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The Terrible Photographer is a storytelling podcast for photographers, designers, and creative humans trying to stay honest in a world that rewards pretending
So right now, it’s dark.
I’m alone in a garage at 2 a.m. on a Saturday.
The street outside is silent. Houses are dim. The only sound is the occasional airplane overhead, heading off to places I’ll never know.
In here, there’s just a desk lamp glowing above a pile of half-charged batteries—red indicator lights blinking like tiny distress signals.
The garage smells like laundry detergent and old wood. Mildewed two-by-fours soaked in decades of salt air.
Somewhere under all that, the scent of Piñon incense—the one I burn to help me focus.
Though lately, I’m not even sure what I’m trying to focus on.
There’s a whiteboard on the wall with a to-do list from nine months ago. A coffee mug with fossilized coffee welded to the bottom. A stack of empty Diet Coke cans. And the busted pieces of a laptop stand I shattered last week during one of those moments you don’t post about. One of those moments you’re a little too proud to call rage, and a little too ashamed to call anything else.
I’m sitting in this old brown leather chair I originally bought as a set prop—something to fill a frame. Now it’s just my desk chair. Cracked and worn. Still here. Like me.
A day after I recorded the last episode, I told myself I’d get to work. Shoot some spec, build momentum. So I cleaned the garage, sorted gear, charged everything I could charge. A ritual of readiness. But wanting to work and actually working—those are two different countries. And most days, I can’t find my passport.
There’s this feeling I can’t shake lately. Like I’m taking up space I don’t deserve. Like I walk into a room and nothing changes—not in the light, not in the air, not in anyone else’s mood. Not even my own.
There’s something about being awake in your workspace at 2:14 AM that strips everything down to its bare wires. No emails. No client demands. No algorithm whispering in your ear. Just you, your tools, and the question: now what?
People love to talk about breaking points. The clean cinematic moment when you fall apart—or rise again. But nobody tells you about this middle part. The ghost zone. When you’re not broken. Not healed. Just quietly reorganizing your shit in the dark, trying to remember what any of it was for.
My name is Patrick.
This is The Terrible Photographer Podcast.
You’re listening to Episode 16.
Titled, Angry.
(Play The National - Demons - at 2:00-3:28)
2. THE REACTION
So, some people messaged me after last week’s episode.
“Patrick, that was really dark.”
“That was depressing.”
And yeah… maybe it was.
But also, maybe it wasn’t.
Because at the core of Terrible Photographer, I never wanted this to feel like pop music. I wanted it to be more singer-songwriter—something with scars, something with weight.
But other times, it's fun as hell. Times when the money is good, the mountain tops when things are going right and when people give you standing ovations.
Great art is about both. The brutal honesty and beauty.
Truth and beauty.
Because this is all ridiculous, and hard, and weird, and crazy and fun and terrible all at the same time.
THE ANGER
The truth is, I'm angry. Really angry. The frustrating thing is I don't know who or what to be angry with. All I know is that energy is there. I know this because that metal laptop stand I smashed is still in pieces on the ground.
Sometimes I think I'm angry at the industry—the way it chews people up, the way it rewards mediocrity if it's packaged right, the way it makes you feel like you're never enough unless you're constantly performing your success on social media. Sometimes I think I'm angry at clients who ghost you after you deliver work, or who ask for "just one more revision" that turns into seventeen.
Sometimes I think I'm angry at myself—for the opportunities I didn't take, for the work I didn't push hard enough on, for the times I said yes when I should have said no, for the times I played it safe when I should have been braver. For still being here, in this garage, wondering if I'm good enough.
But mostly, I think I'm just angry at the gap—the space between what I know I'm capable of and where I actually am. Between the work I want to make and the work that pays the bills. Between the photographer I am in my head and the one who shows up when the pressure's on.
I keep hearing about 'healing your creative wounds' and 'finding your joy again.' Honestly, I've always found statements like that confusing at best and bullshit at worst. To me, you can't heal wounds—you can only learn to live with them. You have to embrace them as part of who you are. And you can't find joy. You can only be in a place where joy can come to you. Like a butterfly that randomly lands on your shoulder. You can't seek out the butterfly. You can only be in a space where the butterfly finds you.
