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Oh my Things

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since i've been rambling about gender here: is: some: more:

been going through the worst gender blues of "oh, no one looks like me! I wish I could find people who's gender I'd want!" only to figure out I'd find it if I just searched androgynous. i just think my problem is that the style of androgynous i like is so so fruity and i am Not Ready. i guess folks who are close to my gender expression feel like they just Appear to me, when i'm sure if you knew them it was like... a process to develop that look. i just don't know how you deal with it.

oh man i used to like, always wear the same jacket that was big every day to hide my body i was so uncomfortable with it and it just hit me that was probably dysphoria. i had to sort of brute force train myself to wear more revealing clothes because people kept bullying me i wasn't performing Typical Woman enough by wearing big skii jackets everywhere. it was such a tactical autism move like nah I don't want people looking at me and I will absolutely sweat in this thing that i wear every day like a shield.

like people knew i did that shit but would tell me "oh your uncomfortable with your body because your a girl :)" and like that felt right but wrong? I thought because I finally forced myself to conform into clothes that were acceptably Girl it would uh. work? and i did start to feel....comfortable walking around like that. but.....i have always been....aware? that what I did not like was on display. like i was uncomfortable but now that was somehow tightened and bottled under pressure into the shape of a woman. but that shape also felt like it protected me from further scrutiny that was growing more pointed as people tried to put labels on me.

i guess it dawned on me I just really never stopped feeling that anxiety I just have sort of....put on an outfit that helps me contain a worse one.

my skii jacket felt nice. it was big, and soft, and it felt like a hug. that body anxiety never really went away i guess i just didn't think of it as queer i just....thought i was uncomfortable with my body being seen... ah man i'm really dense. like yeah that's probably gender and yeah body image issues that severe would like...make it uncomfortable and scary to explore a gender presentation i was curious about.

i have like....the "don't look at me at all please but I will grit my teeth through it because i know this is the way the world functions" issue.

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his reoccurring themes

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going to have to scrap this but look how nice the torso is with that little whisp. hopeful i can bring that soft torso and squeeze into the final. the pose is Still not pushed enough i'm going to have to dig out david and study him a bit. the down angle that I chose is trickier than I thought bc all the important details need to be carefully placed or they get hidden by the natural Overlap the perspective creates. it's so fun to try and figure out, a puzzle for sure.

the song for this one is soooo so grand i feel like a bull dog with my teeth on the ox barely holding on.

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reworking this piece again and again until I get the perspective right but still a bit attached to this.

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doodling squiggles my boyfriend draws over @hocopoko <3333

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I think shit like this is why you get some art teachers that describe goals rather than thinking, because thinking is often personal and cultivated. if you, like me, existed in a space of hyper control around your thinking though, well, you get a bit fucked over in that regard because you wait patiently for your instructions. it's pretty natural i think to then try to cobble together instructions, because without much practice otherwise you just sort of flounder in the vast confusing space your brain occupies without being sure what to think of that either.

I'm going to be real with you I deeply resent the self assured artist that yammers on about things like they're innate skills, makes me wish they knew what it felt like to have it be intentionally underdeveloped or taken away. art has been like, the one thing that actually challenged me to develop this. I know i'm not the only one who got locked out Hard from a lot of joys art can bring either because of this. it's a significantly hard fight, to fight for your identity and your right to live, and your right to explore comfortably the contours of your own brain without someone telling you it's bad and you need to be like Them, Actually, or your Doing it Wrong, or You're Wrong.

every youtuber who gimmick posts do X not Y i am going to come for you, and i am going to grab the beating heart of that thumbnail and squeeze until there is only white flesh.

realizing that for me, at the base of style is Thinking, and so it would be more intuitive for me to Think about how I Think, and adapt my style from there. It makes sense there might be a log jam the moment I try to introduce foreign thinking that is incompatible with my own. (like, you wouldn't tell someone who can't see the apple to "try and see it harder". on the flipside, i see it so well it can cloud my actual vision, i stop seeing the paper and see the apple in my head. people who don't see the apple tend to be excellent artists because they are forced to think in a place they can see, so i wonder what I should do in that regard. I can definitely adopt some of that thinking into my own approach, but I think I need to formulate something in response to Me).

I guess I'm sitting with the aesthetic of my thoughts to try and generalize an approach my hands can execute. I should probably also look into the aesthetic of my hands though and body too though, or I won't account for the pain of pressing too hard on the paper.

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realizing that for me, at the base of style is Thinking, and so it would be more intuitive for me to Think about how I Think, and adapt my style from there. It makes sense there might be a log jam the moment I try to introduce foreign thinking that is incompatible with my own. (like, you wouldn't tell someone who can't see the apple to "try and see it harder". on the flipside, i see it so well it can cloud my actual vision, i stop seeing the paper and see the apple in my head. people who don't see the apple tend to be excellent artists because they are forced to think in a place they can see, so i wonder what I should do in that regard. I can definitely adopt some of that thinking into my own approach, but I think I need to formulate something in response to Me).

