#like and rt things and not having to do my organisation tags and things like i know that sounds so just small and simple but that's how

[arklay]

WIP DAY.

tagged by @girlbosselrond @morvaris @aartyom @risingsh0t @phillipsgraves @leviiackrman @indorilnerevarine & @denerims over the past month! sorry it's taken me so long to get to anything at all, i'm sure you guys have heard me address it enough, but thank you all so much for continuing to tag me in things while i've been inactive ♡

tagging @aelyosos @brujah @calenhads @florbelles @jendoe @lightwardens @liurnia @nokstella @nuclearstorms @shadowsofrose @shellibisshe @steelport @swordcoasts @wrymbloods @voerman & all of those who tagged me again cause i'm so behind + anyone else who'd like to share anything they're working on, not just writing! ♡

i haven't written anything since the last wip game i did, but i started trying to put diana's timeline together at the start of january, so i mean... i'll show that instead. as you can see, fatigue hasn't let me do much with it even though i've got all of her timeline already done and strewn about all over the place.

started with 1995 onwards cause it was originally going to be an ewskers timeline situation, but then wanted to include all of her backstory so i went back to the start and still have the late 80s and early 90s to get through before then, but yeah :]

it's going to include like all little moments i've thought of between the ewskers just for me and placing them on the timeline, so you can imagine how long this is going to get if i have to go to 2021 for village... like just 1996-1998 is going to be so much... she's very special to me if you couldn't tell already lmaoo

never sharing this though, it's just for me, and like will help for when i do her timeline page (more in-depth version of what's on her oc page) to just run through canon events and brief descriptions and whatnot. you understand.

everything is blurred out besides 1995 ewskers momence and the years, just cause like idk her i feel weird sharing her in-depth backstory unless it's in dms or something, just cause there's lots going on there and yeah. things. idk

i also made a carrd for twt if you wanna have a look at that :] there's some cheeky subtle things with the two resi items i used as pics hehe

actually, you know what, i'll give a lil bit from where i left of with that rewrite anyways, even though it's been months since i wrote it. but why not

Wesker left a fleeting kiss behind her ear then reached around her and hooked his fingers beneath her coat, prompting Diana to glance back at him. But all he did was gently pull it from her shoulders. She watched him from out of the corner of her eye as he hung it up on the rack by the door, his movements careful and almost calculated, until he turned back towards her, and the warmth of his body returned once more. He pressed up against her side this time, as opposed to her back, and one of his hands found a home on her waist. The way the arm it belonged to was resting firmly against her as he began leading her towards the kitchen was comforting, secure, yet unmistakably possessive. And she revelled in it. He had quite the knack for handling her just the way she wanted.

#tag games. #keep going to do picrews and just zoning out 😭 i'm so behind on literally everything but it's fine it's okay (lying) #i'm having a day and a half even though i woke up feeling okay but oh well. my last month has just been like watching videos during the day #or playing games when i have a bit more energy but like i can't do anything that requires me to actually read or write things like words #are just not computing in my brain at the moment but it's okay like i'm just exhausted and hoping soon i can get back to writing because i #still have over 30 wips going lmao but yeah it's been a time a half with lots of appointments and seeing specialists again and trying to #sort things out. i've been more active on twitter which i've mentioned before but it's just because like it's easier for me to sort of just #like and rt things and not having to do my organisation tags and things like i know that sounds so just small and simple but that's how #i've been lately like to my brain rn that seems like a really big task. so i just keep coming on here randomly for a few minutes then #disappearing so i'm sorry that i've definitely missed so much and i haven't been around to just show my appreciation and love to your #creations!! also just everything that happened in december and then a bit at the start of january too like i'm just a lil paranoid about #being on here honestly so i'm trying to get back to it and be okay with posting again and i'm going to make a promise to myself to actually #filter more tags i think? just to help me with like not exposing myself to things that do make me feel uncomfortable in any way!! i'm #rambling now but sorry sometimes i just need to lmaooo idk but yes so cute lil subtle things from my carrd i wanna talk about cause why not #i didn't have to change the blue herb from re0 besides making it brighter because it's already teal toned which is so sexy but i shifted #the hue on the spade key like SLIGHTLY like it was so little. but anyways. i use this emoji ✨ on my twitter name and yes cause sparkles but #also. three stars. the s.t.a.r.s. badge and logo :] then blue herb because i will have no poison in my safe space!!!! take a blue herb or #leave please!! only good vibes and safe space here!! spade key because i'm ace <3 i was going to include the diamond one in there as well #because am demiro and like those are the symbols in the community. ace of spades for ace. diamond for demis (both orientations) #but wasn't sure how to weave the pink through the rest of the carrd even though cyan and pink together is so pretty omg

