#i cant use all my money commissioning art of him i have to eat

[taroshusband]

@ sakana fandom: WAKE UP WE BACK IN BUSINESS

[goremet-chef]

DREADFUL so dreadful but the only step is to just reach forward. like all i need to do is pick up my pen but i cant. wish i could tho

art will always be my passion, even if it bothers me sometimes. its all ive ever been good at, fantastic outlet for creativity and emotional buildup but i just. sometimes i cant move and i dont know why and its literally inches away from me but i can hardly move forward yknow? im fine physically, but mentally its like this huge step that seems so intimidating

i feel like i live off of outcomes and when the outcome isnt certain my brain goes haywire and holds me in place until the outcome can settle. but? this outcome IS the same. its so easy, ive done it before. reach and grab, draw what yr dying to draw

im drowning myself in lethal company things im so excited and im . all my minecraft ocs and my sotf ocs like i have so much i need to make and just.. no will to do it. but i want to! want to more than anything. id feel better if i did, which is true i would feel better. when it builds up inside you its OVERWHELMING like insanely so. i can get it out and free myself if i just DO it but theres always this barrier between what i want and what i actually do yknow? very lame

yknow art is my passion even if it hurts me sometimes it makes me very happy and i like to create, everyone likes to create. i like to see what i can do, like to bring all these buzzing thoughts to reality. can hardly hold onto them long enough to do that but i try at least. sometimes i feel really really unreliable and i dont know why?

i dont do commissions anymore, i pretty much ONLY draw for myself. who are you disappointing? who do you THINK yr disappointing? no one even remembers all the times you say "im drawing this 😼", YOU dont even remember all the times you say that. theres no pressure, you can do it whenever you want, it doesnt make you worse or anything. art is for you, you'll get to it when you can

yes :] i think i probably will. im just trying to make myself feel better honestly its something that eats at me and i dont know why?

its like some HORRIBLE combination of impostor syndrome and bpd fears like "oh no im not good enough!!! i need to provide i need to create for others to consume to prove im worthy" and then when i DO create, when too many people like it its.. i feel like ive conned them, surely i didnt make something that good, i must have faked it somehow and the attention is undeserved

SHIT LIKE THAT honest to god all my mento illnesses come together and hold hands like some really fucked up version of the power rangers. all of them collide in the WORST ways possible its. what is bro doing in there !!!! seriously its actually comically tragic but i live in spite this, i probably always will live in spite of it. sometimes im like wow lets let everything wash over and give up, this hell isnt worth it. but isnt it? back and forth black and white, world is ending world is beautiful type shit. when it feels over i just try to remember all that stuff that and it forces me to remember that there is no giving up on this, wouldnt give it up for the world. its mine and ill keep it

as i was saying tho, i feel so much happier drawing when i try to keep it out of mind. like yes, of course i love the attention. who doesnt? but i used to be INCREDIBLY numbers driven for like. hefty chunk of my art history. like little 11 yr old me breaking coppa on dA had so much fun just drawing hot garbage and sharing it and it never got like any likes but i didnt even CARE i just. to be able to create and share is the best part of all

i wish i was like him again. im not that boy, not anymore, but i remember him and i keep him close. all that cringe bullshit and i was having so much fun

ill give myself some credit yknow. im an adult, money is a necessity in this world. art becomes more of a chore and something i feel pressured on because logically its the only thing i can DO right to make a quick buck like. its the one thing i know i can do. but having my passion turn into something like that? dreadful

sometimes you cant avoid it, i just have to do my best to look past it and recognize that beneath all that shit. theres something in me that needs to draw, the same thing that forces me to carry sketchbooks and pencils with me wherever i go, even if i never use them. just this lingering presence that screams at me and tells me that i will create. i will! i will create

[eevyerndracaneon]