I guess I'm sitting with the aesthetic of my thoughts to try and generalize an approach my hands can execute. I should probably also look into the aesthetic of my hands though and body too though, or I won't account for the pain of pressing too hard on the paper.

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talked to my friend who's constantly doing things a bit about my blues and she's dragging me out of the house to do something (a suprise!) (likely a hike and some outdoor drawing which sounds very fun). i wanted to be a slug and get very high all day so I'm excited for the opportunity to do something healthier.

realizing also that being obsessed with getting good with no other drive can make you a bit uh, empty? i don't know how to describe it but it's not a great lens to approach art with. a bit devastating as i feel a bit empty lately, so grinding skills feels comfortable rather than looking to find what i'm full of. It's self defeating in certain ways because in mindlessly grinding my skills i sort of forget that drawing is communication and so all that comes out is like....eloquence with nothing to say. it's uh, the home decor section at your big box store.

it's like a real cart before the horse situation bc i think ideas are what carry you through getting good. i have a pretty intense ability to see in my mind, a collage of up close and far away images of apples firework through my brain along with recall on how the texture looks and feels inside the apple, sketches of apples, an apple i saw painted at a restaurant but also no strong recollection of what it looked like, a rough estimation of how big the apple should be if you could pull your hand through the apple no-clip style, and then several years of watching other people paint apples. I can see this in my head with such vividness that I prefer doing that to actually making a drawing of one. something to contend with for sure, but i have no clue on how to uh....use that library of information. it's like when i'm doing everything but drawing it's there, but when i'm drawing i get shut out from it?

i still don't fully understand the issue, I just know that I struggle to think and draw at the same time, and I know that I prefer to think over drawing, because how I think looks vastly better than how I can draw. in a way it feels like i'm delivering to you an abortion rather than a baby. the idea of refusing to give birth to keep my baby closer to me Forever is so so fucked and funny to me though. birth is painful I guess. sucking air through my teeth about it.

i think i need to draw more slowly, my motor skills holding a pencil are not so sharp that speed helps. if i draw too fast i can't think. this has been lauded as a good thing, but i think some people have different thinking than I do? more automatic and innate thinking, where their thinking isn't as intertwined with their ability to deliver skill. if i can't think i start drawing very poorly, i regress. most of my skill is in my recall, not in my automatic habits. thinking about it further, all of my favorite pieces are ones where i really, really take my time. i don't benchmark myself against my peers ability to deliver a superb drawing in 2 minutes, i am too focused on the detail of the situation. it's supremely frustrating to be "slow", people love to bandy that word around autistic people like authorities love to bandy around steel batons.

one thing that i was taught from like, 6, was to "feel the inside of things with energy" which....i have no idea what to make of now that i have left that spirituality. it's given me pretty intense spacial awareness though, kinda like a dolphins echolocation. i can't see the details but i can feel through and past the form. a super tedious way to draw, but, i think it may be worth exploring.

at a base i guess i am just. letting it all go. i want to draw how i think. i can't adopt other peoples thinking without knowing how i think. horse before the cart.

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I have to go to work after a realization like this!!!!! Augh i want to be drawing all day!!!!!!!!!!!

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I was figuring out platypuses while figuring that out and im soooooooo -laughing- about it. Big say the line bart energy.

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Realize avoidance (and perfectionism) is a mental debt and does not change or reduce emotional charge---> realize you can accept it all because it has already been there the entire time ----> become paraylzed and overwhelemed by the imperfection of reality ---> realize you are always growing and changing ---> feel fond of toddlers and teenagers with their struggles ----> realize that you were forced to be an adult ----> realize YOU can be fond of your toddler and teenager self ----> accept that you are growing in the now, develope fondness for the awkwardness of growth in the present.

I think!!!!!! I got to the bottom of it!!! Art block maybe cleared?????? I figured this out over the course of this hour we'll see how it impliments and if it chafes against anything else.

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Oh yeah no instars is definitely a better framework than egg 2, its hard to orient myself around a before and after and then a second after because those afters are stuck merged in a way that makes you hyper close to something youre actively changing against, but reverting to an egg again sounds like....well, reversion, rather than the newness of a change that comes with a lot of experience. Conceptually an instar allows me the grace of a chapter, along with the acknowledgement of change, while also accepting that dramatic newness is a thing that happens in adults (which, i know it does, but knowing some bugs deal with it too feels grounding). Oh its juicy! Ok i can hold onto this.

The line "go through multiple dramatic transformations more profound than hatching from an egg once" is making me so so emotional an arrow through the brambles into center of something that has been afflicting me. I guess it can be profound. In that i can see a glimmer of the ground. Like its painful but i feel like my feet are on the ground again rather than grasping around at air. Thanks again, a lot.