[jichanxo]

new pinned post 👍

jichan/ji, she/her, 22. aussie timezone :) my art tag: #jichanart finished infinite wealth :)

currently into: sawashiro jo (y7/8), kuwagami, bang bravern permanently into: higurashi/umineko, yakuza series, jokmagus/flex and herds

to be blunt i post whatever i want, and i'm not really organising anything. if this bothers you/our interests no longer align, please feel free to unfollow, it's all g. if there's content you need tagged for your own comfort please let me know. as of writing i've been on tumblr for about a month, so i'm still learning stuff, please be nice (and politely correct me on things if necessary!)

more info below

i don't do comms currently. my setup is csp ex v1 + wacom intuos s

same username on ig/twt: instagram -- most active. an art diary dating back several years. if i made art and it's on the internet, it's probably on there. twitter -- least active. rt heavy, but sometimes i put art there. please remember to turn off retweets on my account if you're only interested in art! discord -- friends/mutuals can dm me for my username if you'd like to chat/invite me to a server somewhere :)

have not played dead souls/rggo so i probably won't make art of that (sorry rggo masumi and jo T_T)

other tags: #jichan'shandslipped -- for posting suggestive art #jichanmakes -- for other stuff i make that's not illustrated art #iw spoilers + #infinite wealth spoilers -- block to avoid IW spoilers

#don't reblog

[spooky1980]

RTS behind the scenes of Loki talk - Wednesday 2nd March 2022 @ Kings Place London

(pictures aren't mine as I didn't take any)

Sorry guys for being out of things for the majority of this week. From Monday through to the very early hours of Thursday morning have equally been the most stressful, upsetting and then awesome time in my life in any fandom. Wednesday was such an incredibly long day. I got up at 5am and didn't get back home from London until 2am on Thursday morning. I am still absolutely knackered.

At around 4pm on Tuesday after all the upset and stress on monday when they had cancelled tickets i had bought on Friday, I was both shocked and surprised to see an email from The RTS saying that I was on the guestlist for the panel. So I was one of a few fans that were lucky enough to get into the panel.

I honestly have never felt so blessed and at the same time unwelcome in an events place as I did while inside that building. There was definitely a distinct air of being watched at all stages as they were looking for any excuse to kick us out.

Very much a them and us air between the staff and alot of the members and then there was us fans. The fans were great though, all incredibly friendly and honestly just feeling very lucky to have got in.

Sophia got the biggest cheer when she came out on stage. Mostly from us fans lol. As understandably did Tom. I felt kinda sorry for Michael as he got the least reaction when he came out.

Tom and Sophia looked absolutely gorgeous. I really wish we'd had chance to meet them either before or after but it wasn't meant to be. As I honestly think after the cluster **** up with tickets and then the threats, they were taking no chances so I think they all entered and left through the underground carpark via the lifts. Hence them doing the selfie in the lift. As they didn't do selfie on stage with the crowd like they usually do. I honestly again think that's because we'd tagged, them all in our complaints on social to say how badly we'd been treated over the whole thing.

So probably put a downer on it for them too.

But from Kate's insta story it was a press event. Certainly got the feeling that ne and my friend were sitting behind the vip section rather than the "members" as we were 2 seats behind Luke on the third row on Tom's side of the stage.

The fact too that before they introduced the cast and crew the CEO came on stage and then basically outlaid the rules. "No shouting out although we understand why you'd want to." Her words not mine.

The strict no photography, recording of the event because they were filming it for online really ****** me off. As people in the row in front did both. But seriously I think they just really wanted any excuse to kick the fans out. So I personally didn't chance anything.

