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The Terrible Creative is a storytelling podcast for photographers, designers, and creative professionals working through the parts of the creative process no gear review or business course ever covers.
Each episode is 30 to 40 minutes. Solo. Story-driven. Built around mental health, artistic identity, and what honest work costs in a career rewarding performance over truth.
This is not a photography podcast about cameras, presets, or client strategy. This is a podcast about the inner experience of being a creative professional, made for the mid-career photographer or designer who has mastered the technical side but lost the thread.
Hosted by Patrick Fore, commercial photographer, author, and former lead photographer and brand designer for Taylor Guitars. His work has appeared globally for clients like Nike, Petco, and Verizon. He built this show because none of the podcasts he found addressed the real problem.
If you are a photographer or creative professional who feels competent on the outside and quietly lost on the inside, you are a Terrible Creative. This is your podcast.
Episode 26: Pub Meditations
Some days the world feels too loud, too endless. You don’t need another podcast. Or a sermon. Or another five-step process. You need a pint, a clean hit of honesty, something small enough to pocket but heavy enough to last.
One of my favorite podcasts is The Daily Stoic, by Ryan Holiday. It’s fucking fantastic. Before I found it, “stoic” to me meant the people I knew who never smiled, never laughed, who thought flat-lining your personality made you deep.
[SFX: fade in Ryan Holiday’s voice, ~15 seconds: “Marcus Aurelius didn’t write for us. He wrote for himself. To remind himself how to live, to stay calm in chaos.”]
That voice — calm, steady, grounded — it hooked me. Stoicism wasn’t what I thought. It wasn’t about being emotionless. It was about surviving chaos with your humanity intact.
People hear the word "meditation" and picture incense and perfect posture. That's not this.
The Stoics weren’t monks sitting on mountaintops. They were people running empires, writing plays, leading armies — people knee-deep in the chaos of everyday life, trying to hold onto some sanity. Marcus Aurelius wasn’t a guru; he was the emperor of Rome, journaling at night to remind himself not to be an asshole in the morning. Seneca wasn’t a saint; he was an advisor to emperors, a playwright, and, like most of us, a hypocrite half the time.
They wrote “meditations” not as polished books for other people, but as private notes for themselves. Seneca once said, “We suffer more in imagination than in reality.” Marcus wrote, “Ask yourself at every moment: is this necessary?” These weren’t meant to be profound quotes for coffee mugs. They were desperate reminders scratched into notebooks: stay calm, stay clear, don’t let the noise eat you alive.
Why should you care about the Stoics? Because their world wasn’t so different from ours. Crowded. Chaotic. Political dumpster fires. The tools they used to survive two thousand years ago, well, they still work today: keep it short, keep it sharp, keep it honest.
And that’s what I want to try here. Not tips. Not theory. Just a line you can carry, the way Marcus carried his notebook through Rome.
That's the spirit of this episode. Not float away, but get anchored you know. Not tips and tricks but clarity and courage.
[SFX: Chair scrape, bartender pulls a tap; the room feels closer]
And part of why I’m doing this is because of what’s coming: Pub Notes.
I’ve wanted a newsletter for months but I kept overthinking it. So I did what most of us do when we’re unsure—I tried to look impressive. I wrote long. I stacked paragraphs because they felt important.
But in full honesty? I wouldn’t even read my own newsletter. Not because it was bad, but because it was long enough to earn the death sentence of “I’ll read it later.” Which always means never.
I’m my own toughest audience. And I’m picky as hell.
So I asked the only question that mattered: What would I actually read on a Wednesday? Not skim. Not save for later. Actually read.
The answer was simple: something short enough to finish in one sitting, and sharp enough to stick with me for a day or two. Not a lecture. Not filler. Just one idea worth carrying.
That’s Pub Notes. Short. Sharp. Insider. For the people who want the back table after the front porch clears out. No velvet rope. Just a circle of us, talking like humans who make things for a living and can’t afford to waste time pretending.
