this post is 16000 characters long. i actually ran out of space and will have to split it in 2 if i wanna say the last bit.... i uhh, really outdid myself this time. in this short novel, i define some concepts, give an account of all the nonsense ive been dealing with, and tell some my art discoveries and new theories.
if you're an artist, you won't be any good unless you can get into the zone. i have always constantly been in a battle ever since i was little, trying to get myself into a good mindset while drawing. personally i never called it the zone, to me it was more like seeing in a way i normally wouldn't, so i had to "see it". so i remind myself to get into a good mindset by my old adage... "I have to see it."
heres an example: if i had artblock, I'd spend a bunch of time struggling frustratingly drawing blindly, but eventually by the end of a few hours drawing, id start to see it again. I'd just... see things about my drawing a lot better, like, i see a more sophisticated level of detail about my art than befure, and i see all sorts of cool things i can do to it, and stuff that i like is more appearant to me. this is a very real mindset shift, that causes me to do things more excellently. it even affects me fur many days after.
I'll focus because ill see cool things i could do, so i pursue. drawing is like chasing a flavor, molding the shape until it tastes tasty, to that high level i see. you watch yourself capture the right look and get excited as you know its gonna come out good, cuz it always does when you're in a good mindset.
When I make a mistake, i notice it very well and fix it, because I'm pursuing and want quality (i can see what i want, this isn't good enough), but also because i more overtly see the mistake, and just... care more, because i know id be ruining a good drawing. if it was normal, and not in good mindset, id continue with the mistake without thinking, cuz i just don't care as much.
normally i don't see it, im not in a good mindset. I'm more clumsy and aimless, i just doodle thoughtless drawings, which are usually bad. i call this "drawing blind", its what ive always called it, so i often tell myself, "don't draw blind, you have to see it." over and over again, you'd see it in my notes a lot. im saying, "you can't just draw, you need to get into a good mindset first." this is my traditional advice I've had since a baby beginner.
I focused on this a lot in the past, but when i started getting better and transfurming from a middling, heavy, ref-bot artist to a higher level of artist (light, comfy, memory based), something very wonderful happened. i found i no longer needed to "see it" to make a good drawing, they'd quite often come out good automatically (as in, even drawing blindly worked). my mindless doodles almost always looked good, and i was a LOT more consistent. it felt like i was on the cusp of perfection, just a little more and i wouldn't even need to be in a good mindset, I'd be perfectly consistent like one of the greats. no more fussing to try see it, or messing up cuz im not in a good mindset, there would be victory whether im in a good one or not.
Drawing was painless, light, and felt rly good, it often magically worked out fur no reason, something that never used to happen.
then i had depression, which completely disoriented me. it killed my passion fur cute things, such that I physically felt all good feelings very little. i want to explain what this is like so you can understand: try tickling your palm with your finger, and after with the same finger, tickle the back of your hand. The palm side is much more sensitive than the back side, right? Now imagine everything you enjoy normally feels like the palm, lots of sensation. With depression, everything you like gets felt like the back of the hand, not much sensation or feeling at all, though you can still feel it a little bit nice. I laughed a lot when i was depressed, but i didn't feel much from laughing, so, i might as well have had hicups. as you might imagine, this makes living straight up pointless, because you barely feel anything good, only bad feelings, so whats the point of even living like that? This state lasts you many months to beyond a year, like a desert without water, and there are many other more minor symptoms that takes many years to slowly recover from, even after the major symptoms are gone, its a pretty serious matter that can kill you. theres lots of little things, like there is normally a subtle glow of light felt around your heart, you actually have this right now if you notice closely, but with depression it goes away. like... this is not a poetic statement, the light inside you literally dies haha. you get emotional, you get violent thoughts, you get petty, hurt easily, but it differs from person to person. Fur example, some lose emotions rather than becoming oversensitive.
Even after recovering feeling to normal, my passion fur cute still took a lot longer to recover, years, it was honestly the last symptom to fix, and its still not as strong as befure. but at least cute girls feel cute again.
Depression however is not at all excruciatingly bad, its mainly just no way to live. you're constantly wishing you were dead like you're wearing squidward's "i really wish i weren't here right now" button, as living like this really isn't worth it, but the level of suffering is actually totally endurable in any given day, and you really can just be happy again when you recover. imo its faster to recover than it is to resolve to die, so you are better off putting up with it. just protect yourself, take it seriously and you'll heal.
