After spending a while indulging the random tangents that enter my head, I think it's probably best to try and bring it all back down to earth. I mean, the reason I indulge any thought process, is that I feel it's worth exploring, as it influences the work. Sure, this is meant to focus on developing creativity and art, but I think it's hard to do that without acknowledging the environment that surrounds us.
Having said that though, sometimes I know it gets a bit too much like smelling your own farts, so it pays to get back into the brass of it all.
In the last few weeks I think I've turned a little bit of a corner as I doodle away without any direction. I've naturally gravitated toward doodling with pens instead of pencils, which is surprising to me, but I'm getting a lot more out of ink than graphite right now.
I started thinking about ink as restrictive due to the permanency of each mark on the page, so I tried to keep it neat and tidy. The hard thing is that this takes a lot of planning and every line needs to be thought out in advance, so there's actually little opportunity for expression. It's a useful technique to practice, as it helps you be a bit more mindful about what you're drawing, but it feels incredibly blocked up and too tight for comfort.
Eventually this dawned on me and I figured I'd just make messy marks with the ink, regardless of how messy it turned out. Instead of worrying about keeping each line neat, it was great to be committing to the freedom of chaos. Rather than planning everything out, it ends up more like an improvisation where you have to go along with whatever starts the conversation. Once a mark is made, there's no going back, so it's forward until an end result is discovered.
It's this element of discovery that's really pulled me into the messy pen doodles that I think have been some of the most fun and interesting doodles I've done recently. Of course, none of these mean anything, but I feel like I've levelled up an element of understanding.
Part of me feels like this kind of understanding would never be achieved through using pencils and erasers, as there's always the motivation to edit and create the best version of the idea. Instead, using permanent ink means that everything has to work from the outset, so when you end up with an acceptable image the accomplishment is amplified. Ultimately I'd like to employ a mix of everything if I were trying to make a fully formed piece of art, which is far from what we're doing here. However, starting off with a pencil sketch is a great way to refine ideas before jumping in with the pens. At least now I know that when it gets to the pen stage, there's plenty of room for movement and I'm not stuck on a linear path.
So these posts will probably continue in their own way, as a mix of intellectual tangents and creative philosophy, and furthering the purpose of doodling and the quality produced. As always, I'm not aiming for any of this to achieve any level of value or substance, so forgive me if it continues to exist as an abstract mess of thought dumps on paper.
Coinciding with all of this though, is the bigger picture of artistic pursuits that I've been giving some serious thought to lately. I mean, there's always a question in my mind about whether or not I should bother doing something, or if I should focus my efforts elsewhere.
I'm sure we all know what it's like when we think about the ways we want to spend our time doing the things we want to be doing. It sounds nice in your head and there are tasks and hobbies that appear attractive and worthwhile, but we're still not sold. After all, if we really wanted to do something, we'd be doing it, right? Isn't that what all the successful people say? That they became the greatest version of themselves because they didn't understand there was any other way of being?
It's what drives my own self-doubt in life, as I'm always worried that my time is being wasted. The harsh result of this paralysis is that I end up wasting my time anyway, thanks to the immobilising nature of choice surrounded by doubt.
Maybe we should all just make a choice and stick to it for better or worse; maybe that's the way our parents got shit done. I've always thought that we're extremely fortunate to live in a time and place where every option is available to us and we're constantly told that we can do anything we put our efforts into. Don't get me wrong, I'm completely appreciative of all the benefits that existing in my reality affords me, but at times it's not all it's cracked up to be.
This could probably be an entire post on its own, but part of me wishes that I was only capable of filling a single role in life. At least then I could focus on getting on with it and making the most of the situation. It's not even limited to work, but even something as intimate as creating a family and all that good stuff can be exhausting.
I personally think that most people are good people and it's very hard to distinguish one from the other most of the time, so the idea of arranges marriages has never seemed that bad to me. I'm not saying that I want to go and adopt this tradition, but it makes me stop and think for a second. After all, if you know you have to spend the rest of your life with someone and make a family work, wouldn't it be in your best interests to make the most of it and learn to love the one your with?
