 'Go.' If TOP is going to go off topic, could it please be about food? That causes my eyes to glaze over and I get up from the computer and go and do something important.  :-)  My needlepoint would say, 'Try, Try and Say No to TOP.'"

Mike replies: How about you just say no to TOP LINKS? That way I won't have to add "go find a job" to my to-do list!

Grant replies: "If you flip my 'Try, Try and Say No to TOP' needlepoint over, you will discover that the back is adorned with, 'Resistance Is Futile.' Now, spend some time researching that quote!"

Mike replies: I did, and here's what internet says: "'Resistance is futile' was the trademark statement of the Borg, an amalgamated race of biomechanical beings determined to assimilate every group of humans it encountered. If the targeted population refused to be assimilated, they were simply destroyed and the Borg moved on to its next target."

Jeff1000: "'Simplify, simplify, simplify!' —Thoreau"

Comments

[Ray Hunter]

Concerning book of the week, I mention Geoff Dyer's two volumes of essays concerning photo: The Ongoing Moment and the more recent See/Saw. I realize that essays aren't everyone's cup of tea, but they are each good, IMHO.

R Hunter

[Benjamin Marks]

I'm going to play the contrarian here: For most humans, I will offer that it is the quality of their connections (social, familial, romantic) that actually determines their happiness. I would posit that mostly saying "yes" rather than "no" in those social and romantic contexts is really what determines success in those areas. Since most of us would not change places with Jobs or Buffet even for a moment (if we really thought about it), we shouldn't worry too much about their insights, however valid, on the matter.

To take things 90-degrees: My father was a painter at the end of his life, and yearned for recognition by other artists. But I often thought seriously about how lucky I was, as his son, that he was not, in fact, the next Picasso. The thing about genius is: it has to serve itself. And I mean "has to" in the "compelled/no other choice" sense, regardless of the other claims the world may have on it. Whether you want to call it narcissism or self-absorption, or by some other label: it sometimes leads to success, but often leaves a certain amount of wreckage in its wake. I am not arguing against the value of that genius, but I will be very cautious before I consciously try to emulate it.

Let me close by offering my own needlepoint aphorism: "The only wealth is time." And all his dollars didn't buy Jobs an extra minute of it.

[Ray Hunter]

Another potential book of "some" week might be Susan Meisalas' 2018 Mediations, a book that discusses her approach to documentary photography.

RH

[Peter Van Dyken]

What do Steve Jobs and Warren Buffet have to do with you? They are celebrated reps of a culture of madness. All that you wrote about yourself so generously is of your path and your necessity, adequate and soundly stated. I’m trying hard just to learn from the simple adage; “Where your focus goes your energy flows.” Success? Follow your heart.

[robert e]

I'm not vegan but I try to eat healthy and avoid processed and prepared foods, or at least keep them on the margins. And it's astonishing and dismaying to me how even that meager standard consumes my time, energy and/or money. Of course, this is an ancient problem--one that supposedly instigated and shaped civilizations, and destroyed some, and it's why we collectively tolerate a food industry that's in many respects evil or stupid, and the consequent health and social problems. I'm also not very good at it, as with many other basic life skills. But while I remain wary about projects like Soylent, I've about had it with the economics and logistics of traditional food, and would welcome a healthy and affordable *something* that can render that an option, or at least a more occasional requirement, and I hope people keep trying. Or, if I missed something, I welcome recommendations.

[ASW]

When my wife finished her PhD in International Relations with a focus on the role of women in conflict resolution (a field unsuprisingly dominated by old white men) my crafty sister presented her with a small needlepoint sampler that said "Carry yourself with the confidence of a mediocre white man." Pretty good advice for any woman entering academia or really any career in the US.

As far as getting your work done, I'm right there with you in progressively getting further behind. For all of my adult life I have longed for the single-minded focus of some of my peers, whereas I find myself moderately interested in almost everything (I'm the guy who admitted to reading every issue of the New Yorker cover-to-cover a few weeks ago). This makes me pretty good at couch Jeopardy and other games of trivia, but not really that successful at life. To admit my most painful failure, I did not finish my PhD in Evolutionary Biology because four years of fieldwork and labwork was my absolute limit and no matter how hard I flogged myself I could not find the motivation to buckle down for six months solely devoted to writing. So close and yet so painfully far away.

The best advice I have heard is to acknowledge that you can't do everything and then intentionally decide which tasks you will do less of. Still not easy when it feels like the tasks on your list are all essential (e.g., how are you going to choose between eating healthy, exercising, sleeping enough, or having a bit of relaxation each day), but it's a start.

[MikeR]

My kids are grown, my wife and I are both retired, and we've never been as busy as we are now. We also have 2+ acres, and the house, and a neglected raised bed vegetable garden that I've been trying to get to for about a month. In sum, your description of your life echoes ours.

Maybe first world problems? We're lucky that we have so much. Or, are we?

[Dave]

Mike,

Yep, you are pretty busy. But the necessary lawn work on the only recently nice day got you a column when added to some other thoughts, so that job wasn't a waste of time.

How do people get it all done?

Well, we're not doing all the writing and moderating and researching for a successful website -- plus writing a book.

Laundry? Easy. Run the washer and dryer. My only concern is pulling the clothes out of the dryer when done, so that they don't wrinkle. I learned a long time ago that half of the time, ironing clothes doesn't make them look better. Ironing is just too fussy, so I don't bother with it.