Depression comes from a broken spirit, and like a broken bone, it needs peace to heal. you have to stop getting hurt, because every hurt is like straining and putting weight on a broken bone. it means more days of depression fur you, so dont let it happen. This will work.
I often say this, but human beings have limits. regardless of how strong your resolve, its not up to you. don't be the fool that endures too much and gets depression, if too much bad stuff happens to you, you'll break. instead, you should try achieve your goals with minimal self sacrifice. I promise you, this is wisdom from heaven. it teaches humility and develops you graceful skill, and best of all, it actually works in practice.
Those that settle fur the hard way never find the easy way, and stay mediocre furever. the one that ignores his limits, simply gets humbled, so don't be a fool. Embracing weakness does not mean accepting mediocrity, or giving up. it means you only have a little strength, so you have to use it wisely if you want to win. if you brute furce things, you'll just burn out and lose. Work hard means burn out, dont do it. it doesn't take much to reach the sustainable limit of your body, i know because ive reached the actual limit.
stop expecting to be able do things you never actually practiced. play to your strengths, and avoid your weaknesses. furget what others do, and do what works fur you in practice more than anything, and stop doing what doesn't work befure it wastes too much resources. Thats why i say, "the one who knows he is weak, is not so weak." and that "It is when you realize you are weak, that you become strong." its my favorite advice of all, its the sole spark that transfurmed me from mediocrity to something better, but no one ever takes it, or really seems to understand it.
Depression made me realize mental states exist, because i was living in a different one, a new world where the rules are different. its kind of interesting. if i looked at something cute, id feel nothing, and not see the cute in it, though i rationally know its there, because it is a cute drawing, its just being bland to my tongue.
This as you could imagine, is super disorienting, and made it really really hard to draw stuff thats appealing, like... how can i salt and spice, when i don't taste the salt and spice...? how am i supposed to make it appealing? I can't chase and mold towards something i can't even see. im basically just opperating on steriotypes and ideas that i know are "supposed to work", like some mechanoid alien trying to guess what humans like. that and experience.
im also a person who's always relied heavily on his passion fur cute gorls too, so not having that is basically me straight up losing my reason to draw. but as you can tell, i kept drawing a ton.
i couldn't help but draw blind often. i could only really draw cute guys n dragon girls, which fur some reason worked, maybe because it was new and different to me at the time, but it isn't who i am, im a cute girls artist, it really bothered me to not be me. unlike most people you hear about i actually like myself, so becoming a different person, let alone a much worser different person is awful. At least the edgy vent art and sad poems was good.
I also developed what i didnt know was nutritional issues closer to the tail end of the depression, which gave me brainfog and serious focusing issues, which was solved by eating potatoes again. (I guess growing up a picky eater wasn't such a bad thing after all?) This brainfog was an extreme lowpoint fur art as thats when automation completely took over, and i chronically and habitually would draw blind as the rule every time.
drawing became something horrible feeling. every drawing felt the same, i used the same patterns a lot over and over, and i would never have that thrill or chase or passion, on top of not even being able to use my brain properly to focus, i had the feeling i was clearly very different from the old me. just felt very disconnected from past focus. Eventually with many months, the last bits of passion loss from depression did fix more or less, but i still had brainfog. then many more months again, my brainfog fixed from potatoes, but even this didn't really fix me. even after all that recovery, it was as if i still had no focus, due to my new total blind drawing habit. I could never care about what I was drawing, it was just automatic and repetitive. i still couldn't focus or put thought into it, despite the heathy brain. its like i can't use the ability i know i have. being like this is very awful, the worst.
then i saw my friend krattking very recently, his art looked the same as it did years ago, (very cute, with a certain ordinary charm that felt missing these days, from not only my art, but others too.) which was very inspiring, like something I'd lost and thought was gone, but he totally had it like nothing changed, felt old. we were friends that drew cute girls together at similar skill levels. i started using guidelines again trying to return to the past when i was like kratt, get back that feeling like the old way, (which was more fundamental-y, hence why i used guidelines) which surprisingly actually worked, and helped much with focus.
