In the early part of the twentieth century, Ehrich Weiss studied locks and locksmithing. As his knowledge grew, he decided on a course of action and became Harry Houdini, the escape artist. During his life, the technology of locks was such that one man, Houdini, was able to assimilate almost the entire human knowledge about the arcane art of lock construction and dared anyone to be able to lock him, such that escape was not possible. They failed.
What form of photography do you practice? Yes, practice is the operative word as no matter what you do, hopefully you strive to learn more. It's easy in the beginning to be enchanted by your capabilities to produce images and so, like a man with a new hammer, you take pictures of everything.
Later, when you decide to earn some money with photography, you probably offered (or were asked) to do weddings, events and most anything else. And that started your career.
As you have been "available" to shoot pictures of most anything, it's quite easy to hang out your shingle and let everyone know. The only problem with practicing almost all forms of photography is you never get to know any one of them thoroughly and have a smattering of knowledge, across the board.
You will quickly reach your earnings peak as you have nothing special to show potential clients--you are like most other photographers showing their book. If you are content with what you are doing and your income, good for you, you've found a niche as a generalist.
However, to reach higher plateaus, you'll have to work harder and specialize. You can't take images across a wide swath to develop a unique style. Finding your niche as a photographer others want to hire, requires taking thousands of images, making mistakes (learn how you made the mistakes and how to repeat them, if necessary) and find yourself.
The unique styles of the top photographers are what sells them and you don't get to be a photographer with a unique style unless you are constantly practicing your craft.
To cross a river, it sometimes requires letting go of the tree branches on one side before you can latch onto those on the other side. You have to be willing to let go of what you are doing to make room for something else. While you may think being a generalist photographer is good, as you can rely on most any type of work to make a living, the reality is you'll make more money by doing less.
Harry Houdini could have been a regular stage magician, but it was specializing in escape art that brought him fame and fortune.
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