Healing part 2. There are things that I do that have come to light in the past year that arenāt totally healthy. Distancing myself from grief, pain, inconveniences, uncomfortable situationsā¦because Iām afraid of anxiety/panic attacks, Iām afraid of disappointment, Iām afraid of failure. Like I said last time my art took a massive hit due to my depression and anxiety. Every single time I picked up a pencil or pen I would hear a voice in my head saying I failed. āWhy arenāt you using your degree?ā āHave you tried selling your art?ā The list goes on. Iām not using my degree, that is true and Iām trying to figure out where to go from here. But my art was always meant to be a form of telling a story, I wanted to share my characters with the world, I wanted to tell their stories. I loved coming up with different characters, figuring out their histories, what they wear, how they act. But I lost that joy when everything suddenly had to be a way of making money. If I didnāt record it or share it to make money, it was worthless. I tried to just make stuff for content, but I couldnāt, it stressed me out. I told myself to set up a graphic design business and do that, but I would panic and shut down and I got nowhere with it. So in my healing Iām getting back to the basics of what I wanted to do. I wanted to share my illustrations and my stories. Even just little glimpses of what worlds my characters lived in. Do I still wish to one day live off of doing only art? Yeah, sure, who wouldnāt want that? But I have realized that in order for me to produce art for myself right now my actual job canāt be creative and thatās okay. Iām not stuck, Iām in a journey, and where that journey takes me is gonna be for the better. Iāve learned that itās better to take a break and work on starting over than slowly feel like youāre losing your mind in an endless cycle. My brain has had scary thoughts lately, but now, now I feel freer. Not quite completely free, because there is still one thing I need to do, but Iām feeling more confident about it. 2022 Ā©ļø Stephanie. B. Martin #ghost #mentalhealth #painting #acrylicpainting #fall #blackcat #birchtree #changingoftheleaves https://www.instagram.com/p/CjY9n9JL5J8/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=