Hey, I don't mean to intrude or anything, being a stranger on the internet and all. Don't feel the need to answer this ask or anything but, I just hope you can hear me out and maybe something I say can help a bit... I've seen some of your posts today, I'm sorry you're going through the ringer. I've got a good couple of friends who deal with the very similar struggles and whatnot, so I just wanted to say pretty much what I always tell them regarding some of what you're feeling. I dunno your specific situation, and I know a lot of things are way more difficult to just outright fix than some people will say it is, so I'll keep this more general. And some of what I will say you might already know, but I feel they bear repeating. First off, your worth as a person is not tied to your ability to make money, or work a job or anything like that. You are a person, and that makes you valuable. No person or thing can ever take that from you. Second, never feel bad about wanting to interact with your friends and loved ones. Even if you're in a bad mood, I'm sure they'd love to spend time with you. Social needs are just as important as any other need, so do not feel guilty of them, and don't hole yourself up if that's not what you need right now. A friend of mine (and I do also to an extent) does this all the time and after they always reflect that it only hurt them.

Third, I'm sorry about whatever issues you're dealing with, with family or otherwise, I know how difficult that can be. There are no easy solutions, but, like, you just gotta keep carrying on, you know? Even if there's no option out today, there might be one down the road. On a lighter note, I think your art style is charming! I think you could get some commission work if that's something you wanted to do, it's less on your skill and more on confidence and a bit of luck, I think. Even if today sucks, it doesn't define you tomorrow and not all days will be like this. None of what you're going through defines you or your worth as a person. You've got this, and your friends and loved ones have your back. Keep on being you, A concerned stranger

ah right i did vent really hard on here huh, thanks for sending this out-

i've been vague overall with my posts bc im just going thru it today so some of what you've said doesn't apply but i can't fault you for it, since i didn't rly explain anything

i've tried for a few years now to have art as a job that i could maybe help pay for rent with if i ever moved out, but i just didn't get enough comms to even get to that point. u-u i'd LOVE to just draw for money but it just didn't rly work out the way i expected. maybe i'll give it another shot, i dunno (I'd have to increase my prices again for 2023....)

the house i live in rn is the one belonging to my partner's family. so i live with my partner. my boyfriend is long distance (i'm polyam if that hasn't come across with some of my posts) and i desperately wish i could live with him as well. my partner's family is amiable, but not exactly super friendly or welcoming. especially not if i was openly trans. (they have a trans daughter but refuse to treat her with respect so she cut herself out of their life years ago) my life is kinda trapped in my partner's room, in a corner, so i really don't feel like i have a home. it sucks, but at least im surviving and have a roof over my head and food to eat and warmth in the cold and cool in the heat.

you're completely right on the social front. i think a lot of us forget this. my boyfriend and a friend of mine both reached out to me an hour or so ago bc they were worried abt how i wasnt around like, at all, and i basically got the same thing from them. "its okay to be around, we can try cheering you up"

and finally the big one. i understand capitalism is trash for making us all think we need to make money to deserve life. i hate that i need to make money to be able to live on my own. luckily im not sitting here thinking im worthless solely bc i cant get a job or make money. but i need money to get a place to live in on my own, apartments need rent, houses need mortgage payments, and then food and bills and all that crap. i need a job for that to get pulled off. and i've been trying to get a job! i've been applying to places since the beginning of december! but no place has accepted me. i've gotten like three interviews. nothing else. its just really infuriating. all of my friends, even my boyfriend, are getting new opportunities, new places to live, new goals new motivations new everything. and im just kinda stuck.

today was really hard. all of these feelings welled up over the past half a year and i think just finally crushed me into the dirt today.

so its just kind of a sad day. im doing what i can now to make it better even if only by a little bit. but oof.

thank you anon for popping in and checking up on me, it means a lot <3

[swampgallows]