But it felt like she was chastising the fans because we couldn't be trusted to behave in a civilised manner in public when around the cast.

I am Seriously annoyed for all those who didn't get second chances because there was a lot of empty seats and they'd moved it into a smaller room.

To be honest I've never felt more unwelcome at an event in my life.

I'm glad I went. But I won't ever go to another event organised by them. It really wasn't worth the mental stress I went through at the hands of the organisers.

The guests as you'd expect were amazing, but I agree with you with how they didn't come out at all despite them having what was clearly a private function vibe with alcohol etc after the talk where you'd usually get them mingle with attendees. Was very much down to the antis threats and the fact that they didn't want us interacting with Tom etc.

We were all well behaved yet still treated less than the members and vips. They only people who didn't treat us any less were the waiters bringing out the wine and nibbles and the guy who was doing photographs who actually took the time to talk to us fans, and treat us as people rather than an irritation.

Sarah Dixon and I were sat two rows behind Luke.

They asked what they watched during lockdown. They were asked about watching titanic.

Sorry this will be rambly no doubt as bits come back to me lol. I honestly can't remember everything that was said etc. So I can't wait for them to put it online so I can relive it from outside of the moment.

There were the odd tidbits we'd not heard before but mostly a rehash of stuff they'd said before.

Sophia spoke about how Tom reacted to seeing her in the Sylvie costume with horns for the first time. Which was amusing as he said it was very weird or surreal or something along those lines.

Spoke about the sets and costumes.

Sophia kept saying shit and apologised for swearing, then said something about being really sorry, she's just been home alot lol

Also how loki was a narcissist and wanting to have sex with himself. They were asked about the sexual tension between them.

They kinda skirted around it but definitely said they were going for a slow burn, kind of learning to love themself, to accept another person as they'd never recieved and real love or affection in their lives.

But Tom reiterated that Loki is Loki and Sylvie is Sylvie. And how Loki wants to know if she has had the same experiences or shares any of his memories of events etc as she's another variant, but essentially they are all separate entities or words to that effect.

Akin to the spidermen all being different yet sharing the same title in their respective timelines.

Sarah Goddard asked Tom about Jotun Loki and what if and being able to play a different kind of Loki.

Kate talked about doing longshots.

Um they talked about the scene on sharu I can never spell that lol. But about the running round that set.

They asked Tom something around the seeing all of Loki’s life flash before his eyes on the file. Seeing him reacting to his death, and that of his family etc.

Sophia spoke about how the costume came about. About her fitting for measurements when pregnant. How she didn't want high heels, or a leotard etc. Breast feeding, lol she mimed sorta unzipping her boob zips to feed the baby. Also made mention of wanting to be able to go to the loo as Tom Holland couldn't in his spiderman costumes, so that they could do it without stripping off completely.

It was cool to hear that Sophia was involved in the costume thought process. So it would work for her.

Tom spoke about stripping Loki of everything that made him him, costumes, Asgard, Thor etc.

Um about pushing boundaries with Kevin Feige on the writing and plot elements they tried to include.

There's a lot more that they talked about but that's all I can remember offhand right now lol

Biggest highlights of course including seeing Tom and Co live in person was meeting the other fans, getting to hang out with several of them prior to the event and after the talk. Getting to spend time with Sarah in person and eight other fans who I've spoken to over various social media outlets.

#tom hiddleston #hiddles #loki #sophia di martino #loki and sylvie #sylvie #kate herron #michael waldron #RTS behind the scenes of loki #royal television society #london #march 2nd 2022 #talk #loki series

[liderfin]

Quarantine q & a

tagged by @thevikingwoman :)

I've been so unwell for the past week that I couldn’t even answer that... I feel better today. I got a rapid antibody test for COVID-19 done on Monday and it was negative. Today I got results of the RT-PCR test, also negative :) so it’s a huge relief! Fortunately what I got is not COVID-19 (I had a fever and horrible dry cough, also my new boss - who I last saw 12 days ago - had a positive rapid test result. So that’s a thing about working in hospitals, even if it’s only IT department). Generally it’s really hard to get tested, I was just lucky to know people at work who could actually help me there...

