It’s October 8th, 2019, in cold but cozy Stockholm. I’m about to do something that scares me. I’m about to speak in front of 300 talented photographers, about a subject close to my heart: the importance of self-care as an entrepreneur as well as a human being. I walk up the stage, nerves rush through my body. But, within minutes I feel at ease. This is my crowd. These are my people. And my message is important. The 40-50 minutes go by in a wink and I feel really good during and afterward. I did it. Whether you were there at Way up North or not, I thought it would be good to open up about my feelings before, during and after my speech. Also, I wanted to share my talk with you. Keep in mind, that these are intended to be spoken words. Imagine me, in front of you, telling you the following:

*Also, keep in mind that the theme of this conference for photographers was ‘Fuck it’ – therefore, you’ll find those words in there quite a few times, where I normally wouldn’t use those in public 😉 – or at all really.

Get Selfish

Dear friends. Hello there. Some eight years ago, on the verge of graduating from High School, I was at the crossroads where so many youngsters find themselves. Heart pounding. Knees trembling. A bit like today on this stage, really. The urge to choose a course of study was killing me. I struggled. Big time. Because unlike others, whom I sometimes envied, I did not have a clue about what I wanted to do in life. Zero ideas of what truly made me happy, besides that slice of pizza on a regular night out. 

At one point, amidst this struggle, I engaged in a conversation with the dean of our school, who advised me to go over some universities and consider studies like law, psychology or anything related to research. You see, I was this smart kid, in the classic sense of the word. At High School I took on subjects like Latin, Greek and Economics and so, according to the dean, it was up to me to further pursue “greatness” on an academic level. Oh… and he also made it abundantly clear that it would be a TOTAL waste of my time to focus on anything more creative in life. 

Hmm. Looking back on the eighteen-year-old teen I was, I know I should have said Fuck It, right? Well maybe not in those exact words, but at least I should have come to that conclusion. But I didn’t. At that point, I did not know myself like I know myself now. So I let myself believe that I had to follow the path that so many others had walked before me. I honestly thought I just had to find a ‘real’ job, in the grown-up world and then that would be it. Looking back on the eighteen-year-old kid I was, I realize nobody taught me how to dream big and follow my inner voice, heart, and intuition. 

Nobody told me that I could set my own rules. Nobody stood by me with some good advice on how to create the life that I wanted and imagined. When I look at this crowd here today, I am fully aware that you guys are nothing like the ignorant eighteen-year-old I was. I realize that this crowd does know how to dream big. I mean, you guys flew ‘Way Up North’, no?

But still, still I wish to talk to you today about the all-powerful force that drives you in creating the life you want, at every stage of it. As a naive young adult, I chose the solid thing to do I started law studies. One year into my law studies, I picked up photography … as a hobby. I shall not tell you today about the ins and outs and highs and lows of those difficult first days as an adult, but what you do need to know is that photography saved me. Photography kept me sane and well-balanced. Through photography, I met people who pursued their art, as well as their dreams. I met people who just delighted in creating a life around the things they loved to do. I met my people. Slowly but surely, the dean’s so-called wisdom got erased from my mind. Slowly but surely, I allowed myself to believe that I too, could live life, actually loving what I do. 

FUCK IT – this is me

I said: fuck it. I dropped out of law school without a degree and started my photography career. Fast-forwarding to today, it has been six years. Six years filled with personal development, business development and loads of steps out of my comfort zone. Up until the steps I took onto this stage today.

So here I go: I am Raisa Zwart. An introvert Dutch woman, who has been walking around this planet for a mere 27 years. I photograph weddings, and I am specialized in intimate weddings and elopement. I absolutely love my boyfriend Erik and our cat Vino. I do editorials & portraits and I work around the globe. Correction: I just need to fly out, as being abroad is a source of oxygen. Traveling, yoga, CrossFit have become a way of life. Oh, and I spend as much time as I can at the beach. Sand between my toes is my life-long favorite. 

That is… besides coaching other photographers and creatives. Some three years ago, my business partner Elsa and I started a second business, which is called The Confetti Collective, a coaching platform for entrepreneurs that has given me loads of joy, a sense of fulfillment as well as freedom. Dear friends, to – be – fair, the theme of this edition of Way up North intimidated me. You see, I am not a very outspoken person, I am far from loud, and I never use the words FUCK IT. 

