Latest / The MOOD Podcast / Before You Improve Your Photography, Read Yourself First - Moments of Mood, 3.3

Transcript

Before You Improve Your Photography, Read Yourself First - Moments of Mood, 3.3 · The MOOD Podcast

• 0:00
  Matt Jacob: There's no self-development without self-awareness.
• 0:03
  Matt Jacob: You can read as many books as you like, but if you can't read yourself, then you'll never learn a thing.
• 0:10
  Matt Jacob: The problem is, most of us are not aware of this truth or believe it at all, or have any idea how to actually do it.
• 0:19
  Matt Jacob: Well, in this video, I'm going to talk about how I managed to do it myself.
• 0:32
  Matt Jacob: Recently, I spent a few days at a silent retreat, just an hour from home here in Bali.
• 0:38
  Matt Jacob: No talking, no devices, just space and time unfolding without interruption.
• 0:43
  Matt Jacob: My mind opened up to a lot of writing, mindfulness, and reading.
• 0:48
  Matt Jacob: And I wrote most of what you're hearing now on paper, as I do most days, because it's one of the ways I stay connected to my own mind.
• 0:57
  Matt Jacob: Writing by hand just feels slower, more honest, and far less performative than maybe typing ever does.
• 1:06
  Matt Jacob: Silence is like a drug for me.
• 1:08
  Matt Jacob: That's a paradox in itself, which I guess I'll come back to.
• 1:11
  Matt Jacob: But the quiet there wasn't unsettling when it arrived.
• 1:15
  Matt Jacob: And when I arrived at the retreat, it was euphoric almost immediately, so like a pressure being released.
• 1:21
  Matt Jacob: And then as the hours passed, the silence revealed this kind of texture: birds moving through the trees, insects humming steadily in the background, rain arriving and leaving again, and even farmers somewhere nearby beginning their work.
• 1:37
  Matt Jacob: The quiet wasn't empty at all.
• 1:40
  Matt Jacob: It was full, but it was precise.
• 1:43
  Matt Jacob: The main reason I'm an early riser most days is so I have a few hours each day in peace and quiet before the rest of this island and my household wakes up.
• 1:53
  Matt Jacob: As I sat there in the middle of these rice fields, though, at the retreat, and in the middle of nature without a machine in sight, it felt far removed from what now dominates much of Bali.
• 2:05
  Matt Jacob: Traffic, construction, noise, movement.
• 2:08
  Matt Jacob: It's a place in constant negotiation with itself.
• 2:11
  Matt Jacob: Ironic, given the history and heritage of why Bali is, well, Bali.
• 2:17
  Matt Jacob: Habituating myself within that culture and lifestyle has made the paradox difficult to ignore.
• 2:23
  Matt Jacob: It reminded me how easily we confuse what is closest to us with what is actually true.
• 2:29
  Matt Jacob: We identify with our immediate environment, our routines, our feats, our obligations.
• 2:36
  Matt Jacob: And slowly that narrow band of experience becomes our entire reality.
• 2:41
  Matt Jacob: Everything else still exists, but it no longer registers.
• 2:44
  Matt Jacob: Not because it has vanished, but because our attention has moved elsewhere.
• 2:50
  Matt Jacob: Now, I didn't go to this retreat to fix anything.
• 2:54
  Matt Jacob: I'm fortunate to have lived through harder seasons before.
• 2:57
  Matt Jacob: And this chapter feels steady and generative rather than about recovery.
• 3:02
  Matt Jacob: I'm also not trying to perform some version of retreat culture.
• 3:07
  Matt Jacob: I've been away on these things a few times.
• 3:09
  Matt Jacob: And here in Bali, I've seen how quickly healing can drift into something aesthetic, transactional, and quietly performative, even.
• 3:19
  Matt Jacob: Silence and solitude for me have never been about escape or renunciation.
• 3:25
  Matt Jacob: They are about facilitating a quickly accessible conduit to connect and be mindful.
