Fanart / Okami Year of the Tachigami/Rat! Happy Lunar New Year 2020! + Rolling up my sleeves update
** This post is a 8 minute read! **
Okami Lunar New Year 2020: Cute Tachigami! Lunar New Year is here since yesterday!
Tachigami, the Celestial God of Power Slash! Was watching a blind playthrough stream of Okami as I did this too ;D The power slash is one of the most used abilities I think!
Decided to go with one of my cute art styles so that I’m not following so close to the official style. This project started since 2015 so if you’re interested, see previous years through this tag here!
I hope Okami gets a sequel one day <3
And hello I’m back! 😀 I don’t do anything during Lunar New Year but I definitely miss some of the food :<
Leonie rambles and update
On bushfires
Devastating Australian bushfires, climate change, politics and world news is a constant worry and concern. Please donate to help the firefighters, people, animals, homes/habitats, communities and fauna affected if you’re able to help! Or get Kyle T Webster’s Limited Time Oz Brushes (for Australian Red Cross), I managed to donate to that. I don’t know the full picture but platypuses, koalas from the New South Wales & some bird species are at risk or are already endangered and there’s been some heavy losses with homes, lives and resources too 🙁
Also if you’re not in a sustainable financial position like I am, don’t feel pressured to donate – just spread the word to those who can! It’s okay if you’re frugal and tight with money – you’re not alone :’)
I translated vaguely about what’s going on to family, making sure we keep the smell of the smoke out (thanks to the smoke, it’s one of the places with the worst air quality in the world earlier this month) and stayed inside when possible. Hassle people to wear P2 face masks (there’s been low supply of them too). The air quality is better where I am as of writing but the fires are still going unfortunately.
Kept away from my twitter feed and and decided to keep tabs on airvisual for the air quality when needed.
What are my dreams now? On Ikigai (生き甲斐)
Feeling super weird, mixed and sad during this ongoing dry freelance period. One day I’ll get used to being constantly uncertain and not knowing where my “big goals for the new decade/career/life” are. One day? I am not hopeful but on the fence. Because who am I kidding, I’ll always be on my toes ;P
Figuring out something that gives me meaning and purpose, that combines what I’m good at, what the world needs, what I can get paid for and what I love (Ikigai, a reason for being) has been swirling around in my mind.
So thinking aloud:
- I’m alright/good at breaking things down and learning, making cute characters, making blog content and rambling a lot
- the world (in my subjective opinion) needs more meaningful, wholesome, simple moments and stories – things that cheer people up, motivate them to make the world a better place, to experience wonderfully meaningful work and keeping things real.
- I strive to be paid for freelance illustration, character design and one day through the online art and posts I already put out there.
- I enjoy watching and playing games, food, learning how to do better with my brain and through others’ experiences. Plus learning art, movies, comics, wonderful music and whatever I end up interested in to better myself and ramble about it here. To be able to work from home at my own hermit island too? ;D
Based from this, my dream is to be able to build a prosperous, fulfilling, creative career that includes having the above in my life. I hope to emotionally connect with people through my work and build meaningful things bigger than myself through both my own and others’ projects.
Others include:
- to be able to do more life admin things. Not be conned by random, dodgy, hustling door knockers with below average services (I won’t go into here but my family got scammed in recent months and I ended up being even more suspicious of strangers),
- to have eczema managed (been battling with hurting, peeling, wounded, dry, flaky, itchy and/or sensitive skin for ages!),
- to have a better handle with loneliness and my mental health by slowing down and breathing whenever I’m super anxious, tense, negative,
- to not have stress/tension/resentment/anger/guilt tripping/anxiety at home by blocking out insults, managing my emotions and thoughts better,
- keep exercising almost everyday and make it a habit of moving about during breaks too,
- maintain good sleep :’)
- keep going with intermittent fasting, manage my “depression junk/comfort food” better and ease into healthier snack foods
- focus on doing the best I can and to be happy and healthy with loved ones and my friendships. Even through the mistakes and my hermit-ness.
- to be able to love and feel loved. Ah well.