[SFX: Room tone dips under; gentle instrumental bed begins]
So tonight is the proof of concept. Six meditations pulled from the episodes that hit hardest this since I started the podcast back in April—the ones that got the most downloads, the highest completion rates, the most DMs saying "I needed to hear this."
If the podcast is the front porch—open door, long form, everyone welcome—Pub Notes is the back table. Dimmer light. Fewer words. Sharper edges.
[Beat.]
Alright. Pint on the table. Pen on the napkin. We'll start where most of us don't give ourselves credit—the fact that you're still standing at all.
Intro
I’m Patrick Fore. This is The Terrible Photographer Podcast—honest conversations about creativity, identity, and finding your voice. Today’s episode is number 26: “Pub Meditations”.
Act I: Why You're Still Standing
Meditation 1: Still Here
[Music: Slow, grounding, atmospheric - sparse piano with space between notes]
The first miracle isn’t that you made something great. The first miracle is that you’re still here at all. Still paying rent. Still pressing the shutter. Still dragging yourself into one more room to try again. Survival isn’t sexy. It doesn’t go in the portfolio. But it’s where the proof of life is hiding. In the fact that you kept going, even when it didn’t make sense.
"In the wild, trees need the wind. Without it, they were weak. Fragile. Pretty, but temporary."
That line came out of my mouth during the resilience episode, and I keep thinking about it. Because most of us want the bubble, not the storm.
Back in the 80s, scientists built Biosphere 2—a sealed glass dome in the Arizona desert. Inside, they created a perfect ecosystem. Rainforest. Ocean. Even trees. Perfect soil, pure water, endless controlled sunlight.
The trees grew fast. Beautiful. Towering. Then they started falling over. Snapping under their own weight.
They were missing wind.
In the wild, resistance forces roots deeper, bark thicker. Without pushback, trees look fine until they break. They need the storm to stand tall.
I can't shake that image because I spent years wanting the opposite. The project where nothing goes wrong. The client who pays on time. The season where my energy doesn't crater. I wanted the dome.
But when I look back, the times I grew weren't in the bubble. They were fighting the wind.
The commercial shoot that went sideways taught me to think on my feet. The client who pushed back on everything forced me to defend my vision. The year I almost quit photography? That's when I found my actual voice.
Resistance isn't proof you're failing. It's proof you're alive and growing stronger.
If you're still showing up—even by a thread—you're already doing something most people never manage. Reaching out to that client when your confidence is shot. Posting the frame that scares you. Scheduling the test shoot you could've skipped.
That's not weakness. That's training.
What wind are you fighting right now? And what if it isn't holding you back—what if it's the very thing making you strong enough to keep standing?
Line you carry: Every day you don't quit is another day the critics are wrong.
Meditation 2: Dim, Not Done
[Music: Reflective, quiet, low piano with gentle sustain]
"Behind a corporate building in East County San Diego, I crouched behind a dumpster, throwing up carne asada and calling it a workday."
That moment came up during the burnout conversation, and it's stuck with people because burnout doesn't always look like collapse. Sometimes it looks like competence.
You're answering emails. Delivering galleries. Nodding on Zoom calls while something in you flickers and fades.
When I worked at Taylor Guitars, my life looked great on paper. Beautiful instruments. Decent budgets. Clean lighting. But behind the curtain? I was underwater. Zoom calls in doctor's offices, answering Slack at midnight, giving everything and owning nothing.
The day I cracked wasn't a crisis. It was one photo my art director didn't like. I scrambled to fix it, stomach twisted, until I found myself behind that dumpster, heaving into the bushes.
That's when I quit. No plan. Just walked out.
And the fear I'd carried for years—that I couldn't survive without this job—lifted the second I let go.
Here's what I've learned since: burnout isn't the end. It's not a finish line. It's a dimmer switch. The spark isn't gone. It's just buried under everything you think you have to be.
Your body waves the white flag before you break. The numbness, the detachment, the feeling like you're performing your own life—that's not weakness. That's your nervous system trying to save you.