• 3:31
  Matt Jacob: They allow me to notice that I'm thinking while I'm thinking, to feel what my body is doing as it does it, and to experience emotion without immediately having to analyze or improve on it.
• 3:45
  Matt Jacob: It's a permission slip to meditate, write, daydream, and rest.
• 3:52
  Matt Jacob: A way of meeting myself before the noise of daily life rushes back in and begins to speak louder than everything and anything else.
• 4:01
  Matt Jacob: If you're enjoying this conversation and if you're drawn to this kind of slow reflective discussions we have on this podcast, then I want to let you know about my free closed community book club, which might be something that you genuinely find value in.
• 4:16
  Matt Jacob: The Voice Alchemy Book Club is kind of an extension of these types of conversations.
• 4:23
  Matt Jacob: Each month we focus on one of three types of work a book, a photo book, or a photo critique.
• 4:30
  Matt Jacob: And we meet online to sit with it properly, asking ourselves what it's meant to one another, what we can maybe learn from it, what ideas and actions we can take from it, what it's wrestling with, and what it asks of us as viewers and creators are.
• 4:47
  Matt Jacob: It's a space for deeper introspection, long-form thinking, and really honest discussions around photography, creativity, and authorship.
• 4:58
  Matt Jacob: There's no pressure to perform at all, no chasing trends, no algorithms, no need to have everything figured out, just an honest, authentic connection with fellow like-minded creators, careful, collaborative looking, thoughtful and meaningful conversation, and a community of people who care about staying with the work long enough for it to mean something.
• 5:21
  Matt Jacob: So if this episode and this podcast generally resonates with you, which I hope it does, the book club is a natural place to continue that way of thinking and actually participate for free with others that will be open and welcoming to you and your ideas.
• 5:38
  Matt Jacob: You'll find more details via the link in the show notes, and I really hope to see you there.
• 5:46
  Matt Jacob: When devices, responsibilities, and endless task lists become the dominant forces in daily life, something subtle really begins to erode.
• 5:57
  Matt Jacob: It isn't focus or motivation, it's traction.
• 6:01
  Matt Jacob: We stay busy, often convincingly so, yet feel strangely unmoored from ourselves, as though all the movement isn't quite taking us anywhere at all meaningful.
• 6:12
  Matt Jacob: Much of what we label as progress can quietly pull us off course, especially when it disguises itself as work or learning or self-improvement.
• 6:24
  Matt Jacob: These forms of distraction are the hardest to see because they look sensible and they look productive and even virtuous.
• 6:32
  Matt Jacob: But in silence, those disguises tend not to hold up for very long.
• 6:37
  Matt Jacob: Without anything external to react against, attention turns inward on its own.
• 6:44
  Matt Jacob: Thoughts surface that have been running around quietly in the background.
• 6:49
  Matt Jacob: Sensations in the body become more legible.
• 6:52
  Matt Jacob: Patterns repeat themselves, sometimes gently, and sometimes uncomfortably.
• 6:58
  Matt Jacob: This isn't about chasing calm or transcendence or enlightenment.
• 7:03
  Matt Jacob: For me, it's about clarity.
• 7:05
  Matt Jacob: Awareness doesn't flatter or reassure.
• 7:08
  Matt Jacob: It simply reveals what is already there and already present.
• 7:11
  Matt Jacob: I've come to think that this is where self-awareness actually begins.
• 7:15
  Matt Jacob: Not in insight, theory, books, or the accumulation of ideas, but in the willingness to notice what the mind keeps reaching for, what it avoids, and what it clings to when given the space and ability to do so.
• 7:30
  Matt Jacob: You know the biggest problem with a disguise?
• 7:33
  Matt Jacob: However hard you try, it always becomes a self-portrait.
• 7:38
  Matt Jacob: I see this repeatedly in our book club sessions.
• 7:41
  Matt Jacob: We might begin by talking about, I don't know, framing, technique, editing, sequencing.
• 7:48
  Matt Jacob: But before long, the conversation drifts towards something a lot deeper.
• 7:53
  Matt Jacob: What keeps returning in someone's images?