But anger? Anger you can use. Anger has weight. Anger has momentum. Anger doesn't wait for permission or the right mood or perfect conditions. Anger just is, and it demands action.
For me, how I work is that I need to get to work—I know this anger, this energy is there, so I need something to do with it, or else it's going to eat me fucking alive. The anger doesn't want to be processed or understood or healed. It wants to be channeled. It wants to make something. Even if that something is ugly or imperfect or unmarketable. Maybe especially then.
4. THE TRAP
I also have to choose NOT to indulge myself in chasing mental habits down stories of self-despair. Sometimes I think I have a lust for thinking about the various injustices I've experienced in my life. That some sick, dark part of myself feels good thinking about and getting angry about the bad shit—not just my own failures, but failures from others. Times I was mistreated or taken advantage of.
But intellectually I know that's a trap. It's not productive. It's just indulging the most painful parts of my past. Like picking at a canker sore or ripping off a scab. Things that are equal parts painful and satisfying.
I need to shift this dark energy into productive energy. That's the only way I transition through this. I'm not even sure what that looks like. I don't have a plan. But I think the first step is understanding what's going on, naming it, and then deciding it won't help—you need to find an alternative path forward.
5. RESISTANCE AND FLOW
Last week I talked about The Flow—that state where everything clicks, where the work feels effortless, where hours pass like minutes. But I didn't talk much about what it takes to get there. About what you're fighting against to find it.
People talk about resistance like it's just creative block or fear of the blank page. But for me, resistance is bigger than that. It's resistance to commodification, to the algorithm, to the status quo. It's resistance to internal and external pressure to give up, to conform, to play it safe.
It's having the audacity and the stubborn courage to follow that internal pull that draws you into spaces that are unsafe and uncharted and unclear. To ignore practical advice to pursue something greater, something bigger. Resistance to that dark force that woos us with a schedule, a regular paycheck, safety.
Making stupid and reckless choices to pursue something you know you have to pursue, even though parts of yourself doubt, even though you don't know how you'll make it through the dark forests. There's a trusting of yourself and your talent. Knowing you have the ability to carry on, and that your job is to keep calm, put your head down, and put one foot in front of the other.
The flow—that's the space I have a choice to enter or not. A space where my soul and my hands and my head are aligned. The choice I've always had: laziness or complacency, or just do the fucking work.
For me, it often takes just one step into the room. Taking the camera out of the case, putting a battery in it, putting it on a tripod. Or turning on the computer and typing a word, then another word, then another—and before I know it, I've written pages and pages.
The flow is mysterious but powerful. It isn't bullshit. If I've gotten anywhere in my career, it's because of my ability to work longer and harder than others.
I often tell people I'm the laziest, hardworking person I know. I can work 24 hours straight on a project, doing something that would take others days or weeks, or I can be a lazy piece of shit scrolling Instagram for hours, watching dumb dog videos and rage-bait political content.
To me, it's always been a choice. Everything's a choice.
Do I resist or do I cower? Do I create or do I scroll? Do I indulge the darkest places of my soul, or do I choose to think about something else?
At some point, we all have to decide to move forward or shrink back.
6. THE DEPRESSION DISTINCTION
I know people in life who are stuck—have been stuck for years, most of their life—because the choice feels impossible. The magnetic pull toward despair and darkness is too strong.
And I'm NOT talking about depression. As someone who struggles with anxiety and depression, I know how that's different.
For me, that hum of depression is always there, like the sound of an old window air conditioner always in the background—it's there. Sometimes it gets louder, sometimes you can almost forget it, but it never really goes away. It colors everything. Makes simple choices feel weighted with lead. Makes getting out of bed an act of defiance.
The only way for me not to hear that hum and rattle is to drown it out with work, with fresh air, with the sound of my daughter laughing, with great art from movies and music. With the mechanical act of putting battery in camera, adjusting a light, framing a shot.
It doesn't always work, but sometimes it does. And sometimes is enough to keep going.