Are you staying home from work or school?

I starter working from home on Tuesday, 24th of March. Too bad that 3 days later I got super ill :) I’ll keep working that way till Easter and then I have to come back - which is total nonsense (what I do now can be easily done from home. I have remote access to everything as if I was really at work. All in-person meetings are canceled anyway, so what’s the point? :( I’ll see what comes next. 

If you’re staying home, who’s with you?

So right now I’m on my own in the flat, the rest of my family is in the flat upstairs (it’s a duplex house with a garden). I completely separated from them a few weeks ago just for them to be safe. I hope we can get together for Easter. 

Are you a homebody?

Yes. Fortunately :)

An event that you were looking forward to that got cancelled.

The board game festival in April got cancelled. I love those events, they are organised twice a year in my region, so now I have to wait till Autumn for the next one. I miss playing board games in general. But I found about this digital platform called TABLETOPIA  where you can play board games online with friends. We need to check it out! I hope it works :)

There is also a Laibach concert on the 25th of May that I’m 100% sure will get canceled. I’m a fan of Laibach since my teen-years so that’s definitely something I’ll miss.

oh - we are having presidential election on the 10th of May, and apparently it is NOT cancelled (yet) - the dangerous morons in our government want all of us dead I guess...

What movies have you watched recently? What shows are you watching?

I watch too many tv shows it’s unhealthy :) So I watched the second season of Altered Carbon (Netflix) a few days ago - gosh.... The first season was sooooo amazing but the second is just bleh. They removed everything that was so fresh and smart in the first season and then emphasized everything that was weak...  

I  also finally watched The Mandalorian (I hate Disney for not coming to Poland until 2021 but that's not the point here). So I liked it :) except episode 4 that was just bad. The show is quite unique, there is so little dialog :P It has its charm and Baby Yoda is really cute!

And then I watched all 3 seasons of Castlevania (Netflix) - I finished it yesterday. OMG, this is something!  I don’t normally watch a lot of animated movies or tv shows but I read a lot of good about this one and it’s all true :) Castlevania is just super cool and a great storytelling. Then it’s also dark and it’s deep and it’s tragic. To compensate for that there is lots of hilarious banter between the main characters.  But better don’t watch this show with kids :) There is also Richard Armitage voicing Trevor Belmont, so... ;)

If you need a show recommendation for quarantine - please go watch the first season of The Terror - I watched it like a month ago or so, but I’m still thinking about it! It’s based on a true story about a failed Franklin Expedition to discover the Northwest Passage. It’s brilliant. It’s mostly about the atmosphere and building the mood. And the main thing - the show features stellar acting, it’s so impressive! Jared Harris in the main role but all the cast is fantastic...

What music are you listening to?

well, that’s actually a sad part - Bill Rieflin died on the 24th of March. He was a great artist involved in a lot of music projects I listened to through the years since I was a teenager. So I’m going through all those bands he was a part of: Ministry, Revco, KMFDM, Swans, old stuff :) his work with Chris Connelly and  his solo record that is also one of my favorite albums of all time: Birth of a Giant.

What are you doing for self care?

Right now I’m recovering form a virus infection :) Otherwise I try not to get outside, I’ve collected a lot of supplies so I don’t have to. If it gets warmer I will spend more time in the garden (actually winter just arrived here with snow and everything, it’s so weird, we really messed up Mother Nature...) 

I also bought some fitness equipment, including a barbell and a resistance band so that I can do Les Mills workouts at home in front of TV hehee it’s crazy - I subscribed to Les Mills on demand - highly recommend it if you need motivation to move your limbs a little. And well, that’s it... 

tagging: @novamm66 @diagk @theblackdomino @malwa1216 @love-in-nature

#personal #thevikingwoman #A bit about me

[aroaessidhe]

Hello fellow book fanartists! I had some thoughts the other day, along the lines of: 

I wish there was more fanart for xyz diverse/queer books!

There must be more artists that consistently do fanart for books that don’t have much/any fanart, but I can only think of a handful….

I should organise a zine specifically for fanart of diverse books that don’t have any fanart!

