Christ, what a question. “What motivates you?” As if life were a tidy multiple-choice quiz you could pencil in before coffee. No motivation is not clean. It’s not a polite little pep talk whispered by some guru in a shiny suit. It’s gasoline poured on the brain, it’s caffeine clawing through the veins, it’s the rabid itch that gnaws at the skull at 3 a.m. and screams move, move, MOVE.

For me, it’s the road. Always the road. Asphalt humming, dirt trails winding, mountains leering in the distance like ancient judges daring me to climb. I’m motivated by the next photograph that doesn’t want to be taken, the ghost town that refuses to die, the split-second when the sky tears open and lightning forks between the peaks. That’s the juice. That’s the raw charge.

I’m motivated by fear too, the good kind. The kind that keeps you running when the silence of a graveyard presses down so heavy you swear the earth itself wants to swallow you. The kind that whispers: if you stop, you rot. Fear is a bastard, but it’s honest.

And underneath it all, chaos. The madness of living in a world that makes less sense by the hour. Politicians lying through their teeth, cities rotting in traffic and neon, the news chewing itself to death. The only sane response is to hit the gas, grab the camera, dive into the wilderness, and remind yourself the world is still sharp enough to cut.

So what motivates me? The sheer bloody fact that time is short. That bones turn to fossils. That silence waits for everyone in the end. Until then, I’ll chase rivers that burst out of the earth, towns that reek of ghosts, and skies painted in fire. Motivation isn’t a reason. It’s a compulsion.

And once you’ve tasted it, there’s no going back.