Mica: [00:00:00] Welcome to the first episode of the New Year for the Savory Shot. Heyo. Y'all know me. I'm your host Mica, y'all. I hope you had an amazing New Year and that January was a month of reflection and new beginnings. Ya girl spent New Year's Eve drinking Mexican martinis, eating Whataburger and singing karaoke all not long.
Mica: I had a great time, but I tell you what, it feels so, so, so, so awesome to be back here with you. Before I begin the show, I wanna say thank you so freaking much for coming back and tuning in. Y'all, you could have been anywhere doing anything, but you came back here with me, so thank you for your time and attention.
Mica: Question, what's your stance on New Year's resolutions? Do you believe in them or do you think they're just a way [00:01:00] for people to set themselves up for failure? Personally, I'm a big supporter of New Year's resolutions. I am, y'all. Every year since 2017, I sat down and wrote down eight resolutions for the year. I don't accomplish them all, but I set them y'all.
Mica: I believe that writing down resolutions can be a useful tool for setting and achieving personal and professional goals. I like to think of my resolutions as my map for the year, my compass, my North Star, all those things. See, most people think resolutions are a big old waste of time, and you know what some of them are, but most resolutions if accomplished, enrich the hell out of your lives.
Mica: And that's what I wanna talk about in today's episode. Resolutions. But, before I get ahead of myself, let's start the [00:02:00] show.
Mica: So let me set the scene for y'all. It was December, 2016. I was out having dinner with my friend and the topic of New Year's resolutions came up. Now, back then y'all, I was so, so, so, so, so, anti resolutions. I thought they were a [00:03:00] waste of time and every time I made a resolution, I'd quit in like two months and y'all, who needs that energy out there?
Mica: Right? Like, fuck that. I was like, I already feel bad about myself. I don't need to feel even shittier at the end of the year. Uhh no thanks. You can keep that energy. But my friend y'all, she was all about the resolutions. She was like, hold on, Mica let me plead my case. And then she introduced me to the Smart Goal Method, which stands for specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, time bound. Now, if you've worked in corporate before, then you know all about the smart goal method. This ain't new to you , but for the ones who don't know what the smart goal method is, basically it's creating an actionable goal that you can measure, break it down [00:04:00] into smaller steps, and add a deadline to.
Mica: For example, let's say you wanna read more books. Here's your goal. I want 'em to read more books. Okay. Like where do you go from there? How do you start that? It's just, it's just very vague, very cloudy. And of course you're gonna fail. But if you turn it into an actionable goal, like, I wanna read two books a month for 2023.
Mica: Now that's better. But back to my friend. My friend tells me about smart goals and she showed me her Pinterest vision board for the year. What? It was impressive. Y'all then homegirl, pulled out a whole ass notebook out of her purse and slapped that thing on the table and y'all, it was a workbook. She used to track her progress.
Mica: Damn, damn. I was impressed as fuck. Seriously. I was [00:05:00] like Chacha. That's something I can get behind. So the next day, I sat down at my desk and I came up with four resolutions. I was being like, super safe y'all. I found this fancy ass workbook on Amazon and come January 2nd, 2017. Boom. Started my resolutions.
Mica: There was something about having this tangible list of shit I planned to do that made me feel like I could spit hot fire. I felt motivated, focused, and excited about what I was going to do in the year. I was like, yo, I'm about to fuck some shit up.
Mica: Seriously, y'all? I came in hot, hot. And at the end of 2017, I remember looking back at my workbook and I realized that I accomplished three out of the four goals I set. Y'all, let me tell you [00:06:00] what, I had a pep in my step. I was dusting my shoulders off. I was like, damn, I got some shit done. And ever since then, I've been a firm believer in resolutions.
Mica: Do resolutions relate to food photography? Uh, hell to the yeah, it does! Y'all, let me tell you what, resolutions are crucial for food photographers. Why? Why you might ask, okay, listen, if you wanna level up your game in the new year, you gotta be willing to try new things. What's the quote? To accomplish new things, you gotta try new things.
Mica: I don't know, something like that. Like I said earlier, I'm not talking about vague, cloudy, [00:07:00] general basic ass resolutions. I'm talking about identifying specific areas where you can improve and giving yourself a clear goal to work towards. In English, it means getting specific about what you want and how you're gonna do it.
Mica: One thing's for sure, y'all, if you do the same shit over and over and over and over, you are going to get the same results. In some situations, that's cool. Like if it ain't broke, don't fix it, right? But when you're a freelancer, it's your job and your responsibility to stay on top of your professional growth.