The key was that the construction guidelines seemed to impart a certain figurine-like charm to it, and it just... helped me to focus. i think the reason i was focusing much more from this was because a guidelines method is different, so i couldn't do it automatically like normal, but it was also still familiar enough fur me to maintain interest.
(note, i am a single minded person, I only care to draw cute girls/guys, if i drew "different fur the sake of different", to help me to focus, which i actually did consider, i know I'd completely lose interest, and it wouldnt work. Drawing different-yet-familiar stuff is pretty much the only way to actually, successfully get me to do something different. simply "draw different" just doesn't work in practice.)
i started getting back to basics, trying to see it again, and draw with love, which are both very traditional ways of thinking fur me. also studying more again, which i didn't actually do. i rarely study ever anymore, and didn't even once tbh.
basically, whats going on now was, i didn't know the solution to focusing again, but unlike befure, i was in practice doing stuff that worked and physically put me to focus again, which was very important to getting out the mud pit. I felt I was really close to solving it. There was a problem though, i dont want to keep using guidelines as my solution, because as charming as it was, it is against my way as an artist, which is to reject guidelines. id hate to be furced to go back to using something that contradicts my principals, that'd be pretty lame.
i also did different styles, like old hair shapes, was a liiiittle more creative, less repeatitive. the guidelines did make me realize my 3D shapes were legit slightly off, which im more conscious to fix, and i even found some use fur the good ol' proportion check, which ive been using surprisingly often. My retvrn to tradition ended up being a good quick refresher honestly.
then a key moment happened, i had a bad feeling when beginning a drawing, like it wasn't going to work again. i always got that feeling throughout these days. but this time i noticed it, and decided to stop, thinking i should wait staring at the blank page until i physically felt right about drawing, maybe that would help. This led to me focusing befure actually starting the drawing, and then i could see it again.
basically... the new fix was simply waiting fur an idea befure starting, seemed to work as a replacement fur the guidelines way, so i finally had a good practical method to getting to a good mindset, while using my regular method, no contradiction of principles required.
it was right after this, i kinda just... realized how things truly worked thinking about it, and the true solution to my problem, and a radical new way of thinking.
it was automation (which is what drawing blindly really is; its simply doing things automatically without thinking or checking) that's what was killing me. i constantly kept doing things without thinking, and i needed to prevent this automatic action, so that i could see it again and do things with focus and intentionality. That the cusp of perfection i subconsciously wanted befure would be thrilless and terrible if i got it! perfection as an artist is to embrace chasing "seeing it", embrace dealing with the annoyance of trying to getting a good mindset, because getting one is where all the good things come from. Automation is without soul, repetitive and just not as special or cool as things made out of talent and focus. I think doing things automatically might even be the source of all artblock, which, big if true, cuz thats fixable. I guess we'll see.
my new idea and understanding is more radical than befure: not only do you not draw without seeing it, (ie, you dont draw blindly, you try get into a good mindset), but now you actively try to avoid doing anything automatically at all. ALL should be done intentionally, so as to benefit from the talent of seeing it, no acting automatically.
The reasoning goes like this: the parts you draw when you "see it" tend to be of superior talent to the parts you produce automatically.
Therefure, each part you de-automate, is another part fur "seeing it" to make awesome or a little cooler looking.
Skillful produce is in a zero sum game against automated produce, as each thing automated means one less lever you're using to express skill and talent in.
by producing as few things as you can automatically, and trying to produce as much stuff as you can through seeing it, you'll maximize the potential quality of every aspect of your drawing, as every aspect that got de-automated, is a aspect that can be made in the zone, and thus way more awesomer. And! you also definitely won't draw blind like that, as blindness is just doing things automatically, which is directly what you are opposing, every step of the way.
being a new idea, i have not yet tested it extensively to see long run problems, or even how useful it would be to anyone not suffering from my unique circumstances, so grain of salt, but it'd be interesting to know if it helps you. possible potential problems being it might in theory be more mentally taxing, and its a little more annoying to setup, but its the new direction im headed in, and it has caused no issues so far. it seems to have the potential to fix my pose problems too, because its furcing me to be conscious about all the things id normally do automatically, like what pose or look to go fur befure even starting.
1/2