But at the same time, it struck me that I do like to create my own set of rules. I quit law school, pursuing adventure. I live life to the fullest. And I love to inspire people in making their very own choices in business. Teaching them to be a bit more selfish. And then I realized that to me, being a bit more selfish is exactly the same thing as saying Fuck It. 

FUCK IT – this is us 

I want to talk with you guys about being selfish in business. And why it is crucial to be selfish. Why it is necessary to look in the mirror and protect what you see. 

I believe that you can and should build the business that you want and that truly fits your life and the way you want to live it. Your business should respond to all your personal needs and not the other way around. You must get selfish so you can help others. Your clients, your colleagues, your loved ones. And I am convinced that if you are not selfish enough, burn-out will lurk around the corner, lie in wait. (trust me I’ve seen it) You will grow tired of being an entrepreneur. You will even grow tired of photography. By not being selfish, not respecting personal boundaries,  you will simply turn miserable and unhappy.  And let’s be honest, that’s an image none of us desires to shoot. 

We are all here because we have a shared passion for photography, and photographing weddings in particular. Yet, sadly enough I speak to so many of you who have chosen this job because of their passion and desire for freedom, but who are definitely not living the life they had in mind. You are held back by the rules the industry dictates, regulations society imposes, trapped by the expectations of those who surround you. Too often, I meet people like me, like you, who just no longer enjoy photography as much as they did before. You complain about clients,  you’re stressed, and just not truly happy.

Question : 

A few questions, no need to raise hands, just think about this: 

• Who of you guys could relate to feeling drained sometimes?
• Cut loose from the things that matter most? 
• Living with the results of other people’s thinking? 
• Being dead tired at one point? 

 

FUCK IT – we are not just photographers, we are artists

Today, we will look at your own businesses, objectively. To identify your needs, your desires, and the actions you will have to take in order to grow. I will provide you guys with stories, assignments and just stuff to think about. So if you have anything you would like to change in your business, if there is any room for growth, if you want a sustainable, healthy business that you feel happy in, stick with me.

As I always like to make things practical, I have created five key tools that will help you, in being more selfish, so you can take better care of yourself, your business and therefore your clients and the people around you.

 

 

Tool 1: define whether you are naturally more drawn to feed the artist you are or the entrepreneur

… that we also need to be. And think about how you want the balance between those two to be.  I think lots of us stepped into this industry as an artist. I know I did. With the artistry, I mean that initial passion for photography that we all have. 

Entering the business, I guess you all learned quite quickly that just being an artist does not cut it. You had to learn how to market yourself and educate yourself to be an entrepreneur as well.  You got into things like branding, marketing, administrative hassles, and financial goals. Even if those things do not always make you smile broadly. However, I am convinced that you need to be both. 

The artist who isn’t an entrepreneur will have a hard time making a living out of it. And on the other hand, the photographer who ignores the artistic side will be left empty-handed and unfulfilled.   

So  please work with me.  Make a decision right now: are you naturally more drawn to feed your needs as an artist?  Or as an entrepreneur?

Made up your mind?

Just so you know… At the end of my first year as a wedding photographer, I discovered my interest in entrepreneurship and marketing. Which was a really good thing because it allowed my business to grow quite quickly. Within 2 years, I was able to photograph fulltime, make a living out of it and was shooting destination weddings as I wanted. I was checking off goal after goal from my list and even started helping other photographers do the same. But, after four years I noticed I wasn’t having as much fun as before. Which felt kind of weird and maybe a bit ungrateful since a lot of photographers wished for the things I had accomplished. And I didn’t feel like wedding photography was something I could go on with for many years to come. Besides that, I was working far too hard, there were simply no standstills. No free time for family and friends.  Not time for me. 

All this resulted in a breaking point a little more than a year ago. I was overworked, unhappy with my photography and business, and kind of lost, AGAIN. I had some honest conversations with friends and family. I emailed clients and told them in all honesty that they would need to wait longer for me to deliver… and finally, … I DID cut back on my working hours. I DID start thinking about how I had gotten to this miserable point. And I think a big part of it was, me not realizing I had zero selfishness in me. I realized I had to develop myself as an artist. It wasn’t that my photos weren’t beautiful: I still love the work that I shot the last couple of years. But I wouldn’t take the time to create personal projects, experiments, and it turned out, I was only working for clients,  working too hard for them,  and draining myself creatively.  