Where are you pretending you're fine when you're not? What part of your creative life has you running on empty but calling it professional?
Don't wait for the dumpster moment. The spark is still there.
Line you carry: Your dimmer switch isn't broken. Someone else has been controlling it.
Act II: The Fight Inside
Meditation 3: Your Brain Is the Biggest Dick
[Music: Sparse, unsettling piano - single notes with too much space]
Not all the battles are out there. Some of the worst ones are in your head. The voices telling you to shrink, to stay quiet, to disappear. The shadows you’ve spent years avoiding. Creativity isn’t just making something — it’s wrestling with the part of you that doesn’t want to be seen at all. The fight inside is quieter, but it cuts deeper.
"The next morning I opened the file… and it was good. My brain had lied to me. Again."
Three AM. I'm pixel-peeping a commercial headshot, zoomed to 400%, hunting flaws that don't exist. The client approved it six hours ago. I should be asleep. Instead, I'm performing surgery on a patient that's already healthy.
This came up during the inner critic episode because your brain is actively trying to sabotage your creative work. Not sometimes. Always. It's got one job—keep you alive—and in caveman days, standing out got you eaten by tigers.
So your brain treats every act of creative courage like mortal danger.
You post something different from your usual work? Brain says: "Everyone will think you're a fraud."
You pitch a project that excites you? Brain says: "They'll laugh. Play it safe."
You consider raising your rates? Brain says: "You'll lose every client. Price like you're desperate."
That voice isn't wisdom. It's not your artistic conscience keeping standards high. It's a primitive alarm system that can't tell the difference between a creative risk and a saber-toothed cat.
And here's the kicker: the more you succeed, the louder it gets. Because now you have something to lose.
I watched a photographer friend land Vogue—her dream client—then spend three days paralyzed, unable to shoot a single frame. Not because she couldn't do the work. Because her brain convinced her she'd already failed.
The critic in your head doesn't want better art. It wants you safe, quiet, invisible. It's not sharpening your work—it's dulling your edge.
When my brain starts its greatest-hits album of my failures, I interrupt: "Thanks for sharing. I'm going to keep working now." Not arguing—that feeds it. Acknowledging it exists, then moving like it doesn't matter.
What has your brain been whispering so long you've started believing it's true?
Line you carry: Your critic isn't truth. It's just your caveman brain afraid of tigers that don't exist.
Meditation 4: In The Shadows
[Music: Contemplative, slightly darker, building slowly]
"What kinds of images make your chest tighten? What moments do you avoid shooting—because they remind you of something you'd rather not feel?"
This question came from the shadow work episode—the one that made people uncomfortable in the best way. Because we don't just avoid difficult subjects. We avoid the parts of ourselves that might have to feel them.
I hate shooting events. Weddings, corporate parties, fundraisers. The moment I walk into those rooms, something in my chest knots. Everyone's laughing too loud, the lighting's bad, but what's worse is how it makes me feel: lonely, small, out of sync with the entire room.
I used to say I wasn't an event guy because I liked control. But that wasn't truth. Those rooms make me feel fifteen again—back at a party I shouldn't have come to, pretending to text someone so I don't look as out of place as I feel.
The smiles in those rooms trigger something closer to grief. Because I know what it's like to fake that kind of joy. To be surrounded by people and feel utterly alone.
That's shadow work. The creative choices we think are aesthetic are often emotional. We avoid shooting certain things not because they're beneath us, but because they make us feel something we can't control.
Jung said we all carry a shadow—every part of ourselves we've disowned because someone taught us it wasn't safe to show. You don't stop being you. You just stop showing the parts that could get you hurt.
But here's the twist: that shadow doesn't disappear. It shapes what we're willing to see, what we're willing to feel, what we're willing to shoot.
What emotion does your work consistently sidestep? What would you create if no one was watching?
Line you carry: The work you're afraid to want is usually the work that's actually yours.