I have never even been in a zine, let alone organised one…..maybe not….

Anyway, I don’t think a zine is the way to start but…..something? a hashtag? a monthly challenge thing? A twitter/tumblr account to reblog stuff?  Even just finding more fanartists I don’t know about would be cool tbh! (this applies more to twitter/instagram, rather than tumblr where it’s somewhat easier to check tags)  If designers, people who make edits, bloggers, fic writers, wanted to get in on this somehow i’d be into that too!!

Whatever it is, I’d want it to focus on books where the main character/s are canonically queer, trans, poc, not just major side characters or subtext. Also books by ownvoices/marginalised authors - I do notice that the most popular m/m books that have a lot of fanart are ones written by white women, rather than ownvoices m/m books (especially those by poc), for example . (I’m not hating on people who do fanart for those books either - just pointing it out!)

Actually, I drafted this post ages ago and have just been too busy to do anything with it, but I decided to make a twitter (currently @diversebookart) for retweeting art on there - so that exists, at the very least! Keen for other things to happen if other people are keen to, though! (and if you post your book fanart on twitter please @ it to me so I can rt it!)

I’ve also definitely noticed in the last couple years that tumblr isn’t the best place for book fanart unless it’s got a pretty big fandom - which is generally not the books I’m talking about here. And on twitter and stuff, it’s rarely tagged and gets lost after a few days. I definitely understand having more motivation to do art of more popular things, especially for those of us who are freelancing (and getting more attention on social media can be really important for), but maybe a hashtag could help that stuff not get like, seen by the author + a handful of people and then nothing after a week. idk. Basically I want to do something that a) creates more fanart for books that don’t have it and b) boosts artists work when we make it! No like, obligation to do certain art of certain things

I’m posting this here because I don’t have any other blog for this sort of thing, but I’ll definitely talk about it on twitter (@layahimalaya and @aroaessidhe are my art and fandom accounts, but also @diversebookart since I’ve made that now) 

Anyway!!! This is just some thoughts, but if anyone else has some thoughts, let me know???? I could make a group chat on twitter, or maybe a discord server, if people are into that. I tagged a bunch of people off the top of my head (& also looking through art i’ve rebblogged) who either have done book fanart of some books with barely any fanart, or some people who do fanart of more popular but still diverse books. Some people who only do like 5% book fanart, too. Feel free to ignore this if you want and also tell me if I missed anyone obvious!!!

EDIT: I also made a discord, which is here, and a tumblr: @diversebookfanart

@nellasbookplanet @ace-artemis-fanartist @may12324 @yabookportraits @lesyablackbird @phantomrin @ghostbeeish @caitabellart @monolime@vinnie-cha @linovadraws @gibbarts @aymmidumps @emieclat @vulpyx @tonftyhw @itsiparwing @benevolenterrancy @rowatree @taratjah @oblivionsdream  @moonlit-sketches  @alexisc-art @hyperhs @drisrt @whitefire17draws

#i've been thinking about this for literally months but been too busy to do anything #I would make a tumblr @diversebookart but it would overlap so much with my book blog #(this blog i mean) #but if anyone else would be interested in helping run it: then maybe! #i dunno if you all are frequent discord users but i could make a server to chat about stuff if people are

[sisterhoodbrij-blog]

Inaugural post of this blog. The pic above is me with Hunt, my beloved (recently and unfortunately deceased) mental health companion animal (if a companion dog is good enough for Carrie Fisher, who also had bipolar disorder, it’s good enough for me). Yes, I named him after James.

Heads-up: long post, swears and Battlestar Galactica-themed profanity, divorce, family drama, discussion of bipolar disorder, specifically psychosis and suicidal ideation

I started this Tumblr, because it was pointed out to me that authenticity is talking about the shit times too. How can I help the next generation of social entrepreneurs if I don’t talk about the stuff that I’m struggling with? I’ll paint an unnaturally rosy picture of entrepreneurship, which is very inauthentic (and I really wish those perky business advice people would talk about the struggles instead of ).

So here comes some authenticity about dealing with family and life drama while trying to start a movement.

