#WELL anyways we are all the causes of our own downfall. and i wont elaborate on that further 🙃

[skitskatdacat63]

Back in my monthly depression era ig but. Thinking about social media and art, and how their relationship has fucked with me. I'm glad I started drawing fanart and I don't regret it. And I think I've really improved my skill this past half year plus. But man it gives me such a terrible complex. That paranoia of "who even would give a shit about this" and "when will people be done with me."

I think any artist always craves some recognition and praise no matter how much you say you draw for yourself. You can draw for yourself but it's still extremely gratifying and inspiring to have people's approval or thoughts on it.I used to draw for myself more and draw so much random art, but I discussed it a lot with friends and it made it more gratifying, to have that interest. And I lost that kinda, a lot. I feel like for a bit btwn losing that and drawing fanart, I can't really remember, I didn't draw as much bcs it just felt a bit unrewarded and it felt bleh.

And then I started drawing fanart. Which felt very rewarding. I'm happy I've not ever really felt the desire to make widely "appealing" art. If you look at even the first things I posted, it's extremely niche, and that's been a lot of fun! But it's also just made me so paranoid and self conscious. What if people get tired of this. What if people find it strange. What if people find it annoying. What if I'm being repetitive. Etc. It's really irritating bcs I KNOW people have told me they find my stuff interesting and that they like it. But my brain can't help but think, what is the expiration date on this, when will it become boring. I discuss my art with people and it's fun, but that self consciousness clings to me like a parasite. Like ah I better hurry this up and enjoy it while I can before they get annoyed and tired of it.

I guess this is all to say, I don't always like my relationship with art, and I hate the way social media messes with your brain. I remember for a bit I would post my art on Instagram and do the whole hashtag game. And then realized it was messing with my relationship with art so I dropped it. And then did the same thing with Twitter, than dropped it, etc. I just hate how I can't let myself enjoy anything. Idk maybe I'm just burnt out or something, but whenever I think of drawing lately, there's just this voice being like "what's the point of even drawing this, why would anyone care." I hate you evil voice in my brain!!!! It's not even a thing about notes, and I feel greedy even simply admitting any of this. I think it's more of a craving of a deeper connection and discussion. Which is what I always seek when I create art. But social media makes you think about numbers and attention and makes it unhealthy and makes you feel guilty for wanting something that's pretty reasonable.

Blah blah blah anyways don't reply to this like, oh you need to fix your relationship w art by taking a break from socmed! It's just this continual cycle and maybe one day I'll break it. But sometimes it just hits harder some days. I just want to stop feeling cringe. I hate it cause internally I'm like "I am cringe but I am free" but that only has to do with actually creating the stuff. Posting about it is the trap I think. Again though, it's natural to crave discussion and approval, but putting myself out there makes me want to curl up in a ball. I miss the days when I was younger and creating all kinds of random art and forcing it upon people with absolutely no shame. But now it's like. I toss my art into the room and shut the door and hide behind it with bated breath. And it often feels like any conversation I have just sates me for a tiny bit and then I go back to feeling empty. Is it ungrateful? Or is it just natural to want to keep having and partaking in a good thing?

Someone sent me advice on this feeling at some point, about how its better to talk to people individually rather than just on main. And I agree! I had a lot of fun the last third of last year. And for some reason it's just felt different ever since the new year began. I just don't know how to recover, and to start having fun like that again. I've drawn a lot of things I've immensely enjoyed since the year began, but for some reason, which I can't really parse, have had way worse self loathing and insecurity about it all. I just wanna recover my joy back :( is that too much to ask

Tldr; yay art improvement! Complex ideas! Much discussion! However: nay! Makes me feel cringe! Makes me feel like I'm running on limited time! Makes me crave too much!

[maryamaibraheem]

The Metro Bus Week!

On the very first day of this week, my entire class was handed a letter written by a very famous yet a controversial writer of our country ‘Manto’. Manto Sahab is well known for his obscene, vulgar and bold writing style for which many people don’t really appreciate him. They accuse him for being too honest about the realities. Well that’s what realists do I guess.

Anyways, our task was to travel in metro, interact with the metro users keeping the contents of the letter in mind. Seemed like something interesting because none of us have had such an experience before. So basically we all were quite excited and with that over excited feeling we left for metro.

 Day 1

The first day was an observational day. Specifically for me because I seriously didn’t want suddenly ending up in a fight, argument or any kind of reaction from the public. You never know how a person would react to your idea and your conversation. So being careful about interactions on the First Day turned out to be a good idea. For most of the time, I drew stuff, which was the result of letter contents and the small conversations I had with people regarding their country Pakistan and American influence on our society.

Talking about myself, I am a patriot. I don’t like people talking against my country when they are the ones living in it and using all the facilities.

