Photography has been the center of my life for the past 15 years. I am not the most knowledgeable or the most skillful photographer but I do know a thing or two about it. In the course of my career, I was lucky enough to be invited into a trusted circle of the editorial team at iStock and later on join Getty Images during their acquisition. At that time, it was all sunshine and roses, the community was great, the gig was awesome and overall feeling was very optimistic.  

I am not going to go into details but the short story is that with time all of that has changed and slowly but surely things started to get very toxic. I could feel the change was in the air but I was hopeful that it’s just a short-term bump, it will pass, things will get better. 

Well, things did not get better. Today I received a very cold and formal email stating that my Contract is being Terminated. Yes, after 10 years of working full-time I am being told that my services are no longer required. That’s it nothing else, just a few orders on how I should remove all traces of my involvement and participation in the inspection team. So just like that, I am jobless and a bit confused.  

What’s next?

I strongly believe that when one door closes another one always opens. There is so much potential for growth and monetization online that my head is starting to spin just thinking about all the possibilities. Of course this is a very scary time and I literally don’t know how I am going to provide food and shelter for my family but I am feeling very optimistic. Since I doubt anyone will read this post I will make a promise to myself here. I WILL MAKE THIS WORK – I will be stronger from this experience, I will evaluate my priorities and I will become a much better version of myself – which will hopefully lead me to become much more successful. No excuses!

If anybody does read this post, I would be very interested to know if you ever had to deal with very tough life situations and how you came out of it. The burden of providing for your family is heavy but a burden of having a job that you hate is even heavier – therefore I will put all of my energy and efforts into finding something I am good at and I love doing and I will be the best of the best in doing it. 

My philosophy

I have to say that even though I was super-efficient at what I did, I reached a limiting factor and I stagnated as an individual. I wasn’t learning anything new and thus wasn’t making any improvements. I believe that the moment you stop learning and improving yourself, you start degrading and slowly slide into mediocrity. I am actually really glad to get such a slap in the face and a reality check. I could’ve done this job for another 10 years and found myself fat, boring and mediocre in my 40s. That would have been the real fail. It’s time to break some eggs and find out what my true potential is and I will do my best to document my journey here on steemit. In the meantime, expect me to post a lot more of my photography and other stuff I find interesting.