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i think entomophobia has done a great disservice to human culture in general but probably the most salient injustice for this missive is that general lack of knowledge about instars

transition narratives would be so much easier to internalize if we were aware of the fact that vast swathes of life on earth go through multiple dramatic transformations more profound than hatching from an egg once

ah thats a reason why people roil against the "egg" narative huh, it makes it sound definitive. Its one of the few extremely popular animals commonly seen that is "alive" that goes from one state to another, and thinking about it, many of the popular bugs i can think of (which, is limited) do not have instars (or perhaps i dont understand that they do). I think the pitfall im falling into is that, the narative of the egg is attractive, deeply so after a lot of instability that frankly i handled with minimal grace. Being done, and settled, is psychologically attractive beyond words enough for me to form at attachement to an identity that doesnt really suit me anymore. It feels like peace because it was effectively so. Now its not and the grief over lack of peace is real. To further it, things that were painful to me i did not have words for, now I do, which i think why this second molt is harder, but also a huge factor in why its happening. Its hitting me with a bit of devastation that it would be hell for me to live with only one perfect transition, i am recognizing that this shit is just not working anymore and being stuck with it would suck so much ass. Ugh ok it sucks its sucked for a bit and the cloying comfort i got in my boysona is now significantly confining me against movement towards a life i wanna live. Yeurgghhhhh denials curtain lifts despite no clear destination in mind. I know it doesnt have to have one, another psychological pitfall.

I agree with you, and had to look up entomophobia and instars to boot. Instars is a really pretty word. Going to see if any leafhoppers have them. Much to learn, thank you for this ask. Something has clicked despite my grief and resistance, and my gratitude is hard to convey without sounding cloyingly appreciative even if sincere. Turning it around a bit in my head helped a lot.

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My ass is getting such a reckoning oughhjjj i'm still kind of avoiding it. The familiarity of what was contains happiness but i know the otherside of the fence is probably better. Conceptualizing it and mapping it out with various pieces ive scoured libraries for, feels soooooooo much better than feeling it. And if im gonna be real that concept/mapping work has been an excellent shield into the tumultious cognative hazards and stories i got told about myself that insist that i should die. I guess, externally ive learned how to be a person that can be kind to my inward issues and navigate it. Is there a world where you develope a mask that reaches back in to save you? Its like ive nervously trained one information set and letting it see the other is just so so risky feeling. The "I can face it all, i can swallow it all and still stand" realization has been solid though. I coordinate myself so much to survive, i guess its time to give it a test run. The anxiety of "What if i just really hate it completely and thats who i am?" still thrums loudly. I havent really given my ""mask"" an attempt to mend that though.

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Its a bit weird to be under a second Trial for gender, because the first time it happened i had no idea what the fuck was going on and kind of based it on vibes and readings i got from other people. I just knew i was disatisfied and frustrated. My transition felt great at first, real euphoria, the works, and then it petered out into a sort of empty mailaise that felt like a fall from the height of self expression to wallowing in boxes i had checked off to pass. I think the poverty ive been in has affected me pretty bad, as gender got shoved into the sideline in my mad dash to figure out how to survive. Now that things are suspiciously comfortable again (yahoo! For now!) its like 10 years of undigested gender festering and growing constrained is errupting.

It genuinely has been pretty weird to put a lot of long term....work? Into something that now is making me dysphoric. Its funny to suddenly be back at square one with all those feelings of discontent again and creeping dysphoria (it sucks). Its weird to suddenly have New dysphoria about things i never had before. I never really got why eggs on reddit like. Understood they were eggs, self ID'd as such, but werent cracked. But now i'm in that space again its like. Guess I'm an egg now. I've been like desperately searching on aesthetic sites for gender inspiration and all i get are glimmers but nothing solid. No direction, no light bulb, its driving me nuts. No words, nothing that sticks or hits me like lightning. No aha! Its just vast fucking discontemtment and the sensation i get from being an autistic flavor of particular.

I'm worried I'm going to have to look inward about it lmao. It would make sense to, its just easier to externalize myself as a collage of my reactions to what i see and vibe with. The foods been predigested and that takes a huge burden off of the legwork, pre-discovered discoveries, a piece of a map that might give me clues to my own terrain.

I think more than anything I just want something solid to hold onto. The whole "what the fuck is happening! Whats going on!" of it all sucks. That solid thing, i dont think it got developed in me like it gets developed in other people. Not a unqiue experience I'm having either, just, not something I've seen anyone articulate problem solving towards yet. I like guides. I guess i get to be my own for a bit. I am the solid thing i hold onto perhaps.

aw im cute the way i feel out actually doing it and psyche myself up, look at me developing my own map for how to look inward safely without putting myself in a psyche ward. Yehaw bitch

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transition 2 kinda sucks if i'm gonna be real but that's because i'm just starting. really in the thick of that beginning oh shit oh fuck wretched scream as your previous constructed identity suddenly becomes a cage tight against the fat of who you are. didn't really fully experience this with transition 1, some hypotheses as for why but nothing feels completely understood. wish it was easier, i feel like i'm in a chokehold. been hard to make art when i feel this way, who i am feels much less concrete.

that said, discovered a perspective book that looks fucking siiiiiiiiick so i'm excited to chew on that and see if any of it sticks. been kinda just chewing on fundamentals that don't really need any specific expression while i gestate this belabored thing.