One small step at a time! :’)
Art struggles and indecision
Been struggling and not feeling fulfilled doing art when I started my hiatus because I didn’t feel like I’m learning anymore or I kept feeling limited and getting stuck.
Did I burn myself out that bad that I don’t want to do art anymore? What’s wrong with me? What is interesting to me? What do I want to do? Am I just doing it because I’m telling myself this is what I want? There’s already lots of wonderfully skilled people doing what I want to do already – why should I bother? How am I special?? Trying to let go of the self and career pressure. And take it slow.
Became super glum about things as a result again. Upon reflection I know that I’ve been letting my mind and feelings run around in circles too much and paralysing myself. My brain knows that I should just act and commit to something and it’s just my feelings and fears slowing me down.
Planning every week stresses me out with self judgement, pressure and anxiety instead so now I’m just happy to be just progressing day to day. I’m in this journey for *all my life* after all – the bigger picture!! So why stress so much about it? I’ll just enjoy doing things that matters to me and helps me be better as an artist and a person!
Draw something or do at least a study everyday and post some of them at the blog. Focus on practicing and not performing most of the time. That is why I won’t “post everyday” as that’s super unhelpful for me and forces me back into “performance mode” and getting too distracted on social media. It becomes art for the wrong reasons. Shall keep learning and juggling with what I need to get better at instead!
Manage the anxiety of “trying to get a job/work” and focus on the lifelong journey of getting better as an artist. Leonie, remember that’s your focus this year! It’s okay to make mistakes as long as you’re learning from them :’)
I think the vague social media hiatus helped heaps! I want to keep it going and not use twitter and instagram much aside from peeking at my selective feed a little, posting and replying ;D Please understand that I don’t check social media all the time and I’m out of the loop :0
Taking long breaks from social media is great, please do it when you’re feeling overwhelmed and depressed with it all! I still check/lurk email, youtube, twitch, discord, slack and this blog so I’m not completely off the grid ;P
Super Nintendo World rambles
Super Nintendo World at Universal Studio Parks seems exciting and I’m keen to go one day. I don’t know if I want to do parkour in order to traverse it though, what happens when you die? D:
I wish there was a VR Luigi’s Mansion escape room kind of thing where you catch ghosts, do puzzles and find money. But small steps I suppose :< I’m certain there’ll be Pokemon world and Zelda world once this one is established. I don’t know if I like the song for the music video because it’s not the soundtrack I was expecting :’) Yay people are happy running and jumping to avoid death!! ;D
Patreon & pulling my sleeves up!
Resolving to give it my best really. I can’t see myself doing anything else – there’s no such job out there where I can just ramble away like this in my blog and be able to have creative freedom and work how I like ;P I think Patreon is a super encouraging & lovely way to help me keep going with my own art and blog adventures. Hey likes and shares don’t represent financial success and stability so I should probably keep posting art with Patreon and potential freelance work in mind :’)
I’m just super lucky that I have 5 patrons to support me a little; thank you!! 😭 I’ll resume my patreon for February so patrons will be billed at the start of March (: Thank youuuu <3
I won’t have a paywall since I’ve always shared personal work & progress free here. I am considering doing art pieces in gratitude when milestones happen though! But I’m still figuring things out and don’t want to give myself too much work right now. I need to study and learn things first!
Next month onwards I’ll be doing at least one progress update blog post, set on every last Sunday of the month. And post art shenanigans as their own little individual posts if they’re time sensitive (ie the previous impromptu Charlie Red post) or on a Sunday! That makes posts more broken down, clearer & easier to consume, convenient and I don’t have to keep moving things about to bundle things into compilation weekly/fortnightly blog posts. The email newsletter becomes a weekly digest again. I don’t have to worry about social media versus blog posts anymore when I’m releasing the same things at the same time! Phew less juggling for me!
Making it work for me and for you for the new year! I hope!
Thanks so much for reading my blog!! <3
Hope your new year has been alright so far and not too stressful and mixed like mine was! Gosh 2020 has been quite a year so far!
Happy to be back and uh hullo 2020!
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