What I want you to do with this? I think when realizing that there is such a balance is the first important step. The second would be to see how you feel about it, and the third, take action if needed. 

 

SO if you are naturally more of an artist but feel like you could feed the entrepreneur a bit more: 

• Do a workshop on business, find a coach, get into a mastermind group with other entrepreneurs (try to find one that has not only photographers in it) and set yearly business goals for yourself.

 

FEED THE ENTREPRENEUR!

And if you’re more the entrepreneur and want to grow as an artist: 

• Create more personal work,  maybe even on a weekly basis. 
• Find inspiration in other areas like paintings, music, poems, movies, whatever you can get your hands on.  
• And set creative goals for yourself on a yearly basis.  

 

FEED THE ARTIST!

Get selfish.  And be enough of both.

 

Tool nr 2: Create time and space to get clear on your needs.

The world is full of noise right? And you are definitely all juggling a lot of things all at the same time. Nevertheless, you might think that you of all people know what you truly want. Knowing what you want and finding out what serves you, means taking time to explore. Taking time to look in the mirror;

There is no other option than to make time to get clear on your needs. Cherish tools to create time and space like:

• Talking. Talk a lot. Have good conversations with loved ones and colleagues on what drives you as an artist or what you need as an entrepreneur. 
• Just do nothing for a while, have a coffee in the morning and think about the day to come, instead of scrolling through Instagram. 
• Practice sports and clear your head from racing. 
• Read, fill your head with stories 
• Hike, watch the world, camera aside.
• Practise yoga, breathe in breathe out.

And yes, I can hear all of you think: “sorry lady, but I barely have enough time to sleep, I do not have time to single out all of my needs”. 

Fine, (well, actually not) but let me tell you that as long as your mind stays unclear and unfocused, it will have a negative impact on your surroundings. Creating time for your own needs is not a luxury, it is a necessity. It is a necessity for you as an artist,  for you as an entrepreneur,  for you as a human being. You will need to create time and space to get clear on your needs. And I will say it again, and again, and again: get selfish.

 

Step 3:  Find out which rules are holding you back

Look at this room! We are different. Introverted, extraverted. Single, married, divorced, some of you have this big family, others like to travel the world while yet others like to stay close to home. 

There are so many variables in that same room, and yet: most of us are actually leading our business in the same way. Making small changes here and there, and branding ourselves differently, but still doing a lot of things the exact same way.  Like:

• Photographing crazy long days in order to capture the whole story 
• Editing series of hundreds of photos ourselves
• But also staying in a certain price range, safe and sound 
• Working way more than 40 hours 
• Shooting weddings each and every damn Saturday 

Wherefore though? Who is to say you cannot be a part-time photographer and still rock those weddings as a pro? For myself, moving from 30 weddings a year to a maximum of ten came with personal insecurities about my brand and professionalism, but looking at the results, I can say that the quantity of weddings has nothing to do with the strength of a brand. 

Whilst I also admire those of us that break the rules on the other side of the spectrum and shoot as many weddings as the year has weekends. Who’s to say you cannot deliver a wedding within the week and close tabs on that one. Who set the rule that you have to meet clients before you shoot them? I do know some of us opt to be surprised when meeting their couple on the morning of their wedding. Who set the rule that we all need to shoot a 12 hour marathon on a regular Saturday? Why wouldn’t it be an option to specialize on Friday weddings and keep more weekends free? What’s with the standard price range – please push boundaries. And why wouldn’t you be able to start another company or income stream? Dare to diversify yourself. As a photographer, you know damn well how many angles there are to take an image. 

Take time to think about the rules that hold you back. Get selfish. Think about the regulations society imposes. Think about the expectations that are killing you. 

Because like Picasso said:  

“Learn the rules like a pro, so you can break them like an artist”

And with that in mind, we move onto the stepping stone of

 

Tool 4:  Break the rules that don’t serve you.

Want to work 40 hours?  Nice. 30, 20? Also good! 10? You do you. 

Tools that will help you break rules (and grow your company) are: 

• Outsource the things you don’t like doing. So you will have more time for the things that do make you happy.  Don’t like editing and sitting behind your computer for two days straight on? Then please take control and decide to no longer do it. Editing can be outsourced. Really. Want to be with your family in the evenings instead of having client meetings? Schedule quick Skype calls and meet during the day. People also take hours off work to go to the dentist right? They can do so for you as well. 
• Don’t lose valuable energy on the need to be out there on social media, plan your social media a week ahead in 2 hours a week instead of 1 hour a day. Be selfish in terms of your own time.
• You could create multiple streams of income within one or multiple companies. 
• And you could find ways to make some (more) passive income to create more time.

