Creative Envy and What to do About it
Reading time: 10 minutes
If you’re anything like me you spend a long long time trying to improve at photography to the point you feel like you’re getting somewhere with your work, then you flick through Instagram, or YouTube, a photography book or whatever and you see someone else’s work that seems achievable but is better than yours (in your mind) or in some cases their work seems to be nowhere near as good as yours yet they have a huge following and notoriety - it seems they have more success and it just gets under your skin and it ends up bringing on a bad mood.
Most often I enjoy finding new photographers and creatives to admire, I love looking at amazing street photographs, but sometimes I feel envious. I want what that person has, their perceived recognition, their skill, their proximity to the city I want to live in. I want to make work like theirs but I don’t feel like I can and it just makes me feel awful. It’s hard to admit I feel this way, it’s an ugly emotion, but there you go.
Street photography is such a powerful and positive force in my life but there always comes a time where I want to push my creativity, improve and then occasionally I’ll see the work of someone I perceive to be ahead of me, then my stupid ape brain kicks in and makes me feel envious rather than appreciative of what I already have. At best it gives me motivation to go out and make more work and at worst it makes me get under my bed covers and put the Devil Wears Prada on TV.
It’s envy. It happens to pretty much everyone but sometimes it can really get me down. Over time however, I’ve come up with some ways to make it less damaging to my spirit. I thought if it happens to me sometimes you might struggle with creative envy too, so that’s what this article is all about: what creative envy is, why it happens and what to do about it.
(It’s important to note I am not a medical professional or a scientist - I’m just a guy with a camera. This article is what has worked for me and some techniques I use to overcome feelings of creative envy or a feeling of ‘falling behind’)
What is Envy?
I think many of us use jealousy and envy interchangeably but they are different. Jealousy is a fear of having something taken away from you and envy is a desire to have something that someone else has that you do not. We all experience envy; Sally in the office bragging about their upcoming trip to Dubai, your friend buying a brand new shiny car, seeing someone walk down the street with an ice cream (though that one is easily overcome by buying an ice cream). What we’re talking about in this article however is creative envy, and some of us might experience this, or similar feelings, often and not even really know what it is or what to do about it. Creative envy can come in many forms from coveting someone else’s creative eye, their perceived success, editing style, social media following - the list goes on. So what do we do about it when we feel this way?
Why You Are Feeling Envious
Once upon a time humans needed envy. If you saw someone else get what they wanted and you wanted it too, it meant you might have the drive to get it yourself, namely more food, shelter, a mate etc. If you didn’t care then, well, that might just have been the end of your life.
These days the only kinda good thing that can potentially come out of envy is inspiration and drive to get out and do your own thing but most of the time it’s nothing but a negative thing to have in our lives. Having said that it’s a totally normal feeling and everyone, even the people you look up to, have it from time to time. I think it can help a bit sometimes just to know that. Even the greats of art have struggled with creative envy. For some it meant making the best work of their lives, and for others it meant their demise.
Ultimately why you are feeling envious is something you need to ask yourself - that’s the first step to overcoming it. You need to try and understand how and why you are feeling the way you do, acknowledge it, appreciate how you feel and sit with it for a bit but not too long. Think about why you might feel like this. Is it low self esteem? Are you too harsh on yourself or do you actually need to get better at your craft? Are there things you can work on yourself to stop having these feelings and would it be a good idea to talk about it with a professional? Once you have an idea of the cause of why you feel creative envy the better placed you are to cope with it.
Get Your Feelings Out
It can help to sit down and write a list or a journal or speak to a friend or partner, just to get your thoughts out of your head as to why you feel this way. It’s important to get it out and just understand you’re entitled to feel this way too. They are your feelings, there’s nothing wrong with that at all and realising and understanding a bit about why you feel a certain way but also getting those thoughts out of your head and not letting it stew in your mind can really go a long way to combating that emotion and getting you back on track.
Seek Feedback
Often I find my creative envy stems from seeing others’ work and feeling mine is not good enough, will never be good enough and I should just quit. Who am I to give advice to people to improve thier own street photography when I can’t even improve mine. That’s where feedback comes in, show a trusted friend your work, ideally someone creative too, and ask for their honest feedback. Where can you improve, what do you need to work on. Often you’ll find that actually your work is quite good already, you’re just being too harsh a critic.
It gets easier the sooner you understand that the reception you get (or don’t get) when you share your work online is not a reflection of how great your work is at all - you can’t let an algorithm define your self worth or creative ability. Of course its as double-edged sword because we want our work to be seen and we want to be good at our craft but if all of your artistic self worth comes from what other people think of your work, this will lead to disaster in the long run.
