adriya replied to your post: “Ask Memes are kinda weird. If you’re not popular or well-known here...”:
Yeah, I get that. I've noticed myself feeling like that too. It's hard to stay motivated when you feel like you're just shouting into the void.
Especially if it feels like everyone around you is "doing it right" and making the right kinds of posts and the right kinds of characters and everyone loves them. They just do it right while you do it WRONG. And suddenly you are WRONG on every imperceptible level and your writing sucks and your characters are weird and you dress funny and your hair doesn't part correctly and you smell like the way orange juice tastes after brushing your teeth.
...which sounds totally ridiculous. BUT THAT'S THE DOWNWARD SPIRAL.
Personally, I feel like I write in two different spheres. One sphere has the stuff I do for people off Tumblr, in workshops or for myself or whatever. I get an idea. I get excited about it. I sit down, I write something, it's tough and while there's not much of a reward and it's depressing sometimes, I never feel like a piece of shit simply for making the attempt.
Tumblr is, well. The same as above, only now there is the bonus piece of shit feeling at the end.
Why? I can't really tell you why. It's ineffable. Maybe it's that swell public humiliation aspect, or that sinking feeling that people are sneering or laughing at your posts for being such pathetic loser attempts at whatever it is you're attempting. It's puerile and it's embarrassing to admit, but I'm admitting it in hopes of helping others who feel the same way sometimes.
If there is instant gratification, then there must be instant...well, whatever the opposite of gratification is. But here's the thing. DO IT DO IT DO IT DO IT ANYWAY. If anything, do it so we'll always have ORIGINAL CONTENT somewhere on Tumblr. So maybe only one or two people will like your stuff but it's a PATCH, okay. Think of it as a tiny tiny tiny patch of lush verdant golf grass, a freckle that is forever YOU amid a vast desert of...uh...forever NOT YOU.
And even if nobody asks about it, please tell us what your character's favorite Steely Dan album is.
And speaking of drum machines that won a platinum record showing up creatively, check out MY FAVORITE POST on this very subject.