Mica: No overlord is gonna stand in front of you, wagging their finger, expecting you to keep up with the times. You gotta do that shit yourself. So what better way to do that than setting resolutions? [00:08:00] Goals for the year. Setting resolutions will get you out of your comfort zone and get you to try new styles, new techniques, new equipment, and y'all.
Mica: That's how you grow.
Mica: I've been asked about my favorite tools for keeping track of my goals. Y'all, over the years, my tools have changed, but I'm gonna talk about the ones I'm using right now. These tools, y'all have been a game changer for me in terms of setting and achieving my goals. First, I lurve the Cultivate What Matters Power Sheets, y'all. Ooh, y'all. These power sheets are freaking amazing. They're pretty bomb. I don't know about y'all, but I [00:09:00] love writing things down. I still use a paper calendar. I love the stickers, the colorful pens all of that. So this goal planner is perfect for my needs. If you're also a fan of good old fashioned pen and paper, then I suggest you buy this planner.
Mica: What I love about the Power Sheets Goal Planner is that the prompts help you define your goals, and it gives you structure and direction and then, it helps you break down your goals into smaller steps. Like the setup takes forever and a motherfucking day, but once it's set, oh, it feels amazing. My favorite thing about it is it has quarterly refresh, which is great.
Mica: It's a great time so you can reevaluate your goals. Maybe you want to change up a few that aren't working for you. Poll, raise your hand if you like affirmations. I do! Cha Ching. I recently bought Oprah Winfrey's daily affirmation cards, y'all. So [00:10:00] my new ritual, I've made it a daily morning ritual to sit at my breakfast table.
Mica: Ooh, that was fancy. My breakfast table. Y'all have a breakfast table? That's a little ridiculous, but yeah. So. Let me try that again. I've made it a daily morning ritual to sit at my breakfast table, pick out five random cards. I read them out loud, and I pick the one that I feel most connected to. I then take a picture of it, reflect on why I chose that card, and then it comes with like this little display holder thingy.
Mica: It's so cool. It's so, it's so awesome. I, I put the, I put the affirmation card in the middle of my breakfast table. Sounds so fancy when I say that. I put it in the middle of my breakfast table, and that's my affirmation for the day. That's my mood. That's my motivation. Ah, it's been a huge help in staying positive [00:11:00] and motivated.
Mica: Ooh. Okay. So I was telling Aaron about this, but I used this desktop software called Shift, which I discovered in 2022, I think. So I was setting up a coffee meeting with a new foodie friend. You know, we're going back and forth with the emails and in the bottom of her email there was a hyperlink and it says, sent with Shift.
Mica: So of course I checked it out. Instantly, fell in love, downloaded it. I have the premium version. Shift streamlines all of my accounts into one hub. And it's perfect for email, calendar, social media, stuff like everything is under one roof. And it's great for my goals because this helps me stay organized and shit.
Mica: If I'm on on Google Chrome. Like I'm all over the place. I got YouTube open in one app. Like I just, who has time for that? So Shift is great in that it keeps everything in one house and I like it and it's pretty [00:12:00] bomb. So check it out. It's free. If you wanna get rid of the little hyperlink on the bottom, then of course you gotta pay for the premium version.
Mica: But for everything that it does, it's actually not that bad. Price-wise. Recently I switched over to To-Doist. I mean, I used to keep my, my to-do list on like a piece of paper and you know, I'd scratch things off, but recently I hired a virtual assistant. So Todoist is what we both use to keep organized with one another.
Mica: And let me just say this, damn what a game changer for me. Todoist is like freaking powerful y'all. And customizable. Like that's what I love so much about it. It's customizable. I use it to manage my shoots from start to finish. I run my podcast. I keep track of my social media post and the best part is Aaron and I, we are, you know, gonna start using To-Doist to [00:13:00] like keep our, you know, personal goals, like connected goals
Mica: organized. Yeah. It's gonna be so cool. Now you know your girl loves herself some business books. So I wanna mention some of my favorite books that I'm living for these days. The first book is Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. Now, truth. Truth, the first time I read this book, I read it with like a grain of motherfucking salt. I did not wanna read this book because my former boss pushed this book into my hands and she's like, read it. At the time I thought, you know, this is bullshit. Like, I don't wanna read this fucking book. But now y'all, I love it. And every like quarter every year, I take a little bit of time to like read a chapter or two.