Be Wary of Comparison
I’m sure you’re familiar with the famous quote of Theodore Roosevelt: “Comparison is the thief of joy”. It’s so true but it’s also natural. We imitate our parents as kids and the other children we grow up around, that’s how we learn, share ideas and grow.
In this day and age of social media and the Internet however it can be all to easy to compare yourself to others. Just remember that even when it looks like things are going well for others, you have no real way of knowing their experiences or trials. Whatever they show of themselves on social media is heavily curated, and their audience follows them because they show up and put in the work, so you need to stop comparing as much as you can. I’m not going to patronise you and say delete social media, just try to look at it less, turn your phone off when you go out on a shoot maybe. The less you can compare yourself to others in a negative way and the more you can compare yourself to your old self and see how far you have actually come, the better off you’ll be in the long run.
What to do About Creative Envy
Here are some things that have worked for me in the past when trying to overcome feelings of creative envy and being left behind.
Spend less time on social media: I’ve mentioned it already but I’ll say it again, get off social media as much as possible to stop comparing yourself to others - it’s the paradox of wanting to share your work and for people to like it, so you need to use social media for that to happen I get it, especially if you have a business to maintain or an audience to grow. However overuse of social media can be detrimental to our mental health especially when we slip into to comparing ourselves to others, so schedule your posts, limit your time on the apps and try to get out into the real world and not dwell on other people’s progress. They are going to keep making and posting work and you can’t do anything about that, why should you, they are entitled to create just as much as you. Just understand you can only control what you do with your time.
Understanding your limits: Understand there are always going to be people ‘better’ than you, for example Lebron James, the famous American basketball player, has to consistently hear that people think Michael Jordan is better than him. Even someone at the top of their game goes through feelings of envy for sure. It’s very refreshing when you realise this, there will always be people better than you and it’s not a competition - this is so freeing once you understand it.
Stop looking at their work: If you find someone’s work triggering for you, they are better or they have a bigger audience and get more attention, stop looking at their work. Sure that’s easier said than done but try looking at other work instead. Look at the greats of your craft, we know deep down we can never compete with them, so it can give you inspiration rather than envy.
Support them: If someone has made something amazing which you’ve had this emotional reaction to, support them - you’ll be amazed at how much that can help you feel less envious. Give their posts some likes, tell them how much you love their work. It will make you feel better. Maybe even reach out to them, talk to them, ask them how they do what they do and try and learn from them and their work.
Talk it though with someone: We’ve covered this above already.
Try something else: Try a different activity for a bit or have a break. Read, look at other genres of art, exercise, work on yourself another way and try to feel gratitude for what you have that isn’t the pursuit of your creative work, this can often give a proper sense of perspective. Or just take a break, cut yourself off from it all for a bit and then come back fresh and ready to go.
Look through your own work: Look at old photos and see how far you’ve come - my guess is it’s a long way already. Appreciate that you have something different and worthy to make for the world and if you’re a beginner go out and make new work, there is no substitute for that.
Go your own way: So you can’t be like someone else, you’ve come to terms with that. Good, they are them you are you. We don’t need a clone of someone else in the world. You might not be achieving what you want just yet but if you keep plugging away then you will get there eventually, you’ll find something new to focus on and you may even find if you keep doing that, keep putting in the work you might outgrow your feeling of envy to the person you were envious about in the first place and be content with the direction you’re going in.
Make a plan: Set goals and make a plan for yourself. If you want to grow on social media then you need a strategy, so research how to do it (I have no idea so can’t help you there) and then commit to trying to grow for a long period of time. If you want to feel part of a community, reach out to people, join a workshop or a local photography club. Book on to a workshop to grow your skills, reach out to a friend to go on a shoot with, join forums, photo clubs, schedule yourself photography time and stick to it so you’re always out there making new work and giving yourself the best chance to improve.
What’s Next?
Creative envy can often come about when we’ve had a confidence knock, or when we compare ourselves to others, or when we put our work out there just to get a negative reaction or no reaction at all. This is likely to occur sometimes in your creative journey, unless you have perfect mental health but lets face it, how many of us have that? The key is to work on things like this, and know that it’s not a linear process, you don’t work on it then start feeling better and never feel envy again - it’s not something to be cured. Instead you have good days and bad days, make progress for weeks and months, but then take a slide backwards. That’s normal, you’re normal, you just have to keep going.
One of the best ways to get over creative envy is to shut out the noise and go out and make new work. Sometimes though it can be hard to know where to start or what to even photograph but that’s where this article comes in.