• 7:56
  Matt Jacob: What feels charged?
• 7:58
  Matt Jacob: What is being revealed often unintentionally?
• 8:02
  Matt Jacob: Now, you may be asking, what does this have to do with photography?
• 8:06
  Matt Jacob: Well, most photographers don't set out to expose their fears, longings, aversions, or obsessions, yet they do.
• 8:12
  Matt Jacob: Photography has an uncanny way of functioning as a mirror long before we are ready to recognize ourselves in it.
• 8:20
  Matt Jacob: Patterns repeat, themes persist, certain visual decisions always keep resurfacing.
• 8:27
  Matt Jacob: Not because they're trendy or fashionable, but because they are resonant.
• 8:31
  Matt Jacob: That gap between intuition and understanding is where both discomfort and growth tend to live.
• 8:40
  Matt Jacob: You can read endlessly about vision, style, or creativity, but without awareness or what governs your attention, those ideas rarely land where you think they will.
• 8:53
  Matt Jacob: Attention is not neutral, it is shaped by what we care about, what we fear, what we desire, and what we have learned to stay clear of and avoid.
• 9:04
  Matt Jacob: If those forces remain unconscious, they don't disappear.
• 9:08
  Matt Jacob: They simply guide the work from behind the scenes while we tell ourselves we are choosing freely.
• 9:14
  Matt Jacob: And this is why this distinction between distraction and traction matters so much.
• 9:22
  Matt Jacob: Let me explain.
• 9:23
  Matt Jacob: Because distraction is the opposite of traction, right?
• 9:26
  Matt Jacob: And traction is from the Latin root trahir, meaning to pull.
• 9:31
  Matt Jacob: So to be distracted is literally to be pulled away from momentum or direction.
• 9:37
  Matt Jacob: Traction is any action that draws us toward what we say we value.
• 9:42
  Matt Jacob: So distraction is any action, no matter how productive it might appear on the surface, that quietly pulls a or pulls us away from that path.
• 9:51
  Matt Jacob: And many of the most dangerous distractions wear this costume of growth and progress.
• 9:57
  Matt Jacob: They look like learning, planning, refining, doing, researching.
• 10:02
  Matt Jacob: They look like self-development or development generically.
• 10:06
  Matt Jacob: But without awareness, they can quietly take you further from yourself while convincing that you're moving forward and that you're improving.
• 10:15
  Matt Jacob: Now, I hesitate to frame this as advice, of course, because what I'm describing isn't a strategy so much as more of a shift in relationship.
• 10:25
  Matt Jacob: For me, meditation, uh, at least the rational form of the practice, is not a belief system or an aesthetic.
• 10:33
  Matt Jacob: It's an empirical tool that can be applied to actual daily life.
• 10:37
  Matt Jacob: It trains the capacity to observe thoughts, emotions, bodily sensations, and impulses as they arise without immediately identifying with them or acting upon them.
• 10:48
  Matt Jacob: Over time, this changes the relationship you have with your own mind.
• 10:54
  Matt Jacob: You begin to notice really what actually governs your attention rather than what you think should matter.
• 11:02
  Matt Jacob: And the noticing is what makes self-awareness possible.
• 11:07
  Matt Jacob: Now, the beauty of meditation is that it is not confined to a cushion or a quiet room or a retreat.
• 11:15
  Matt Jacob: Just sitting in stillness can be powerful, but the point is not posture, the point is mindfulness.
• 11:21
  Matt Jacob: And that can be practiced anywhere, in meetings, while walking, while exercising, with your camera, in conversation.
• 11:30
  Matt Jacob: And downstream of that mindfulness comes things that matter far more in daily life: presence, sustained attention, emotional regulation, relief from unnecessary suffering, and at times, a quiet, unforced sense of happiness.
• 11:44
  Matt Jacob: Meditation didn't make me a better photographer by giving me ideas, aesthetics, style, or confidence.
• 11:52
  Matt Jacob: I believe it made me better by helping me understand myself more clearly and what I really care about.
