Just do it

“One should really use the camera as though tomorrow you'd be stricken blind.”

Those few powerful words from Dorothea Lange should strike all photographers like an unexpected electric shock - that is how they affected me the first time I read them.

We never know what the future holds in store for us, or whether it will be something wonderful or something dreadful. All we can do is do what we do in the present moment, right now, today. All we can do is live and photograph in the now, which when you really think about it is not a bad thing - it is a gift.

Get your camera and go. Make that image that you have been thinking about making, or the image that you want to try to make. Get your camera and just go. Go out on the street. Walk around to see what you can see. Make the unplanned, unexpected images that pop up when you aren’t looking for them. Life happens. Photographs happen, whether you are there with your camera or not. Don’t miss out.

For photographers, it is so unbelievably simple - it just comes down to this:

Photograph.

Every.

Day.

Don’t put it off. Do it now - today. Do it every day. Even if you make just five or ten images. Even if it’s just one subject. Even if you have to do it on your lunch break or on the way to your car after work. That is how you get better as a photographer.

Just do it.