I’ve been running Motorsport Sisterhood since August 2015. (The website anniversary is September 15th, 2015, so that’s where we officially count from - we count birthdays, not conception days.) For the most part, it’s felt like yelling into the void. I yelled into the void for a full frakking year before people (other than my friends, who I’m pretty sure got sick of forced adds to groups and tags in FB and Twitter posts with requests to RT) started to respond to me.

My own frakking mother didn’t even like my Facebook page for over a year, until I complained that she didn’t support my organisation. Then she started doing that thing where she commented on posts, criticising them without reading them. On a post about suicide - that was really brave of me to write, because it was so personal, and I angled it very much towards ‘seek professional help’ - she commented, ‘Uh, I would’ve thought going to see a psychologist would be a good idea!’ This from the woman who spent the best part of a decade pretending my symptoms were either a personality flaw for her to manipulate, shame, and gas-light out of me, or a demon that needed to be exorcised. (She did try an exorcism once when I got grumpy because my grandmother told me not to sit on the same side of the car as my mother as I would ‘break the suspension’. Incidentally, two fat women won’t break the suspension. Packing the car full of people and stuff and driving it on a long road-trip on a bumpy road breaks the suspension. I learned this lesson in that car in real life. Prior to the evil bitch’s claims that my then-120kg self would break the suspension. But point aside, my mother’s attempt at an exorcism caused a psychotic break in which I heard a voice in the room that spoke words of comfort to me, and gave me tips for self-care. Best auditory hallucination ever! If I had been religious at the time, I would probably have written it down as a word from the Lord. I mean, how many other people have a psychotic-break head-voice that gives good self-care advice?) I can’t win with her.

Then in March this year, she started slowly and painfully divorcing my dad, and (due to circumstances she claims were beyond her control) made me responsible for sorting through her belongings (she’s a hoarder and they’ve been married 40 years, so a lot of junk has accumulated), sending her the things she wants (the entire scarf collection must be shipped, but the wedding dress and lingerie [which is way more kinky than I ever wanted to contemplate in the context of my parents...I’m off red pleather suspenders for life after realising my dad was into that!] must be 'got rid of’), and finding appropriate homes for the vast majority of her belongings. And in my birthday phonecall from her, she had the gall to say, ‘Now you understand why I was so beady with you for not helping when we moved from [previous address] to [current address]!’ (It. Was. Her. Stuff. I packed and moved my own stuff, in addition to helping a bit with hers out of the goodness of my heart. Her stuff, her problem, right?) So around all the day-job and Sisterhood things, I’ve been silently disassembling my family home.

I feel like an awful feminist for taking my dad’s side in the divorce. I know that women almost always end up worse off financially, but I can’t bring myself to care enough to call her in over the bad economic decisions she’s making. I know that a lot of women are in abusive relationships and struggle to leave, but I don’t buy her story that Dad was an angry, abusive wife-beater their entire marriage. (Show me the bruises! I have way more scarring memories of her yelling for no reason - for example, when my deputy headmaster snitched on me for wanting to kill myself as a teenager, she yelled for two hours straight [literally spitting mad] about how I could keep secrets and humiliate her by telling Rod Montague [the deputy head in question] instead of her [I skipped manual labour {ditch digging around the school grounds; standard punishment for calling the French teacher an ill-informed bitch when she corrected my grammar when I wasn’t even wrong according to the textbook} to kill myself, and didn’t end up killing myself because she got home from the shop early, and then I had to give Rod Montague a reason for not taking my punishment] and air our family’s dirty laundry in public - than I do of him. He has the occasional eruption of irrational, angry yelling, but most people reach breaking point sometimes.) I’m 100% on Team Dad because she’s so frakking bonkers and self-centred and crazy-making, but feel like I should side with her because she was also born with a vagina and is being disadvantaged by society’s views on said vagina, in addition to her own shitty life choices.

So, if you know someone as crazy-making as my mother, here’s some advice from what I’m learning at the moment.

- Distance is good. Find a way to get some space. Thankfully, mine moved countries of her own accord, and gifted me with the space to see how toxic she was.

