This is the condensed version of a much longer post I wrote on my present state of burnout, both burnout on certain commission topics, as well as physical burnout from overwork. 100% of the pertinent information is in this version tho. I think this gets the point across though, so i don't think i need to go into further detail. Sorry it's long, this was kinda tricky to write tbh, this is not the easiest thing to put into words but I've tried (It's taken me like two whole days to write this for the record). you can scroll down for a tl;dr version if you don't have time to read the full version. There's a general newsletter update at the bottom.

⚠️ important disclaimer (pls read)⚠️
no one individual commissioner is causing me to burn out, so eliminate the thought immediately that anything i'm about to say is your fault. this is something i've struggled to communicate for a very long time, so don't feel guilty or anything if you commissioned me to draw your favorite thing, and it turned out to not be my favorite thing. how on earth could you have possibly known? you couldn't is what i'm saying. so don't feel like you have the remotest inkling of a crumb of an iota of responsibility for what i'm about to say, seriously, it's a me problem, not a you problem. but with that out of the way, i do have to live my truth, so no hard feelings okay? thank you <3

-i'm a little burnt out on hard kinks and "furry logic" fetish material. And by a little burnt out, I mean very much a lot burnt out. i'm not just burnt out on the subjects, i'm like completely, physically burnt out in general and pretty mentally fried also. but more on that in a bit.

-i'm comfortable drawing hard kink and furry logic fetish pics every now and again, it can be a lot of fun, but i've come to the realization that i'm not exactly comfortable drawing several hundred of them in a row, all day every day, for years on end, with no days off and nothing in between. to be honest, i'm really not even comfortable doing that with nsfw. yeah, this post has kinda been a long time coming.. but I've struggling to bring myself to make it for all kinds of reasons, it's a little awkward.

-allow me to reiterate: it's not any one individual's commissions that are causing me discomfort, you're absolutely fine, i mean it. even you with the really weird stuff.. the really weird stuff... i promise, you're fine. but i am feeling a little bit uncomfy *in general* with the subject matter i'm drawing, because things that used to be an occasional change of pace, are now just the entirety of the whole ass entire pace. it's a problem of proportion more so than composition.

-i haven't crunched the numbers, but the ratio FEELS like 10:1 (or more) between commissions that are extremely demanding to execute and only appeal to a narrow niche, vs. commissions that are simple to execute and have broad appeal. sometimes a niche pic is an unexpected hit, but these are the exception and it's not something that can reliably be manufactured and replicated.

-i'm sure you can guess which category of work has been the most helpful in getting the bsky up and running now that twitter's become untenable.. (hint: it's not the freak shit). i've been uploading stuff from the back catalog, and when I scroll thru the hundreds of pics from over the years, there's only a handful I actually want to promote as something I'd like to draw more of. kind of a disadvantage when there's now this overwhelming moral duty to ditch twitter and you can't even use your back catalog to do so..

-on top of this, hyperkink/furrylogic commissions are actually kinda really extremely tricky to draw in general, due to needing to bend the confines of anatomy as well as the physical laws of the universe in the process. they very frequently go way over schedule and sometimes I'm having to invent some way to quite literally depict the impossible. they're prone to accidents, delays and fuckups. and over-time always comes out of my paycheck and when these go wrong they cause serious pileups that keep me occupied around the clock.

-i'm up for a serious challenge from time to time, but once again a very high proportion of my commissions are black diamond courses involving complex characters bending all constraints of anatomy, physics, perspective and/or taste. i spend a lot of time working at the absolute extreme limit of my drawing and design ability to make these pics like feasible and appealing. and it genuinely takes a lot out of me that i am just not getting back in any way shape or form at the end of the day. the limit pushing stuff actually does kind of push me to the absolute limit too. i'm never able to recover my batteries to 100%.. or even to 60%... I'm starting to feel pretty hollowed out.

-so it may be coming into focus how this is a serious burnout-inducing, hate to use the word crisis, so let's say dilemma. time-consuming, difficult to execute, and largely unmarketable commissions have kind of become the cuckoo chick in the nest as the old swedish folk saying goes (it's a metaphor about brood parasitism). they eat up a lot of time, substantially reducing the number of pics i even produce, they go over schedule and tire me out, further eating into my other commissions as well as all my free time, and when it comes time to finally post them, they only bring in more of the same while repelling the lot of people who would otherwise follow/commission/promote the type of stuff i'd honestly much rather be drawing in the first place.. so it becomes its own dilemma if it's even worth uploading. and this has been a big contributor to my declining upload schedule. there's a large amount of work now that i simply am not uploading or promoting because i wouldn't be able to handle more of it (it's in the early access channel still tho).

