FA+
Shop
The Quest for Fursonas, or Some Assembly Required.
11 years ago
General
I've been feeling it ever since I first discovered "furry" in the early 90s; Ever since I first clicked on a cute animated counter on a Geocities page, found the site of someone who likes webcomics, was eventually led to the artists of "Yerf" (while it was still at its peak), and discovered the whole idea of "fursonas"...
I should have a fursona.
In all the writing I've done in those many years since (most of which you will never see), I've invented a lot of characters, a lot of interesting personalities and some interesting stories. Practically none of these were attempts to create a fursona for myself, though. There were a few vague half-assed character ideas that were, but none of them felt right (or even remotely close), and all were either discarded quickly or recycled into story characters.
This isn't something I can just make up. I already am something, I've concluded. So I can't just pick a species I like and say "this is me", because it's not. Just saying "I'm a (species) now" has never sounded right in my head; I've tried it. Saying "I'm a (species) because I love those" is even worse; I could never be so narcissistic as to believe myself the sum of everything I love! I also don't want to be one of those people who identify as one species for a few months, then find a better match and suddenly change species, change back a few months later and then suddenly become something different, complete with changing names (and sometimes genders) and getting new FA accounts without even informing anyone... all just to repeat the whole process again a year later, and so on. (Yes, I've seen that!)
Yes, people change and grow over time; I get that. But if, as a result, you're switching entire identities in and out ad nauseum like Seagate Barracuda hard drives in a rackmount file server, you're probably not looking for identity in exactly the right place!
I'm a perfectionist. I want to get this right the first time; to discover the furry identity that immediately, accurately, perfectly describes exactly what I am, exactly who I am at the deepest levels. This isn't something I, nor anyone, can imagine or invent; It's something that must be discovered, unburied, tiny puzzle piece by tiny puzzle piece.
And it hasn't been easy. There is no mirror in the world that offers this kind of self-perception, no camera that can photograph the shape of one's soul(s), no meditation nor medication that enables sufficiently deep introspection, and no psychologist nor prophet possessing that level of insight. (Or at least none that I can afford!)
Not even my dreams have been helpful at all: I've had dreams in which I've been at furry conventions, completely surrounded by brightly-colored toony animals of various types and styles and qualities, but I'm just the same ol' relatively-mundane me in human form, the only one there lacking a costume. There was even one dream in which I met a specific fur whom I've been a fan of for a few years (not saying who), and he felt sorry for my suitless self, and offered to lend me a spare he had in the back of his car, a rusty yellow VW punch-buggy. Before we could reach the car, I suddenly woke up for no apparent reason - perhaps subconsciously rejecting any identity that he could possibly have offered me. (Even within my own subconscious.)
How does one identify one's soul?
It's a weird, lonely kind of feeling, sitting here, feeling insubstantial as a ghost among so many of you; you creative German Shepherds and silly dholes and playful coyotes and wolves, you friendly pandas and charming bears and just-plain-sweet porcupines, you cookie-obsessed cougars, cartoon-obsessed brony kangaroos, just-plain-weird-yet-still-likable turtles, cats, dogs, dragons, otters, mice... and the foxies, goodness, so many foxies! And here's me, so close yet so far from that world that I see you all in... Almost like I'm waiting to be born. All that's missing is a body; all I need is a form!
At least I've been making progress, especially in the past several months when I've been putting real thought and effort into this. It's been slow, and intermittent, but every little bit is progress.
The trick, I've found, is not to try to look at who and what I am, and who and what I like; it's to look at why. To that end, I've had to examine, in uncomfortable detail, various aspects of my present and past; the things, good and bad, that have made me what I am.
You've been helping, too; perhaps more than any of you realize. Providing the occasional offhand observation or random bit of inspiration, or creating your own characters that I enjoy and/or feel I have much in common with - leading me to consider why, of course. The influence that all of you have had during this time has been most invaluable!
I'm finding lots of these little details and events and aspects, and collecting them into a large, long and detailed mental list. Some ideas get minimized, maybe even discarded, but others need only minimal tweaking; and they start fitting together like puzzle pieces, and begin to form a picture.
During the process, interestingly enough, I've figured out that this is extremely close to how I've created a lot of the characters for my stories: By focusing on the story first, and the characters' roles in them. These roles typically determine the characters' back-stories and personalities, which then influence the characters' designs.
In short, I'm just putting together another story. Except this time, the story is me.
And, now that I know that, I'm nearly done. I've only got a few little gaps left to fill, a few details left to finalize. This shouldn't take long. I will probably have something to share with you very soon!
I should have a fursona.
In all the writing I've done in those many years since (most of which you will never see), I've invented a lot of characters, a lot of interesting personalities and some interesting stories. Practically none of these were attempts to create a fursona for myself, though. There were a few vague half-assed character ideas that were, but none of them felt right (or even remotely close), and all were either discarded quickly or recycled into story characters.
