Help others to help yourself
In today’s world, everyone is striving to be successful and reach to the top by any means. Most of the time we rely on our ability and try to improve ourselves day by day. However, becoming successful and popular does not, only depends on how much you work for yourself, but also how much you contribute to the success of others. There are many resources available on this topic and my intention is not to write from a psychological or success guru point of view but as a commoner with personal experience.
I do photography and to get feedback and promote my work I upload some of my photos on websites like 500px, Flickr etc. In my experience, unless you are an awesome photographer for whom the work speaks for itself you are not likely to get many likes and favourites. However, if you take some time out to just look for photos with the similar theme as yours and appreciate other people’s work then you are better positioned to get some feedback and likes on your work in return.
When I started uploading my photos on photo sharing websites I never use to like or comment on other people’s work unless they are awesome. I never even bothered to follow many people apart from my friends. I had the thinking that if somebody really likes my photos then they should appreciate it willingly without me obliging them to do so. I was quite successful in getting likes on some of my pics, which were good. However, I could not manage to get any critical comments on the photos, which were not that good. To progress in anything it is important to get positive feedbacks to encourage yourself but you also need some critical comments for improvements.
People will only take out time for you if you give them something for themselves as well. The day I started following more people and appreciating their work I also started receiving more likes and comments on my work. Everyone likes to be appreciated and everyone has the capacity to encourage others. We just do not do it thinking that we can fathom everything on our own without anyone’s help. It’s good to be independent but it’s the interdependence which pays off more in the long run. So in conclusion, if you want to engage a huge audience in your creativity start contributing to improving the work of others and they will uplift you as they rise themselves.