While on our way back to college, I was very much consumed in drawing something. A few of my friends were conducting a poll whether people consider Pakistan better or America when one of the men told them he doesn’t like Pakistan. My pencil stopped instantly and I looked at him with a stern. i was seriously pissed at his statement. Well, obviously everyone has their own opinion but still. So I started talking. I talked about how we, the people are the cause for our country’s downfall, how we have destroyed its image. This country is gives us home, it gave us our identity, we are living on its ground, eating fruits and vegetables, enjoying all the facilities here yet we blame Pakistan for it. WHY? One of the guy said ‘yahan barhay log corruption krtay hain or hmain hmara huk nahin milta’ to which I replied that corruption isn’t just of money. If you aren’t obeying the traffic rules, that’s corruption. If you are throwing trash on roads, that’s corruption. Why is it that the same people violating all the laws here when go abroad tend to follow all the rules? Is it that we don’t have laws? Or penalties for breaking them? Or that people are not aware of these laws everyone is but we all are ignorant about these things in our country. I concluded by saying ‘the problem with our people is we don’t point out what is wrong and we fear it as well. The day when we get over this fear and say it out loud that these things are wrong and we shouldn’t be a part of all this but work for the right things and for betterment of our country and ourselves will be the day we will initiate metamorphosis.

I made quite much of a speech out there for good 15 minutes and I was surprised to see that people actually listened to what I said and didn’t stop me in the middle. When I finished talking, a lady standing right next to me patted on my shoulder and said ‘beta! Ye bht achi baatain ki hain aap ne’ which was very sweet of her and it actually felt nice too! Well obviously who doesn’t like being appreciated.

 Day 2

Pretty much being exhausted on the first day, I still wasn’t clear enough what I had to do today. Metro tour started again and I decided to read the letter we were given out loud in the bus which I did so. Once I started reading it, people actually wanted to know who was reading it and what was being read. They kept starring which was quite much of a response I guess. My friends were there too but we pretended not knowing eachother. They acted like they were irritated by my act and asked a few ladies around if they were bothered as well to which one of them replied ‘Let her do whatever she wants to’ which was quite a clear statement that she was not bothered at all! So later that day I again did few drawings about how at times our people wont even bother about what is happening around them just because its not happening to them. Our people to some extent have restricted themselves to their own mundane life circle and do not feel a need to break it. Maybe because everything goes smoothly in it. I remembered a dialogue from the music video of a Pakistani Singer ‘ Ye awaam soo rai hai iss ko soye he rehnay do!’ which is correct to a great extent.

 Day 3

On the third day I thought about doing a ‘balck magic performance’ while travelling on metro bus. I dressed up exactly like someone who is very much into this black magic, wearing a lot of rings (including a skull ring as well), and tasbeeh around wrist etc.  Even my college mates failed to recognize me which meant I pulled off the look nicely! I was happy however the discussion with the panel of teachers ended up in my idea being a flop! Lol. Happens. Nothing serious. Thought of something better later. Waaalaaaaa!

But I seriously wanted to see people’e reaction to such a person being in public, that too a female. Thus I travelled to home in metro in the same getup and the response was quite interesting. Most of the people actually stared at me, looking at my hands first with all the rings and then ofcourse the eyes. The women kept looking at me with that fear in their eyes because I was continuously doing tasbeeh. Few of the passengers passed comments like ‘tauba tauba ye kaisi hai or kia kr rai hai’. Later I was told by my friends that even a security guard was sent on the same bus I was on, to keep an eye on me. ThankGod I didn’t know that or I would have been scared myself! He got off after two stations as I didn’t do anything fishy. A girl on metro seeing my attire asked me if I was too much into spirituality and I said yes that’s my work. She even asked me from where did I learn all this and I answered her that too! Its amazing how strongly you can influence people just by your getup and appearance. So, this was one hell of an experience.

Day 4

The new idea I came up with was introducing photography services for the funerals and dead bodies because why not? When people can choose the most expensive photographers for their weddings and birthdays, why not make the last event in this World a memorable one? Why not make it extravagant too? We people are so much influenced by the West and whatever they do that we try to copy them in every possible way. We are so much concerned about maintaining our financial status and our repos, that we would do anything for it.

So I ended up making a handout for my photography services for funerals. A friend along was doing event coverage for funerals. So we both had our individual word but a collaborative one as well.

We got off at a station and started giving people the handouts and waited for their reactions. They would take it while walking, then start reading it, then slow down, then stop and finally turn back looking at us like “what is wrong with you guys?” in their eyes. A few of them were awkward however few laughed it off and enjoyed it. There were some people who actually came up to us and asked us what it was all about and we elaborated it for them. I don’t think it offended any of them. Which I think was a good thing. Atleast for us because otherwise we would have gotten ourselves in big trouble. I don’t know what they would make out of that pamphlet. Some of them might understand the reason behind it and some might not. It was just an effort to convey a message to the public.

So this is where I wrap up this post. 5 days of travelling, interacting, doing insane stuff, experiencing new things and learning so much comes to an end. Jury Tomorrow. May the odds be in our favour!!!

Will interact in the next post that will be up soon.