-i wish this wasn't as important as it is rn. popularity is becoming something of a critical factor in stability, which means it's becoming a determining factor in survival. hate to put it in crass terms like this, but there is something of an opportunity cost to spending a lot of most of my time drawing subjects that the majority finds unappealing. like i said this wasn't as much of an issue even just a few short years ago. maybe things accelerated like crazy the last few years and we are just firmly in the influencer/social media era now, or maybe the people on the bottom of the totem pole just all get shaken out during a recession because there's no discretionary spending anymore. either way, some of the other artists maybe have noticed this as well, but atm a viral hit post on ur socials is doing a lot more to bring in business than the week's 4th 'commissions open/adopts still available reminder' on FA. sad but true! And really it's not all about popularity or money, doing something unpopular can still be really good for you if it's for your own personal gratification and if it's something you're passionate about that you feel is underrepresented.. but about that..

-i've gotten somewhat pegged as a hyperkink/furrylogic specialist, when the reality is, i'm just a generalist *capable* of drawing hyperkink/furrylogic stuff, but who in all actuality, just prefers everyday slice of life and vanilla themes with maybe some rough bdsm every once in a while as a treat. hope you aren't wiping your coffee off the screen after reading that. most of the stuff in the gallery has more to do with clients' taste than my own, hate to shatter the illusion.. i'm actually not all that horni (sorry). i've been told there aren't enough artists at this level of ability servicing some of these niche subjects, so it makes sense why they're always in demand. but right now it is a lot more than i am actually comfortable with and i think i do have to find a way to get some semblance of balance. i'm creatively frustrated to be honest. regardless of how you feel about getting pegged, surely you don't want to get pegged by your "job" all day every day, 7 days a week.. for years on end..

-things like this are awkward to admit. the level of burnout i'm at currently is kind of serious. by kind of, i mean kind of very. not to cause alarm of course, but i've let it get bad. i've uh.. developed a couple physical and some borderline actual mental problems from the chronic stress, fatigue and overwork at this point, i can't mince words about it or keep pretending i'm like, well. this is all intertwined with a chronic shoulder problem that never gets the rest to heal up ever and 2-3 recurrent RSI problems that regularly flare up in my drawing arm. when i say i'm burnt out i don't mean i'm just a little bored and understimulated in my 9 to 5. i mean that my physical and mental health have in a noticeable way been steadily declining and instead of addressing it, i've been brushing it aside and whipping myself to work harder. once again this isn't anyone's fault, this has more to do with like, deep-seated personal issues within myself that we're not going to go into here.. look, please don't be alarmed by what i'm saying.. i do have an irl support network, i'll be okay. and the silver lining in all this is that i have actually started *working on myself*, so ultimately i am in a better spot than i have been in many years, even if i am sort of *objectively* in a worse spot.. better late than never.. i'm having this long overdue conversation with you, because i've been having some long overdue conversations with myself. i don't even want to talk about this stuff, i don't want you to even know about it, but it's at the point where it is now impossible to brush aside. you don't need to send me get well cards and flowers, but if you feel you want to do something to help alleviate my present burnout, next commission let me do creative freedom or something, i may give a discount, promocode SMOKES (but don't use the promocode if you're a person who can comfortably afford to pay full price..).

-i don't want to say i'm feeling 'trapped', that's a little unfair to you all, but i sometimes feel like i'm flooring the pedal of a jeep stuck in the mud and only digging it in deeper.. i need a bit of a winch to get me out at the moment, but what i actually need in the long run is like a subaru with symmetrical AWD.. (both in the metaphor but come to think of it irl), and that's kind of why i've been working on this rebrand since october (it's slow going, i' don't get a lot of free time).. but that's a whole other topic. i'll describe the winch.

-going forward i will be posting a new ToS where I highlight the point that some subjects have completely worn me out. I do still want to remain open to covering niche subjects, and I don't want to hit my most loyal commissioners with a burnout tax, so here's the compromise i'm going to make, and please let me know if the following is completely beyond the pale:

-I'm going to ask that if you'd like me to work on demanding and unmarketable pictures, that you either pay the private commission fee (we'll call this the burnout tax), or, if you volunteer the information to me that you're a patron when commissioning, i'll charge you at the regular rate, as you are supporting to me to work on my own personal artistic vision. so supporters/fans of the svenonline patreon will be given preference in this regard, but if you're asking me to do a lot of them, i'd like your pledge level to reflect that. I may also be setting some total limit on the number somehow, I've yet to think of the best, fairest way to do this. I do have a couple niche kink regulars who I have an enjoyable collaborative relationship with also, and I don't want them to get fleeced or excluded from getting comms.

-I'd like to emphasize that this policy will be in effect *going forward*, so if you're one of the few people who commissioned a niche commission that I'm presently overdue on, rest assured, I am not expecting any sort of pledge from you; I'm not ransoming the completion of your pic for patronage, although come to think of it that's a great idea... (kidding, i'm sorry about the holdup). This is for future commissions and is just the only way i'll get the situation under control. and if you're someone who commissioned me a niche topic like 3 days ago or something, dw about it either, this is all stuff going forward so don't even sweat it.