i just woke up, it’s close to noon here, five hours is good enough i guess. i keep thinking about college and how fucking suicidally depressed i was then and how ive spent half of this year being unemployed and generally just struggling to take care of myself in the most banal and basic ways possible, and how depression really does just delete years from your life. you live through them in a daze,  you’re already a ghost, you’re already dead. questing in wrath of the lich king is honestly some of the last shit i remember concretely before going into a two year gray area of passing my classes and nothing else. i remember breaking up with my boyfriend because he chose raiding over me. i dont want to talk about it again. the memory is still painful. still, even still, ten years later. and in late 2008 i was attacked in my dorm room and i was screaming and my roommates thought i was being a big ol slut. they thought any guy that came over was someone i was fucking. when i went to blizzcon in 2008 and my brother stayed in my dorm they thought i was fucking him too until i told them he was my little brother. they tried so fucking hard to suppress my interests and make me “like them”. “there’s more to life than world of warcraft and pokemon” they said as if going to college basketball games and rewatching disney movies has any more enrichment or depth beyond what i was fucking doing. my life is so full of hatred, from myself, from other people, just being fostered in me in general, and it’s only within the last few years that i’ve gotten to heal from it at all, all the time being hurt more and more

i was talking to a friend yesterday who is just 19 and thinking about where i was when i was 19, which of course puts me in 2009 again, the year i dropped out of existence, and i was telling them about how i was essentially raised by the ilk of 4chan and the piece of shit community on wow that, like, since i’m around ~liberal genderqueer~ tumblr-type spaces all the time, genuinely shocks me to remember still exists, of those fucking hypermasculine overcompensating military dudes. and we were talking about how like, nerds in general tend to have shit social skills or anxiety or are Othered in ways that have them reinforce this piece of shit pecking order where the loudest and meanest proclaim themselves the Leader and everyone just follows them because theyre too meek to challenge them or they mistake arrogance for confidence and assume any asshole crowing that loud about how Right they are all the time Must Be Right. 

and i thought of my own life, my ex QP, my old friend groups, my abusive ex boyfriend, how i mistook so long their malice as strength, how i was duped by their self-aggrandizement. they had no skills, no talents, no girlfriend (except when i dated them), no women in their lives in general, no real friends they could count on (except, for my abuser, an older man with 3 children and a brand new divorce whose house he muscled and manipulated himself into—”i cant even bear to be in the old master bedroom anymore”—and my abuser promptly MOVED HIMSELF INTO IT) no hobbies, and the one or two hobbies that they had—fishing, video games—they were fucking less-than-passable at. my ex-qp wasn’t good at video games. he would use cheat codes or just play the strongest character and rely on everyone else to pick up his slack. warrior, carry, tank, what have you; all of us his underlings to support him to victory—”I’m doing all of the damage and getting none of the kills”—he would whine, oblivious to the concept of teamwork and seeking credit within the only realm he had a semblance of succeeding in. 

anyway so when i first joined tumblr i swung the pendulum in the other direction because i absolutely had to, it was for my survival to become a virulent feminazi as they put it, and i was obnoxious about it, and i reposted rape statistics all the time and challenged people all the time because i had to. i had to let it overtake me in order to purge all of the 10+ years of toxic social conditioning that places like 4chan and their little infestations in WoW and all of my abusive partners instilled in me. i had to be vocal about rape this and sexual assault that because i spent the better part of my adolescence trying to laugh away the fact that i was raped as a child, trying to make jokes about my “delicious flat chest” and pedobear and “surprise buttsecks/it’s not rape if you yell surprise” and “delicious loli”; some of the images i had willingly saved on my ancient hard drive are absolutely harrowing to go through now as an adult knowing my mushy impressionable 14 year old traumatized mind was trying to cope with and gloss over what had happened to me and with the future i was facing as a budding adolescent in this kind of environment. men didnt want to be responsible for what happened to me or with what would happen to me, it made them uncomfortable for me to talk about it, so i was told to laugh it away, that nobody cares that i was raped, that i was stronger if i could just laugh about it, that no topics were beyond reproach or off limits, and that if i wasnt desensitized to my own suffering then i was weak, i was a sheep, i was a burden, i was letting my emotions get the better of me.

