#don't compare yourself to others

[lauramkaye]

Keep Your Bad Art

You know when you finish a piece of art/writing/music and you're so disappointed because it didn't turn out how you wanted? And you just want to throw it away and never think about it ever?

Don't.

Keep it.

Because being an artist-any kind of artist- is a process that involves experimentation and practice and trial and error and growth and it's very easy to get discouraged along the way, especially in today's social media environment when you are seeing everyone else's BEST on their feeds all the time.

When you get frustrated about your own growth as an artist or feel like you aren't getting better it helps SO MUCH to be able to look back at your own past work and see that you actually HAVE.

I made myself a little collage with a few works I've done over the years since I started seriously working on my art so that when I am getting frustrated I can remember. Obviously there are a lot more pieces in between but these were all black and white portraits so I liked seeing the progression.

If you had shown me the last picture right after I drawn the first one and told me I would one day draw it I would not have believed you.

I'm excited to see what we'll all be making in another 3 years!

[tessaannedesigns]

Willow the Flamingo. 🦩 💖🌸

[nhzmlplths]

to everyone out there. YOU. YES YOU.

reblog this and write at least one thing you're proud of yourself for. ANYTHING.

It can be that today you helped someone carry their bag, maybe you drank a glass of water, maybe five, maybe you finally finished that Minecraft axolotl model, maybe you finally had a warm shower, maybe you started that project that's due in two days, maybe you ate some vegetables, maybe you scored a 100% on that maths test-

ANYTHING!! There is ALWAYS something for you to be proud of, and every single day is a new one and you can ALWAYS start again if something didn't work out.

I'll start. I just spent like an hour trying to study Vocabularly for a German spelling test. I studied three words out of 48, but right now I am contently eating a carrot and chilling, about to carry on with the next Shadow and Bone episode. THIS IS MORE THAN I DID YESTERDAY!! yesterday i did not study ANYTHING. so all in all, I'm really proud of myself and deserve a fifty minute break.

NO MATTER HOW LITTLE, A WIN IS A WIN!!

take care of yourself man<3

[chalkrub]

mockley time it's mockley time will you have some mockleys of mine

[deservedgrace]

this might be a bit scattered and vague because bringing attention to dissociation makes me dissociate more and forget things and struggle to explain stuff lol, but... i feel like evangelicalism kinda teaches you dissociation as a baseline? especially if you're raised in it as a child?

like, arguably equating being human to being sinful, human nature and sin nature being interchangeable phrases for the same concept, convincing people that they need to be separate from sin if they are to be good and therefore need to be separate from being human, calling your wants, needs, emotions, thoughts, etc sinful and needing to repent for simply being human and having a human experience, that "existing in the flesh is not what god intended for us", that almost requires dissociation on some level

but there's also the dissociation from "the world" and "worldly things", from common phrases like "we're in the world not of it", believing that we are so separate and distinct from the world that we're called to "save it", to the belief that this life isn't our "real" life, our "real" life is the one we have with god in heaven

and all of that is just, par for the course, extremely normal beliefs to constantly be exposed to: your human self is not your "real" self, this world is not the "real" world. and that's without even getting into the way they use music, prayer, chanting, etc, to induce hypnotic states and other thought/emotion stopping tactics to disconnect you from your thoughts and emotions if you start feeling or thinking the """wrong""" things

and like, i didn't realize until after i left and long into my mental health journey that my default is dissociation. i thought it was normal to just exist like this because i didn't really have anything to compare it to, especially because i was taught that worldly people were the ones running on autopilot and disconnected to their thoughts, actions, emotions, etc

i just... wonder how common it is, and how many people don't even realize it

[beautiful-basque-country]

I'm SO grateful to the universe for keeping all my classmates anonymous regular people.

I can't imagine the pressure - from the rest, from your family, and from yourself! - when comparing that former classmate who is rich and internationally successful and you that just try to make ends meet.

[introspectivememories]

i think tim is possessive in the way that he wants to monopolize bernard's attention but bernard is possessive in the way that he wants to monopolize all of tim's emotions. like if tim could he'd replace all the breath in bear's lungs with his own so with every exhale, bernard would only think tim, tim, tim. but bear wants to be the sole recipient of tim's emotions. he wants to keep every smile, every tear, every frown to himself. he wants all of that to only be his. but tim belongs to so many people unlike bear who only belongs to tim. so he settles with the way tim laughs so hard that he snorts, at his corny jokes, at home. he settles with the frown that appears on his face as he works out the kinks in a new WE proposal. bernard lets himself be content with the way tim looks when he's hovering over him -- flushed and panting, tears building up in the corners of tim's eyes. at least this, he thinks reaching out to caress his boyfriend's face, at least this is mine. only mine.

[silusvesuius]

this tree from my new drawing looking goated afffffff 👑👑

[kazu-naito]

"amen is so hated we are so oppressed" idk if you've noticed but he's in 2 covers and on the dr poster like bro he's quite literally the most popular (current) love interest in the app tf you oN about 😭

[zehina]

I am not cut out to be a writer, never was. I don't have a consistent schedule, and the weight of wanting to provide for those few who enjoy my writing crushes me eventually.

I don't know why I decided to be one.

[yukidragon]

Just wanted to remind everyone that the fact that you are creating art is a wonderful thing, and you're wonderful for sharing it. I guarantee that someone out there is happy that they found your creation.