• 11:59
  Matt Jacob: By sitting regularly with my own mind, I began to recognize patterns shaping my creative output, patterns of attraction, patterns of avoidance, restlessness, and control that had been there all along.
• 12:13
  Matt Jacob: Through meditation, I learned to stay with discomfort rather than immediately trying to resolve it.
• 12:20
  Matt Jacob: And that translated directly into my photography.
• 12:25
  Matt Jacob: I became more present with what was in front of me.
• 12:29
  Matt Jacob: I became less eager to impose this fabricated meaning, more willing to let images emerge from sustained attention rather than urgency.
• 12:39
  Matt Jacob: This didn't require withdrawing from life at all or abandoning ambition.
• 12:43
  Matt Jacob: Quite the opposite.
• 12:44
  Matt Jacob: My life is still full of projects, responsibilities, goals, and pressures.
• 12:48
  Matt Jacob: I'm not interested in renouncing those things at all.
• 12:52
  Matt Jacob: Done consciously, those pursuits can be sources of great meaning and joy.
• 12:57
  Matt Jacob: But what changed was the way I relate to them.
• 13:01
  Matt Jacob: Seeing clearly when ambition tips into rapacity, softens its grip, the work stops being about proving something and starts becoming a way of exploring what genuinely matters.
• 13:14
  Matt Jacob: At some point, this inevitably turns back toward you.
• 13:18
  Matt Jacob: If you create in any form, you've likely seen certain themes, moods, or questions appearing again and again in your work.
• 13:27
  Matt Jacob: It's tempting to retreat those repetitions as flaws or stagnation, but they are often invitations.
• 13:33
  Matt Jacob: They point towards something completely unresolved, something asking to be deeply understood rather than escaped.
• 13:43
  Matt Jacob: Much of what we call growth is just simply movement.
• 13:47
  Matt Jacob: More information, more effort, more activity layered on top.
• 13:52
  Matt Jacob: None of that, of course, is inherently wrong, but without self-awareness, it can really quietly pull you further away from what you care about most and what from your inner individuality is.
• 14:04
  Matt Jacob: You become busy without traction, productive without direction.
• 14:09
  Matt Jacob: Meditation offers no final state to reach, but what it offers is the ability to stay present long enough to recognize yourself in your own patterns and to respond with intention rather than habit.
• 14:22
  Matt Jacob: When you know what you really care about, truly and not conceptually, your art and your photography begins to organize itself differently.
• 14:32
  Matt Jacob: Direction feels earned rather than imposed.
• 14:35
  Matt Jacob: The work becomes more coherent, not because you are trying to be original, but because you are no longer distracted from yourself.
• 14:44
  Matt Jacob: There is no destination here.
• 14:47
  Matt Jacob: No final version of you that is complete.
• 14:51
  Matt Jacob: There is only the ongoing practice of paying attention.
• 14:55
  Matt Jacob: If there is commitment worth making as a human and as an artist, it is learning to read yourself with the same care you bring to everything else.
• 15:06
  Matt Jacob: Because without that, no amount of learning will ever quite land where it should.
• 15:12
  Matt Jacob: Happy shooting.
• 15:36
  Matt Jacob: That's the spirit behind my Voice Alchemy Book Club.
• 15:40
  Matt Jacob: It's a monthly space where photographers and creatives alike come together to sit with meaningful work.
• 15:48
  Matt Jacob: Photo books, books, essays, and long-form projects and talk honestly about what they're seeing, feeling, and trying to make themselves.
• 15:59
  Matt Jacob: It's quiet, it's thoughtful and intentionally human.
• 16:03
  Matt Jacob: There's no pressure to perform, no need to have answers.
• 16:07
  Matt Jacob: We're all just figuring it out.
• 16:08
  Matt Jacob: It's just time and space to reconnect with others, your work and your thinking.
• 16:13
  Matt Jacob: So if that sounds like something you would benefit from, you can find more information via the link in the notes and the description below.
• 16:22
  Matt Jacob: Hope to see you there.