- Limit communication to safe topics. Do. Not. Engage. Recognise and dodge the crazy. If they get angry with you, deflect onto a safe topic. Keep deflecting. Don’t let them near your soft underbelly. Have a wing-buddy where possible.

- Lean into your community. As in, pick up the frakking telephone and call a human being you like and trust. No vaguebooking and hoping someone notices your pain. Choose specific people who are good listeners, and are possibly willing and able to wing-buddy for you when you’re around the crazy factory. Call them, and talk, preferably in person and not at the crazy-maker’s house.

- Get a therapist/coach/professional help of some description. They can put names to the things the crazy-maker does that make you feel bad. Having words to google is so frakking helpful! They can also reassure you that you are unlikely to have contracted pathological narcissism.

- Take care of yourself. Exercise. Read books you love. Eat nutritious food. Keep your body and living space clean(ish). Complete the sentence, ‘I show love to [person you love] by...’ then do the things to yourself.

If you have any advice to add, add it in the reblogs!

#personal #long post #Carrie Fisher #Battlestar Galactica #frak #gaslighting #family drama #divorce #suicide #bipolar disorder #psychosis #James Hunt #the Mother of Doom #self-care

[samanthabarnespaints]

Just One Thing A Day Towards Your True Vocation - Perfect Monday Reading!

Just One Thing A Day Towards Your True Vocation. ArtMummy Blog

May 28, 2017

Solo Creative is my share of 20+ in my industry of being a self-employed practising artist. Together and in no particular order, I'm going to be re-reading my diaries for you, tacking some of the problems I encountered, all of which are absolutely relevant for today, perhaps even more so that there are so many of us now working freelance.  

Feel free to send me any questions and I'll do my best to reply.  

One Thing A Day Toward Your True Vocation.

To make this applicable to everyone, I am going to write to you as if you are working in your back bedroom or garage and probably working elsewhere to get the money in.  I'm imagining that you are frustrated that all those years of study/work learning your skill has led you to where you are now and assume that you want to go further, earn more money and get a little more recognition for your art and perhaps more importantly, gain more time to make more work - all of which is highly doable.

I remember this stage well.  I remember the burning frustration I had at spending at least 8 hours per day on someone else's business let alone the hours I spent on trains and in cars getting to the actual office and back.    I'd been out of art school for a number of years by now and wasn't getting anywhere fast - or so I thought.   In retrospect I see that all my previous jobs helped me in various ways to become the artist that I am now.  I worked for a frenetic event organising agency as a general dog's body which of course helped me in the future to organise my own exhibitions and shows, another job was in The V&A Museum in the book shop, gaining vital retail skills , another position was cold-calling for a presentation company, again, honing those vital communication skills.  All very well to look back and see how each job helped me and the benefits I got from them -  but not then, in those actual years and months I could not have felt further away from my vocation and my precious time away from my drawing board seemed to go SO slowly.  

To combat some of the annoyance at my portfolio of artwork laying dormant under my bed, I told myself that I was going to do one thing a day, just ONE THING that would help me get to my dream of being a full time artist.  My one thing a day consisted of anything - literally anything that would help me get to my end goal.  Sometimes it was simply buying myself a paint brush, other times it might have been phoning a gallery to ask how like their artists to approach them, visiting an exhibition, calling an old friend from art college, take part in a life drawing class - my one thing a day helped me beyond measure because, weekends included, I was doing 30 things a month and those 30 added up fast to something much bigger.

My one-thing-a-day stage lasted for about 4 years and in that time I held my first exhibition, broke my arm and used the time off to paint (yes, with my broken arm) started to make new paintings and drawings, joined a printmaking studio and did the odd class and workshop and began to connect with other artists outside of my paid job hours.  I can't tell you that it was easy, but the frustration was certainly lessoned by my one-thing-a-day-plan.  I can see now that I  needed that frustration because that gave me persistence and determination to succeed in becoming a full time career artist.  

So now over to you - how can you implement the one-thing-a-day-plan?  My advice is to keep it simple when you begin, the smaller the thing the more your confidence builds.  Don't overtire yourself because you are precious.  Keep a journal, sketchbook or notebook to keep track of your things and like planting seeds, watch them grow.

Best, Samantha

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