Chapter Three. The Ladder

Too often in life, we climb the ladder of success only to get to the top and realize that the ladder is leaning against the wrong tree (to paraphrase Thomas Merton). Or worse, it isn’t leaning against anything at all.

This book is about finding the right ladder and getting to the top. I’m a photographer by trade, but this book isn’t limited to that. It’s about creating your best work whatever you do. As you’ll discover, The Creative Fight isn’t for a select few. At its core, the fight is about living life to the fullest degree. And the best way to achieve this goal isn’t simply fighting harder, but fighting in the right way. Too often we climb the ladder without looking up. It’s not just the effort we expend but the work itself that makes the journey worthwhile. As Theodore Roosevelt said, “Far and away the best prize that life has to offer is the chance to work hard at work worth doing.” The challenge is to discover what the work is.

I’m a backyard beekeeper, and my friend Tony and I have climbed many ladders in pursuit of catching a swarm so that we can establish a hive. The best time of day to do this is at night, when the bees are huddled together in a clump. Usually a swarm will consist of tens of thousands of bees. When dealing with something like that, preparation and patience are key. Without a ladder, catching a swarm would be a lost cause. With the wrong ladder, like the time we used a rickety old piece of junk, things can really go wrong. Accidentally losing your step and knocking into a clump of twenty thousand bees makes quite a buzz.

Sometimes we climb ladders to reach for our dreams. Other times we climb to see what’s on the other side of the wall. Too often we choose a ladder simply because it’s nearby. Yet the closest and easiest ladder may not be the best one to climb.

You may be halfway up the wrong ladder right now. Or maybe your mistake is something else. The most common blunder is to use a ladder that is too short. To make a short ladder taller, we ignore the “Do not stand on the top step” warning and step up—that’s how ladder fatalities happen every year. Or maybe your ladder isn’t resting on even ground. Or you might be climbing a ladder that leads to a swarm of angry bees. Or your ladder might be leaning against a dead-end wall. Regardless, this book is about how we can find the right ladder and climb all the way up. It’s never enough to imagine and dream. This may help you find the ladder, but you still have to make the climb.

Let’s revisit the idea of success. It bothers me that the business world has hijacked this term. Success isn’t just power and wealth. And it isn’t bigger, better, and more. Success isn’t a house and it isn’t a car. Corporate America has got it wrong. Worse are websites like successories.com, which promote a diluted form of success with their traditional motivational kitsch. On the website, you can buy motivational clichés on posters or a sleek geometric Plexiglas trophy that reads, “Success is reaching the highest peak then exceeding above it.” When you think about it, that doesn’t even really make sense. Are you supposed to climb to the top of Mount Everest and then take a rocket ship into outer space?

Yvon Chouinard, the famous mountaineer, put it best: “How you climb a mountain is more important than reaching the top.” Success isn’t planting your flag at the top of a peak. It’s embracing the challenge and enjoying the view. Success isn’t only external results but an internal reward. Chouinard said, “We do not climb mountains to get to the top. We climb mountains so that we can be changed.” Chouinard’s idea provides us with a different way to approach success. This shift in focus has saved my career.

I was ten thousand hours and ten years into my career when I hit the wall. I was a “successful” photographer and was gaining momentum in my craft. I taught at a prestigious photography school, spoke at conferences, and had written a few photography books. Yet I felt disconnected and dull. My career seemed great from the outside, but I was feeling trapped. So I took some time off and started to reflect.

The way the world defines success doesn’t work. It’s time we take this term back. Success is more than a list of accomplishments and it’s definitely more than stuff. Success is leading a fulfilling life, spending time with family, and connecting with friends. To be successful we have to fight, but we have to fight in the right way. Success isn’t just calling attention to yourself. David McCullough, a junior high English teacher, said it well: “Climb the mountain so you can see the world, not so the world can see you.” The biggest success isn’t just about you, but about accomplishing dreams and inspiring others to do the same. True success is a reciprocal force.

To be fair, the business world doesn’t have it completely wrong. Successful business can be a huge force for good. The real problem is whether or not we let something or someone else define what we should define ourselves. Achieving success is less about blame and more about taking a stand. It’s a really difficult term to define. So most of us default to the definition that is trending at the time. That’s where I went wrong. That’s where we all go wrong. The way we experience success evolves and changes throughout life, so it’s easy to get it wrong. What might have been success five years ago isn’t success today.