-please there's no need to DM me and ask if a commission you asked for was too much, it's completely fine, like I said it's about the proportion of certain comms relative to others, not the composition of individual comms. but having read this, you are now aware that there are certain topics that i am a bit spent on, so in my present condition i do ask that people take this into consideration when asking me to draw them. keep in mind some of these things may feel like you're asking a lot of me... and let's just say if i go to your media tab and see fresh art every day of the week by all the top Name Brand artists.. and photos of you posing in a fursuit by one of Furrydom's top suitmakers.. next to the exact car from Gran Turismo 1 & 2 (you know the one).. i may be asking a lot of you too.. ;))

-thank you for reading my life story <33, let me say for the last time, don't feel bad, don't be alarmed, i am taking the steps to get my workload and burnout situation under control. i am still going to have to work a lot, but just having the personal stuff as variation is doing wonders for my motivation and mental health rn (even though it's causing me to work even harder). as a special little treat for making it this far if anyone can guess what Smokes' actual favorite subject to draw is there's a free in-slot commission slot with your name on it for next month. Comment below. No cheating if i've ever told u the answer of course. One guess per head!

tl;dr:
-i kind of work around the clock on commissions and don't do personal art anymore, i'm sure you guys are stressed out too rn, life is hard rn
-there is and has for several years been a wide mismatch between the subjects i'm frequently commissioned, and what i genuinely enjoy drawing, something of a chasm unfortunately, lack of free time and hobby projects has made this more than a little unbearable atm
-this has led to a feedback loop where the only work i get asked to do is the type of thing people have seen me do
-a lot of this work is niche, extreme, divisive, by it's nature it'll always be underground
-popularity and opportunity are very much intertwined in the current climate, it is what it is, being 100% underground won't cut it anymore (i'm an influencer now :3)
-i'm spending both all my work time and all my free time working on unpopular art that i personally don't get any gratification out of
-on top of this most of these subjects require me to work at my absolute limit of skill and effort to pull off, challenging the laws of anatomy, perspective and physics at every step
-this means that they're prone to delays, fuckups, accidents and being scrapped and reworked, i'm inventing ways to do the impossible sometimes
-this is leading to a level of burnout that is actually deleterious to my health at present, i have to keep it 100, my health is not good, i am operating at 50% capacity or lower most days, the bags under my eyes have bags under their eyes
-this state of things frequently trips me up while working and a large number of pics go over schedule, even ones that are simple and should be unproblematic to draw
-to get things under control again, i'm changing my policy on certain niche topics
-there will be a burnout tax on certain topics, but which patrons will be exempt from, that's the compromise i'm making to not hit loyal customers with a burnout fee
-i might be setting a hard limit on hard kink/furry logic stuff, i'm not sure to what degree, but this may be the only to draw niche subjects without feeling like i'm getting trapped by them, i genuinely want to draw general appeal stuff, it's what i'm actually interested in personally


+General Update
-there is a remote possibility i will attend Lone Star Fur Con in Austin at the end of the month. depends on if i can scrape together some pocket money. i'm practically a stone's throw away, so really i just need a $10 amtrak ticket, a small bit of uber money, the floor ticket price and food/beer money for the weekend.. a friend said i could crash on the couchbed in their room. it's not looking likely due to several large bills i had to pay this month, but like i said a remote possibility exists. the hurdle is not particularly high by like normal standards, i need like 200 bucks (and 3 days off)..
-February's In-streams are almost finished, would have had them done this weekend, but instead I had to write this long, gay substack post. but i've spent two straight days writing it because it's actually a little bit of a delicate subject and does need to be delivered with some degree of tact or everyone will think i hate them (which would be bad).
-So I expect in-streams to wrap tomorrow, at which point I will be opening publicly for March's batch. 2 are taken already so 3/5 slots are still available.
-The pinup for patreon will go up this week as well.
-After that it's back to backlog and getting WIPs and updates out for the winter 2024 comms that are still waiting on them.
-The monthly work schedule is shaking out to look something like this:
Week 1 - Monthly Instreams
Week 2 - Patreon Pinup, other patreon art
Week 3-4 - backlog
-i will not be able to have months as productive for shaving off the queue as i did in january very often. i worked an insane amount of hours, and had a bit of a windfall because december saw an uncommon uptick in business, which bought substantial extra time to knock out things in the backlog
-this made me realize, that the more consistent my cash flow is, the more consistently i can knock things out of the queue, so monthly slots and patreon obligations are going to be a necessity, even though i hate promoting them while there's someone waiting on an overdue assignment, but it's what reducing my stress level so i am starting to be able to think straight again. i need the stability to get things under control. i can't like, get things under control first and then pursue making my life stable afterwards, that hasn't worked..
-i'm working on my personal art, would mean a lot if you checked it out, it's not ready to go live, but i'm posting a lot.. (it's not porn tho sry)
(free membership tier) https://www.patreon.com/c/svenonline
(wips channel) https://discord.gg/6dEAaebmC8

xoxoxooxo luv u
-smoke