My 12-step program consisted of deciding not to drink anymore and then sticking to it. I was ready to quit cold turkey and that was that. No hourly meetings twice a week. More time to take photos!

I consider myself lucky that I'm not interested in cooking. (Nor eating, if that could be managed.) I try to spend as little time as possible in prepping the food before cooking. Shopping should be easy and quick if you know where the items are located in the store. Just dump 'em in the cart and get the heck out of the store. No "shelf shopping".

Spending an hour or two daily with the dog isn't too bad. Dogs give back of their time, so it's a win-win situation.

The comparisons with Jobs and Buffett, of course, pertain to work, but as part of their job, not the necessary house and yard work, etc. You'd need to hire a maid and a landscaper to handle the necessary indoor and outdoor work that you can do yourself. Sure, it takes time. But are you really going to pay someone else when you can do it? Only rich people or disabled people generally hire someone to do those simple tasks.

I got a kick out of this part to a reply: "But when Oprah mused that she thought fresh sheets every two days was best, the expert dismissed it with a wave of his hand, saying, "real people can't do that." Oprah's feelings were hurt!"

I hope you get some good advice on saving time.

[Mark Sampson]

Mike,
"Press on regardless".

[Kirk]

I bought a house on nearly 3/4th of an acre in Austin, Texas about 25 years ago. At the time my full time job was (and still is) commercial photography. Grass grows quick here and it grows all year long. The lawns, hedges, etc. don't get time off during the winter months. I had a choice, I could surrender whatever free time I might have from paying work to do my own lawn care. It would require also purchasing a lawn mower, a weed wacker, some gardening shears, safely storing gasoline, and maybe even buying and using one of those nasty gas-powered leaf blowers. I calculated my lost earning potential of doing my own lawn care and quickly found, through good recommendations, a one man lawn care company which I have now used for the last 25 years. I own no heavy yard machinery, I have time (three or four extra hours every other week) to do things I really want to do. I would suggest, since you mention lawn responsibilities more than once, using what you might have learned from Jobs, Buffett and other billionaires and outsourcing the droll and mindless tasks that can be done better and cheaper by other people. I can charge multiples more for my services than what I pay for yard services. It seems like a very simple business equation to me. When my wife and I both worked in the advertising business back in the 1980s our hours at work were insane. Since our agency billed our time at several hundred dollars per hour the idea of spending all weekend cleaning our condominium and running errands seemed downright foolish so we hired a cleaning service to come in once a week, on Fridays, so we could enjoy a nicely cleaned home on the weekends. The cost was very small considering the alternative of productive time lost doing the work ourselves. You might consider sitting down at the kitchen table and making a list of all the many things that you could eliminate from your plate by just doing some smart outsourcing. It's worked well for us over the last 36 years of domestic existence. Just a thought. Having a gardener or lawn care company means one fewer vector for back injuries....

[Dave]

That's a lot of yard to keep up for sure. If you're looking for alternatives, you might want to have a look at the work of the landscape designer Piet Oudolf.

I grew up with the 50's commitment to manicured lawns and yards but a recent presentation by a local gardener talked about the ongoing crisis with pollinators and how challenging current practices are to them. The other interesting topic covered was the rewilding efforts going on around the world, notably with the estates in Scotland and England.

So now I'm committed (to what extreme will likely be up to my wife). Perennial, native plants and grasses for the large part - low maintenance and bug friendly with mowed grass to a minimum. It might take a couple of years to get done but hopefully I can then spend less time working on it and more time enjoying it.

[Albert Smith]

"...and if I say no to yardwork it sure gets away from me in a hurry..."

In my town's newspaper there is a column written by one of the ever shrinking staff called "The Darwinian Gardener", which changed my life.

Things that live are suppose to live. Things that die were not meant to be. I don't try to create an unnatural environment by playing God over things humans can't control without way too much effort. I can't estimate how many hours of mindless, never complete work that this philosophy has given me back.

[Richard Tugwell]

Some things are obviously catching.... BBC recently published "How often should you change your bed sheets?"

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/newsbeat-61259074

[Tom Burke]

“Resistance is Futile”: there’s some evidence that the phrase was first used, at least in TV SF, in early Doctor Who episodes in the 1960s. Either by the Daleks, or the Cybermen, or both. One reference takes it back to 1963, but I can’t confirm it.

And apparently Douglas Adams used it in Hitchhiiker’s Guide to the Galaxy; it may have been spoken by a Vogon soldier, possibly when he was about to throw Ford Prefect and Arthur Dent out of the airlock. The first incarnation (instantiation?) of HHGttG was the radio series in 1978, and the phrase might have been used then. However, there is a connection between Adams and Doctor Who - before HHGttG he wrote scripts for Doctor Who, and would have been familiar with that programme, so he may well have known about the earlier usage of the phrase in Doctor Who.

[c.d.embrey]

Don't make "to do" lists--just do it then move on to your next task. Simple as that.

BTW scut work is a waste of time. Remember that time equals money and that writing can be more profitable than mowing lawns.

[Bear.]

If I may also quote from the late, great Douglas Adams: “I love deadlines. I love the whooshing sound they make as they fly by.”

[Moose]

Book of the Month (better than week):
Jay Maisel's Light Gesture Color

More good photos, photo advice, life wisdom, etc. than in a stack of others.

(AND, not one monochrome pic from the rear of a NY couple in winter coats and hats on an overcast day!)