Of course this is getting into some areas that are quite uncomfortable for people in our Australian culture to think about. We're all so tied up in the individualistic way of seeing the world where everything and anything is possible. We've been promised our dreams, but I fear most of our dreams are unattainable. I'm constantly seeing people around me making choices based on expectations and what they think they want out of life, rather than what they actually find desirable in life.
I'm not complaining, I know I've got it pretty damn good from an objective perspective, but I can't help feeling like having so much choice is nothing more than crippling. I don't want to do anything in the world, I just want to be happy.
Which brings me back to other artistic and creative pursuits that may or may not be as interesting as I feel they should be. It sounds dumb to say, but I only like painting when everything is in its correct place. I've been working on this lately by preparing myself with plenty of resources and opportunities to get stuck in when inspiration strikes. What worries me is the idea that if I really wanted to be painting, surely I'd be painting?
People always talk about how they do a thing because they can't not do the thing. I'm not sure I've ever felt that way about anything at any time in my life. The closest I get is writing, as I always seem to have something on the go that involves writing words, but I've never considered that anything more than a means to another end.
Lately I've been thinking that maybe that's where I've been going wrong. Perhaps I like writing about art and games and everything else I'm into, because I like writing. What if my drive is focused more on writing something than it is on the thing I'm writing about? What if I've totally missed a trick there and been blind to it all along? What if that's all bullshit and I'm just talking crap and still have nothing that really pulls me either way?
It's easy to sabotage these trains of thought, so I'll attempt not to do so. However, I still think that I lack that inherent drive to do certain things that I really like doing, thus rendering the entire process moot.
At the same time, we're still humans aren't we? All of us exist in a society that has certain requirements of participation that must be met. If I'm supposed to be prosperous, surely I need work and income and a way to participate and engage with my community. It's all very romantic and beautiful to talk about being self-sustainable and living off the grid, but I've never met anyone who was able to accomplish this without some sort of foundation to leave behind. It's a sad irony to say that the less you have, the more you're required to participate in the constructs of social function.
Let's not talk about the merits of participation in a capitalistic free market society, as it's not going to help us at the end of the day. The point is that the need to find work and make an income has a lot to do with the decisions we make in life. It's funny that I've always been told I can accomplish anything, but as soon as I say I want to "be a writer" or "be an artist" I get shot down with the usual "you can't make money doing that".
It sounds cliché, but it's entirely accurate to highlight how discouraging it is to be interested in vocations that are not economically supportive. There's a reason so many people I know have ended up choosing teaching or nursing as their vocation, because these are roles that will always need to be filled. I hope like hell that they are all passionate about the work, but I just can't bring myself to lock into something I've never been that interested in.
Instead I try to continually justify my own aimless meandering around the world of interests and production. I've had many different jobs over the years and none of them were fulfilling, but a few of them were tolerable. When you have no interest in the work you're doing, it really falls on the other people you're working with to make it tolerable. We all know how reliable it is to end up with colleagues we enjoy being around, so even the people aren't reliable enough to make it bearable.
I guess I'm at a loss for what to do in life and how to focus my working efforts. I enjoy graphic design and have always had fun with my freelance business, but I hate advertising and marketing and the line between the two continues to blur. I'm not sure how to contain design and illustration to a format that can be financially sustainable, but also avoid the trappings of advertising and marketing. If anyone has the keys to that particular kingdom, let me know! It might be a revelation to benefit many more folks than just me.
Anyway, that leaves me here, exploring the infinite landscape of possibility without a compass or any form of guidance to clear the horizon. It might not sound like this has anything to do with the creative work at all, but it's essentially tied in with everything that drives creativity, so I find it hard to stay away from these tangents.
Here's hoping that I can report some fun discoveries in the next few posts. I'm not sure I want to keep wandering around aimlessly bumping into random existential thoughts. It's fun for a while, but spinning the wheel gets tiring fast.