This applies to all forms of art - drawing, writing, photography, game development, music composition, voice acting, choreographed dances, etc. Just the fact that you are creating anything is amazing. You're putting your soul and your experiences that make you, you into that art, and it truly shines. This is why even a silly doodle can really resonate with others.

Keep creating. You're making the world a better place, and I'm so proud of you.

[linusbenjamin]

tumblr is literally my comfort zone, the only place where i don't constantly compare myself to others because we're all the same here

[lynaferns]

Hey- about your recent post regarding the ability of patience - that put things into a different perspective for me, and i thank you. I have been trying to draw for maaaybe 4ish years, and progress seems to always have weird times of super fast improvement, and then times i feel nothing changes. And i see artists my age that started the same time i did, and i get so discouraged, but now i realise the patience thing. Just like everyone's brains are different

Glad I helped :D

And don't worry about the "suddenly improves faster and then stops improving", that's very normal.

To improve you have to walk a lot of hills up and down (2022 was my best year for art and then 2023 was the worst and I felt like I was stuck), sometimes you just need to get up from drawing and do other things like watching a new movie/show or maybe go on a walk, take a closer look to the world around you, it may inspire you.

But most importantly, take your time. Art should not be rushed.

[dana-chan-the-control-brain]

Cool dice and stargazer

(Also the vampire one made me wheeze laugh so hard I snorted XD I was like nah I ain't saying that one about anyone 💀)

Everyone has diagnosed me as "Cool Dice" It makes me wonder if I should post a picture of my neat socks collection.

Also... Stargazer is so VISERALLY accurate, I'm surprised not many people got it sooner.

I was a Honor Roll straight A kid who didn't need to study or learn any life skills because schoolwork just came naturally to me and a lot of the subjects in school, like reading, science and art... and the basic academics were my special interests at the time so I did well.

When I went to college, I think I got my first Cs in classes that I genuinely loved and thought I was to be good at. Like Theatre, Photography and Psychology. and then I cried cus I thought I was dumb and not good at things that I loved.

No, I wasn't, I just didn't study and no one told me like that's what you HAD to do in college.

So like when... I tell Neurotypicals that I'm actually Autistic. They look at me so strange like... "But you did good in school!"

Yeah. And then I flounder later in adult life cause fundamentals weren't explained to me and quickly forgotten about.

I remember fighting with my English Teacher in highschool a lot because i said that "as long as the sentence makes sense in the context of the story, grammar isn't nessasary"

Which is probably something you see in my writing that I struggle with, and it's typically why I take so long because I keep trying to change the tense of verbage use to keep it consistent and second guess myself as if my fanfic is an academic paper to be graded. A horrible habit I know.

I'm also mildly dyslexic and horrible at spelling and cheated on all my spelling tests in Fifth grade and don't know how to spell to this day.

Spellcheck has been my friend, but since they integrated AI into it, lately spellcheck has not been picking up on my common misspelled words and usually recommend me different damn words then what I want....

buuuut...

Yeah. Sorry for dumping

Anyway. I have a lot of cool socks.

[leejihoonownsmyheart]

it's me again !!! i've read all your jeonghan recos, thank you, they're lovely!

just wanted to ask if you had any seungcheol recos too 🥺 preferrably angsty tooo mehehe

tysm and i rly appreciate the time u give to reco fics! i luv u !!!

- 💟

Hi!!! I’m glad you liked them and I am so sorry that I took approximately literally ten years (a little over a week) to respond to this. I kept putting it off even though it was going to take me like two minutes lol I'm so sorry

I already recced you I think two Cheol fics but I'm going to rec them again because THEy'RE SO GOOD. I'm like.... really going through it with Cheol right now like he's all I talk about. I told one of my bosses at work the other day that he played golf for no reason at all I just can't get him out of my head

Push it down (sooner or later it all comes out) by @/dontflailmenow a Seungcheol camboy series which is ridiculously good

Also Sapiosexual by @/smileysuh is.... I read it recently because I'm trying to read more stuff here and it was such a good read. It's about sugar daddy!Cheol and I feel like that's all that has to be said? so good

Terrifyingly Innocent by @/twogyuu full disclosure- I have not read this, but badboy older brother's best friend!Seungcheol??? It can't be bad IT LITERALLY CAN't. Plus twogyuu is a great writer don't @ me

This is just a sugar daddy cheol drabble but it still deserves love and is really good by @/toruro

this one's for the brats by @/onlymingyus like don't @ me pt. 2 but I read so much Cehol smut. Mean hard dom!cheol is just something else

After Class by @/rubyreduji are we surprised JJ is here? No we are not I love JJ and give me professor Seungcheol everyday and I'll actually go to class

Thirst Trap and Down bad (so so bad) by @/lovelyhan are SO GOOD, thirst trap?? phone sex with Cheol. I KNOW I know. Down bad... y/n being horny because cheol calls himself daddy to his dog? relatable, honestly

I'm so sorry I don't read willingly read angst. If I read angst it is A. an accident, or B. me reading through a persons' entire masterlist. I... this is more information than you asked, but I read Twist and Shout when I was a destiel girlie (girly?) and that killed all angst enjoyment for me. I cried in the cafeteria my freshmen year of high school. SO I DON'T READ ANGST BUT I'll make an angst rec list just for you one day <3