For me, launching online courses and licensing my travel photography for webshops in fine art prints, delivered much-needed income as well as free time for me, as an artist AND an entrepreneur. I now enjoy every wedding to the fullest, and once again I can give clients my all.  

Breaking the rules can look entirely different as well. For example, I really liked how Rosie Hardy, who spoke at Way up North in Cannes, told about how she takes photoshop requests from couples, where most of us wouldn’t. How José Villa decided to stick with film in a time where everyone else transferred to digital cameras. Just because you’ve made the choice to be a wedding photographer, it doesn’t mean you have to stick with it if it makes you unhappy in any way. You have so much talent and are able to explore multiple things if that serves you better. Dare to break the rules. Please get selfish.

 

Tool 5: Strategize & dare to take chances

Alright, the final one ! 

Setting goals and strategizing has always helped me get to where I wanted to be. Quite quickly a lot of the times. And I’m absolutely not the only one that has benefited from strategizing. May it blow your mind that research shows that by writing down your goals and speaking about them with others, you gain a 43% more chance of actually reaching them. It seems insane, right?  

So if we talk about breaking rules, creating the business and life you wish for,  and finding the time, strategizing is a big part of that as well. So please get selfish about your goals, write them down and talk them through. Just trust me on this one, you don’t have to change your business overnight if you don’t want to. You can work towards your own goals, step by step.  Whilst we are at it: please don’t be afraid to take chances and make changes. Just because something made sense at one point, doesn’t mean you have to keep doing it. You can learn new things.  And even better: challenging yourself will keep things interesting.

“I am always doing what I can not do, in order to learn how to do it.” – Van Gogh 

 

GET SELFISH – build a better world

Dear friends. I am no longer 18 years old.  And a lot less ignorant. I have no clue whether schools still have deans and my knowledge of Latin and Greek has slowly disappeared.  And I am no longer lost.  Instead, I mastered the courage to walk onto this stage because I have a purpose. My business has a purpose. 

The past couple of years, the gains as well as the losses have taught me to be selfish. Taught me to be better. First and foremost to be better to me. To be better for those around me. And even better so, I own and lead a business that makes a difference. That gives back to the community. Six years into this business I find myself at a point where I can be proud to say that I do invest in changing the world.  At least for a bit.

Since a month, I, as an entrepreneur have been giving something back. Not just for me or not just for those around me. For each client I get, whether it is for a wedding, an editorial or a portrait series, I plant two trees through a Dutch company which is called ‘Trees for all’. They plant one tree in the Netherlands, where I live, and one tree in Costa Rica, a country that I absolutely love. They plant trees to grow into healthy forests, that are homes to animals, and that help balance our carbon footprint. A cause dear to me, even if I could understand some of you rolling their eyes right now.

The thing is, the only way I can continue to help grow these trees is if I sustain my business, based on me taking care of myself first and foremost. I think this is a perfect example of how being selfish can mean so much more than you think.

You too can identify what you want to change in the world and how you can make it happen. Use your reach, your voice, your money or time to create a change or support the people that are changing things.  

Dear friends.

Taking care of yourself, and being selfish is crucial. Period. 

And so I would like to keep you guys accountable. Please write down the very first step you are going to take to get selfish. Don’t think: I’ll do it later. Write it down right now. What’s the one thing you would really like to take away from this story? In what way will you take better care of yourself? Cause you see: being selfish is not selfish. Or let me rephrase it, it’s not negatively selfish as the word is mostly used. It’s the same like they say on airplanes about the oxygen masks: help yourself before assisting others.

Taking care of yourself means you can grow a healthy business. Identifying your needs, strategizing efficiently, breaking the rules that hold you back, balancing out the artist and entrepreneur that you are, will all help you take better care of yourself. And therefore also your clients. It will help you make the right choices, even if those choices are not the expected ones. Getting selfish will ensure you keep enjoying photography or other things you want to do in your life. Personal growth = business growth. And being selfish will help you take better care of your loved ones, it could even help you take better care of the world.  

Thank you guys.