an example of inspiration

My favorite subject in year 6 at school was called 'themes'. I neglected everything else and would spend hours working on this subject, completely absorbed in the creative project. It was kind of meant to be about writing, but for me it became more about filling the page I'd written on with color. 

What initially inspired me was that our teacher showed us a notebook that was done by one of his past students. It showed me what was possible. The interesting thing was that the work I went on to create, inspired by the notebook he showed us, was nothing like that notebook, and yet the notebook was in many ways my goal. 

dogs of war

For some reason, with my daily goals, I've stopped doing the ones that you would think would be most helpful - like: reading about or watching videos about self-help and positive thinking, and practicing meditation/ mindfulness/ relaxation. 

There are certain YouTube channels that are specifically about benzo withdrawal and I used to watch them a lot, and I got a lot out of them, but I don't watch them any more. 

I wonder why. Maybe it's because I don't want that narrative to be one of the main stories in my life, even though I could tell it as a meaningful story. I think that's it. I want to own the stories I tell. 

Their story is not my story. 

This month has been tough. It's demoralizing...a year has gone by and it seems like lately things have been getting worse. It's getting harder, which is scary. So, I'm thinking about that and trying to answer my dilemma with the positive message from these YouTubers, and it doesn't work any more. I'm doing it all wrong. I'm recovering wrong, and I'm not getting better. 

But then, instead of thinking about this same old struggle, I want to think about other things. I'm sick of hearing the positive message about how I can get through this. I don't believe it. Years go by and I'm not better, and come to think of it, I've never really known what it's like to be mentally healthy anyway. 

I realized something. I've become really interested in a dog breed that is often used by the police and the military: the Belgian Malinois. They have that fully committed quality that is so impressive. I was walking to the shop and thinking as I so often do that I want relief. I don't want to be distressed any more. 

But I was also thinking about how cool these dogs are, and it made me see my struggles in a different light. It's good to be going through challenges and to endure. I want to thrive in the midst of the fight, and just by virtue of the challenges I'm going through, I have something to take pride in. That is something I have. I have my own struggle, and my struggle doesn't make me weak, it makes me formidable. 

creating

Around the end of July I decided that I was going to publish something on Medium every day. I've been in the 'Medium Partner Program' for a year now, which means I can make money from my posts. Every month I've made something but it's always been between $1 and $5. I usually write about 10 - 12 posts a month. I didn't have any expectation that I would earn any more from publishing every day, but I did. In August, I earned $41. It's still not much, but it's exciting. That's not pocket change.

Even just earning a few dollars a month was satisfying, because I'm making money from doing what I want. But then this month - September - I didn't maintain the level I reached in August. I still might. The month isn't over yet. I've earned more than usual though. For a while, when I saw that I wasn't earning as much this month as last month, I looked at the posts I've done that earned more than the others and I thought, maybe I should try to replicate what I did there. They had some quality that worked, so I should try to capture that same quality. 

But I don't really know what it was that made those posts do better, and anyway, I don't think that's a good practice...looking back on what you've done and trying to achieve the same thing that made some money. That's actually not the path to increasing my earnings even more. The path that I want to follow is that I want to write really well. I want to write good stuff. I want to grow and stretch myself. 

I do think about what will do well, but that's only part of it. 

Then there's Redbubble. I basically earn nothing from Redbubble. I sold a few things to a friend when I first opened my shop, but there's been nothing since, and it's been about a year. For a while I stopped uploading designs because I thought, it's not working. But then I saw some t-shirts that a big youtuber was selling on teespring, which is another print on demand service which a lot of youtubers use because you can integrate it with youtube and promote your products under your videos. I saw her designs and I thought, that's kind of like what I do, so I started uploading designs to Redbubble again. I've uploaded 593 designs. 

I started assigning a number to each of my designs and saving them as PNG files in a special folder, so that way, when I want to expand to other print on demand platforms, I will be ready to go. I keep a spreadsheet with records of all my art and which designs I've uploaded to Redbubble. I keep working on my skills and techniques and improving my craft. There's a lot to learn about design and research and marketing and how to succeed with print on demand. While I'm learning new skills, I just keep uploading my artworks the way I have from the start, even though it doesn't 'work' and I don't make any sales. I don't care. This is what I do. I'm learning new skills, but in the mean time, I'm uploading the same crap. 

When I finish an artwork or a design, I assign a serial number to the work, then I save it under that serial number and upload it to Instagram with the serial number as a hashtag. So, if you look at my instagram account or my Redbubble shop, and see an artwork you like, you can tell me the serial number and I will be able to put that artwork on print on demand products - t-shirts, notebooks, clocks, art prints, stickers, backpacks, etc.

It's possible that I will never make another sale on Redbubble. My work does get 'favorited' - quite a lot actually. I've uploaded 593 designs and my designs have been favorited 643 times. So, I know people are seeing my work and like it....they just don't buy it. But I keep uploading and learning and trying different things. You can always do something. I've started doing some designs in Canva again lately. 

There's a long list of different projects and schemes I want to work on - digital products, e-books, affiliate marketing, email list, other print on demand sites, freelancing on fiverr or upwork (maybe editing and proofreading), etsy, substack, my own website or other money making blog, dropshipping, ebay, Kindle Direct Publishing, web3 publishing, nft's, cryptocurrency, etc. I have a long list. 

What I've found is that, with my art and with my writing, I need to just create. I can't be thinking about making a product. I'm thinking about creating my best work. But then I also start introducing an element of product making into my process. Like, with a lot of my art, I just make art and then later I put it on products as it is. I'm not thinking about the product while I'm making the art. But then, with print on demand, there's an element of design and combining words and graphics in interesting ways - and they are skills I can work on - but I incorporate those skills and that marketing aspect into my creative process, so it's driven by creativity. 

I want all the things I do to grow organically like that. I'll keep creating work that expresses what I want to express, and that facilitates my growth as a creator. 

art XXXIV

art XXXVII

art XLI

art XLII

art XLVI

bendz

It always seems like the end. I still go back into my refuge of fear and pain all the time. I still want it to be easier. I want that so that I won't have to fight, but I will not get that. It's not going to get easier, not in the way that I want. It's going to get easier because I am going to change, and as long as life is still challenging that means I have more changing to do. 

As much as it is the end now, at the same time, it is the beginning. I just focus on the ending because that's what I know, but the ending is the ending of my old life and the beginning is the beginning of my new life.