Mid-Episode CTA
[Pub sound briefly swells, like the mic catching a nearby toast]
If one of these lines sticks with you, that’s what Pub Notes is every Wednesday. One meditation. One burning question. One reminder you’re not alone. Short, sharp, no filler. Link’s in the show notes. Pull up a chair.
Act III: Light in the Fire
Act III Introduction
Even in chaos, light sneaks back in. Sometimes it’s a flicker in the corner of the frame, sometimes it hits you straight in the chest when you least expect it. The world has always burned. But we keep making anyway. Because creating beauty in the middle of disaster isn’t denial — it’s defiance.
[Music: Cinematic, warm, building carefully]
"The first thing I felt wasn't pride. It was nausea. Like I'd been called on in class and realized I wasn't wearing pants."
The morning Apple Podcasts featured my show, that's exactly what happened. And this moment from the attention episode keeps resonating because nobody warns you: success doesn't evolve you—it mutates you.
Overnight, you go from making something honest to managing it. Every move becomes calculation. Do I post now? Do I pivot? Do I hashtag or look desperate?
You stop making. You start managing.
The artist becomes the marketing department for the artist. And something essential dies in the translation.
Here's what I've learned: the work that gets you seen is rarely the work you planned. It's the accident. The unscripted moment. The thing you almost didn't share because it felt too raw, too weird, too you.
And you can't reverse-engineer authenticity into a content strategy.
When attention finds you, the temptation is to optimize for more. To study what worked and repeat it. To become a factory for the thing that broke through.
But the light doesn't come back when you chase it. It finds you when you've stopped looking. When you return to the work for its own sake, not for what it might get you.
The featured episode was recorded in my garage at midnight, talking about something I'd never discussed publicly. No strategy. No plan. Just truth I couldn't keep buried.
What spark are you over-managing right now? What would happen if you let it breathe instead of optimizing it?
Line you carry: You don't chase light. It finds you when you stop performing and start making.
Meditation 6: We Work, Rome Burns
[Music: Expansive, hopeful, rising with purpose]
"That's the rhythm now. Manufacturing authentic enthusiasm while the floorboards of your life—or the whole damn world—are on fire."
One morning I drank the news like cheap vodka—DEA raids, politics burning—then flipped into charm mode for a yoga brand. That split-screen moment from the crisis episode captures something we all live with now.
Rome burning in one ear, color palettes in the other.
Maybe that's always been the job. People got married during World War II. Families had portraits taken during the Depression. Humanity keeps insisting on beauty, especially when the world feels fragile.
Creating while everything burns isn't denial. It's defiance. It's saying: the fire may rage, but I'm still going to make something beautiful out of the ashes.
The news will always be catastrophic. The world will always feel like it's ending somewhere. If you wait for stable times to make your art, you'll never make anything.
But here's what the crisis conversation revealed: your creativity isn't separate from the chaos. It's how you process it. How you transform it. How you find meaning in the wreckage.
The photographer documenting climate change. The musician writing songs about grief. The designer creating spaces that feel safe when nowhere feels safe.
That's not art despite the crisis. That's art because of it.
What beauty are you building as your protest against despair? What are you creating that says "not today" to the darkness?
Line you carry: The world has always burned. Beauty is how we resist.
Closing (Pub Atmosphere + Newsletter CTA)
[Sound: Pub room tone rising back—chairs scraping, distant laughter, the night winding down]
That's six meditations from the episodes that wouldn't let go. Six lines I couldn't leave behind.
Still here. Dim, not done. Critics that lie. Shadows that shape us. Light that finds its own way. Beauty as resistance.
If they landed, that's what Pub Notes will be every Wednesday. Shorter. Sharper. A pint in your inbox instead of a lecture. One meditation, one burning question, one reminder you're not alone in this work.
If the podcast is the front porch—open door, everyone welcome—Pub Notes is the back table. Smaller circle. Dimmer light. A little more honest about what it costs to make things that matter.
Pull up a chair at terriblephotographer.com.
Until next time—stay grounded. Stay human. And yeah... stay terrible.