Jorge Quinteros gets it:

Sounds crazy but when I’m out pho­tograph­ing, I lit­er­ally pre­tend I’m on assign­ment for a pres­ti­gious mag­a­zine who I have to deliver qual­ity work not just because they believe I can exe­cute but because they’ve already given me an advance to do it.

When we go out and take pho­tos on the street, at the park or a place where peo­ple play, we are touch­ing the very fab­ric of real life — no make-ups, no acts, no pre­tend­ing, you are breath­ing and liv­ing the moment, … it’s awe­some. This atmos­phere is rare in a photo set, even more so in a com­mer­cial pho­to­shoot where we are run­ning on someone’s clock & money, shoot­ing some­thing that they want to see.

For that rea­son, I pick my assign­ments care­fully; either I do it with all my heart, or noth­ing at all, I hate turn­ing down assign­ments, espe­cially ones that feeds my stom­ach, but the agony of doing some­thing pre­ten­tiously is killing my soul, I’d rather go hun­gry rather than spir­i­tu­ally numb.

There’s no other way to do it, go all the way or don’t, you can always find food, but you can never turn back time.