Mica: Now my second favorite book is How To Win Friends by Dale Carnegie. Y'all ask any marketer, freelancer, [00:14:00] entrepreneur, CEO, whoever, what their top five favorite business books are and guarantee they will mention this book. I read this book for the first time back in 2018 because, oh yeah. 2018, because I wanted to get better at networking, and I heard through many grapevines that this book was the book to get my hands on.
Mica: The original edition, the language is like super proper, like, what to do about nothing! Like super proper cuz it was published in 1936 a k a forever ago. But there's still good nuggets in there. And if you just like can't handle the old ass language, then go ahead and buy the updated version on Amazon. It's like 10 bucks.
Mica: Everyone should have this book. It's so awesome. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh. I almost forgot to mention this book. It's called The Magic of Thinking Big by David Schwartz.. And [00:15:00] y'all. Okay. This book is like a buffet of bombass advice, okay? It makes you think of challenging small and little ideas you set for yourself, and it encourages you to think big and make big moves.
Mica: Reading this book, it was the first time I heard of the three failure diseases: procrastination. Ding, ding, ding. Guilty. Excuse-itis. Ding, ding. Guilty. And Detail-itis. Ding, ding, ding. Guilty. I almost sit and start this podcast because of detail-itis. The overall theme of the book teaches you how believing in yourself and believing that not only can you achieve big goals, but you can achieve them with little resources.
Mica: Like you don't need a whole fucking factory to make like this goal. Like it's attainable. I know I'm not the only one who plays it safe with one goals. Like the first time I did, you know, resolutions, I made four [00:16:00] resolutions. That book helped me put a lot of things into perspective.
Mica: Now I'm like, every time I think of a goal or a dream or anything, I'm like, how much bigger and better can I go with this? So check it out.
Mica: Y'all. Damn. Can you believe how far this podcast has come? I'm jazzed about the community we've created and the conversations I've been able to have with all of y'all.
Mica: Oof. And I wanna take it deeper. I wanna take it further. I want people to feel so jazzed and motivated that they're gonna like step into their backyard and build a fucking rocket and shit. Like I want them to like patent some, some magical things and stuff after listening to these episodes. I mentioned this in in the last episode [00:17:00] about my three goals for this podcast.
Mica: I want to create a platform for the after party. Or, or, or the continuation of these conversations outside of the podcast, whether it's Slack, could be Patreon, um, I'm thinking Facebook, who's still on Facebook? Let me know if you're still on Facebook. Whatever platform y'all prefer, that is where the conversation will be.
Mica: Y'all are going to see more of moi on Instagram, meaning y'all are gonna see my face. I'm gonna be doing more little pep talks on, on the Insta Stories. Maybe I'll do a live, I'm still debating reels. I'm not a dancer, so I'm not sure how that's gonna work out, but whatever I do, I'm gonna make sure that I stay connected with y'all and bring more value to you.
Mica: Last but not least, [00:18:00] I wanna bring on more variety of guests with like professionals beyond food photographers. Y'all know I love my fellow food photographers and I will have food photographers on the show, but on top of that I wanna have chefs on here. Writers, producers, PR agent, art directors, prop stylists, specialty stylists, retouchers, magazine people, teachers.
Mica: I wanna have everybody that is in the food photography industry, commercial, food blogging, whatever it is, I want them on here because these roles are interconnected and it's important to have different perspectives and learn about how all these roles come together. In bringing a photo shoot together.
Mica: Wait, what? Like in a commercial shoot? You think that the photographer just shows up and just does everything? Well, actually most low budget shoots, it is just the photographer. But if it's a big ass commercial shoot, everyone has a role and I think it's really [00:19:00] interesting to get the perspective from everyone in those roles.
Mica: Let's get into it. Let's make it happen and let's get this partay started. Okay, I don't know where this singing shit came from, but if you're into it, say hello. If you're not, then too bad
Mica: Well, y'all, my goal was to keep this episode short and to the point. I think I accomplished that. You let me know. Thank you for your time and for listening. Let's make 2023 one bomb ass year. Okay, so next episode, and our first guest is Robin Zachary, y'all. She's prop stylist, educator path creator. Ah, man. We had such a wonderful time on the show.
Mica: Ooh, and I can't wait for y'all to hear this [00:20:00] episode cuz it is truly one of those conversations where you walk away feeling inspired and jazzed as hell. Seriously, y'all, I went to Goodwill right after our talk and I bought some shit, but I won't get too deep into that cuz that will be on the next episode.
Mica: Till then, y'all. Happy New Year. Happy New Year. Happy New Year. Thank you for joining me on this
Mica: Till next time y'all.
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