So when I talk about choice—resist or cower, create or scroll—I'm not pretending it's simple. I'm not saying depression is a choice or that you can just think your way out of mental illness. That's bullshit. That's the kind of toxic positivity that makes people feel worse about feeling bad.
But there's this other thing. This learned helplessness. This comfort in the familiar pain of being stuck. This seductive whisper that says "why bother trying when you'll probably fail anyway?" And that—that is a choice. Even when it doesn't feel like one.
The depression makes everything harder. Makes the resistance feel heavier, makes the flow harder to find. But it doesn't eliminate choice entirely. It just makes the choices smaller, more incremental. Maybe today the choice isn't between creating a masterpiece or scrolling Instagram. Maybe today the choice is between getting dressed or staying in pajamas. Between opening the laptop or leaving it closed. Between one small step or no step at all.
And that's okay. That's still movement. That's still resistance.
7. THE CHOICE
I've always been stubborn in that I can't give up. Even though I've always had this really dark, hidden desire to give up. I don't know if it's a curse or a blessing, but I've always felt like I was too smart to understand the implications of giving up. There's a cost to giving up, and it's really fucking expensive. It's cheaper and easier to keep going, to keep moving forward, even when everything in you just wants to sit in the corner and hide.
I think I knew I just had to power through. That I had a choice. I could use the time, space, gear, creativity, and experience that I have, or I can be a coward and not do it. I can sit on my hands and cower in fear and self-loathing, or I can do the fucking work.
To me, I did the work. Even though I didn't want to. Even though it's probably shitty. Even though it won't pay for groceries.
And here's what I discovered: the work doesn't have to be good to be meaningful. It doesn't have to solve everything to be worth doing. Sometimes the act of making something—anything—is the victory. Sometimes showing up is enough. Sometimes the choice to create instead of consume, to build instead of tear down, to move instead of stay stuck—sometimes that choice is everything.
You just got to do it. And when you do, something shifts. Not everything. But something.
8. CLOSE: Back to the Garage
So here I am, back in the garage with the broken laptop stand pieces and the nine-month-old todo list. The anger is still there. The depression hum is still humming. The gear is still mostly untouched. But I'm here. And I'm making something—something angry, something honest, something that gives the middle finger to despair.
And you know what? The garage feels different now. Not because anything major changed, but because I changed something small. I chose to be here. I chose to make something. I chose to trust that the work matters, even when I can't see why.
This isn't the comeback episode. This is the campfire moment. The one where we sit in the dark, a little less alone, and quietly start warming our hands again. No big speeches. Just a reminder: you're not broken. You're rebuilding. And sometimes the rebuild happens one small choice at a time, in a garage that smells like incense and laundry detergent, surrounded by the tools that are waiting for you to remember how to use them.
The butterfly might not land on your shoulder today. But you can still be in the space where it might find you tomorrow. And maybe, just maybe, that's enough to keep going. Maybe that's everything.
9. LightLeak
LightLeak:
Sometimes the bravest thing you can do is stay in the room.
Not fix it.
Not solve it.
Just stay.
Stay with the anger.
Stay with the quiet.
Stay with the version of you that doesn’t have answers yet.
Because showing up angry still counts as showing up.
And rebuilding doesn’t start with blueprints.
It starts with a cracked chair, an old to-do list, and a choice to try again anyway.
Let the world chase clarity.
You?
You can sit in the garage and make something honest.
That’s the work.
That’s the leak of light.
We’ll that's it for this week, I think I’ve given you enough to chew on.
Hey before I forget, I created something for you,
If you’ve been listening and thinking, “Damn, this creative thing is harder than anyone wants to admit”—you’re not alone.
I put together a free download called The Darkroom.
It’s short. It’s honest. It’s what I wish someone handed me the last time I wanted to throw in the towel.
You’ll get some encouragement, some tough love, and a few small steps that might help you find your way out of the creative fog.
You get it when you sign up for Field Notes, my email newsletter for people who care about making real work in an unreal world.
Just head to terriblephotographer.com, hit The Darkroom, and it’s yours.
Thanks for listening. Stay curious. Stay courageous. Stay terrible