obviously, tumblr as a whole DIRECTLY acts in opposition of this: everything is rooted in our traumas, which we are expected to lay bare for all to be taken seriously: 4chan demanded that we invalidate the trauma by making a joke of it and allowing the masses to pick it apart for their own entertainment, to become part of the anonymous “legion” by offering up our individuality to be consumed by the group (as a currency of “lulz”, basically); tumblr, reflexively, demands we validate the trauma by making it an open and public integral asset to our identity, to have easily digestible and categorized characteristics so as to fit into the tumblr hierarchy of needs, their own misinterpreted facsimile and microcosm of existing systematic oppression, and obtain a sort of fixed currency of privilege or “woke points” dependent on identity politics. so i definitely needed to purge my previous conditioning with this reclamation of my identity as a survivor, etc, and had about 7 years of misplaced anger and fury condensed into a good two or so years instead, and even now im still parsing details. 

it wasnt until i was 22 that i had even heard the term asexuality and it wasnt until i was 25 that i realized i was bi (or “could be” bi), even though i had already been in love with and sexually active with women years prior lmao. i had been told by every possible source that having a dick inside me would change my life and change my outlook and change me into a better person or whatever the fuck, that i would “understand” and “grow up” and “become a woman” or whatever and guess what it did fucking NOTHING, just like every teen drama romance or whatever tries to stress over and over, sex is not a magical lifechanging event that hands you a million dollars and a healthy brain. it changes your life in some ways and it’s definitely not something to be taken lightly but in no way is it a cure for anything.

i dont know where i’m going with this, im just fucking pissed off about my life, im pissed off that healing takes so long and that i had to do any of it in the first place. im so pissed about all of my time wasted with this fucking piece of shit body and fucking piece of shit brain and i wish i could just go back to work and be a functional human being but im like just a short leap away from doing any of that. i have to get in touch w my previous HMO once the new year starts now that im confirmed for medi-cal, and i should have done it months ago, but i have to just accept that this whole time ive been not USELESS but just utterly CONSUMED by self-preservation, that it is taking most of my effort to want to be alive and stay on this planet any longer. especially now with my teeth bugging me so bad because i cant fucking take care of myself so im grinding my teeth and clenching my jaw and i guess eating improperly or what have you idont fucking know. im going to buy a waterpik even though it’s fifty dollars and i have not made ANY MONEY in the last 6 months or done ANY of what i wanted to do and i still have a number of commissions needling at me that i genuinely like cant fucking even look at withotu fucking hitting myself and crying, and im seriously not trying to make fucking excuses, i am so fucking ashamed and consumed by self-hatred about this, this has been a problem for me SINCE COLLEGE where i was an ART MAJOR that i had to fucking beat the shit out of myself to try to draw anything “seriously”, and i do mean literally beating myself, bludgeoning myself with my morris sticks and smacking myself in the face/head and clawing at my skin, and i fucking hate it

i just know i need like SO MUCH recovery or healing or whatever the fuck, i feel so long overdue for very basic shit, and part of me feels like a withering plant, like pouring water over dry leaves thinking it’s just going to saturate itself and be instantly rejuvenated. im losing leaves in the process, as it were, and getting no “water” all this time. i feel like i’m in drought mode. these last six months are me basically conserving all i have, toeing away from the edge of the cliff because iw as so ready yall i was so fucking ready, i was ready to jump off, i spent whole lunch hours just ready to fucking leap, staring down the void, staring at the winding road that went up the mountain, staring at the deer who stared back at me, hiding my face from Adults who treated me like a wind-up doll, i just couldnt take it, ic ouldnt be somewhere that sterile, i couldnt be spending so much of my life getting so little back, i coudlnt see my friends ever, i couldnt breathe, but in general my brain is sick and i need to heal from all of these things, i need to figure out how i can cope with being alive because i am going to be alive at least a little longer and i need to not fear and crave death simultaneously. i do not want to die, I DO NOT want to die, but i cannot live in a constant state of recuperating. my life has just felt like the Shutting Down... screen for the last 2 years. 

NEED a new dentist NEED my teeth fixed PLEASE GOD open the stem cell dentin treatment to clinics worldwide GOD fix my TEETH PLEASE let me REGROW my TEETH NEED therapy NEED to fix my brain NEED to figure out how i can cope with being unable to support myself in this shit fucking economy NEED TO RECOVER NEED TO GET BETTER PLEASE IM FUCKING SUFFERING