This isn't something I can just make up. I already am something, I've concluded. So I can't just pick a species I like and say "this is me", because it's not. Just saying "I'm a (species) now" has never sounded right in my head; I've tried it. Saying "I'm a (species) because I love those" is even worse; I could never be so narcissistic as to believe myself the sum of everything I love! I also don't want to be one of those people who identify as one species for a few months, then find a better match and suddenly change species, change back a few months later and then suddenly become something different, complete with changing names (and sometimes genders) and getting new FA accounts without even informing anyone... all just to repeat the whole process again a year later, and so on. (Yes, I've seen that!)
Yes, people change and grow over time; I get that. But if, as a result, you're switching entire identities in and out ad nauseum like Seagate Barracuda hard drives in a rackmount file server, you're probably not looking for identity in exactly the right place!
I'm a perfectionist. I want to get this right the first time; to discover the furry identity that immediately, accurately, perfectly describes exactly what I am, exactly who I am at the deepest levels. This isn't something I, nor anyone, can imagine or invent; It's something that must be discovered, unburied, tiny puzzle piece by tiny puzzle piece.
And it hasn't been easy. There is no mirror in the world that offers this kind of self-perception, no camera that can photograph the shape of one's soul(s), no meditation nor medication that enables sufficiently deep introspection, and no psychologist nor prophet possessing that level of insight. (Or at least none that I can afford!)
Not even my dreams have been helpful at all: I've had dreams in which I've been at furry conventions, completely surrounded by brightly-colored toony animals of various types and styles and qualities, but I'm just the same ol' relatively-mundane me in human form, the only one there lacking a costume. There was even one dream in which I met a specific fur whom I've been a fan of for a few years (not saying who), and he felt sorry for my suitless self, and offered to lend me a spare he had in the back of his car, a rusty yellow VW punch-buggy. Before we could reach the car, I suddenly woke up for no apparent reason - perhaps subconsciously rejecting any identity that he could possibly have offered me. (Even within my own subconscious.)
How does one identify one's soul?
It's a weird, lonely kind of feeling, sitting here, feeling insubstantial as a ghost among so many of you; you creative German Shepherds and silly dholes and playful coyotes and wolves, you friendly pandas and charming bears and just-plain-sweet porcupines, you cookie-obsessed cougars, cartoon-obsessed brony kangaroos, just-plain-weird-yet-still-likable turtles, cats, dogs, dragons, otters, mice... and the foxies, goodness, so many foxies! And here's me, so close yet so far from that world that I see you all in... Almost like I'm waiting to be born. All that's missing is a body; all I need is a form!
At least I've been making progress, especially in the past several months when I've been putting real thought and effort into this. It's been slow, and intermittent, but every little bit is progress.
The trick, I've found, is not to try to look at who and what I am, and who and what I like; it's to look at why. To that end, I've had to examine, in uncomfortable detail, various aspects of my present and past; the things, good and bad, that have made me what I am.
You've been helping, too; perhaps more than any of you realize. Providing the occasional offhand observation or random bit of inspiration, or creating your own characters that I enjoy and/or feel I have much in common with - leading me to consider why, of course. The influence that all of you have had during this time has been most invaluable!
I'm finding lots of these little details and events and aspects, and collecting them into a large, long and detailed mental list. Some ideas get minimized, maybe even discarded, but others need only minimal tweaking; and they start fitting together like puzzle pieces, and begin to form a picture.
During the process, interestingly enough, I've figured out that this is extremely close to how I've created a lot of the characters for my stories: By focusing on the story first, and the characters' roles in them. These roles typically determine the characters' back-stories and personalities, which then influence the characters' designs.
In short, I'm just putting together another story. Except this time, the story is me.
And, now that I know that, I'm nearly done. I've only got a few little gaps left to fill, a few details left to finalize. This shouldn't take long. I will probably have something to share with you very soon!
Good Luck!
There have actually been times when I've felt like a therian, except it was never really -of- any identifiable species. Closest I ever came to figuring that out was "generic stuffed animal of indeterminate species", and I'm not even sure there is such a thing as a therian of that! (I'm probably not actually therian, and any feeling of such is just the influence of my therian friends rubbing off on me. At least it's simpler to assume that...)
Personally I tried and found none fitting. i was obviously going for canines not because I like them -which I do-, but because i could understand them really well and surely better than any. From the start i saw it would -not- work. I do well with them, but I am surely not one either in soul or flesh.
So I kept fursonaless.
Sure. I have that owl which I accidentally found as a perfect match for my personality (not like it is a good thing, but it is true, so... whatever works). Still it is not a fursona. I have not an individual or an story behind it or a character that represents me. Well. That. I just enjoy the views here. Meh.
Sometimes it actually can be that simple.
I would be most curious to hear on your progress in this area though, it is always quite fascinating to me: the people who take this into such an extreme level of self expression and inward analysis to churn out a fursona. The people who take it all THAT seriously are actually pretty rare it feels. Tusami the dragon started out as nothing more than a character for a roleplay game actually (and was a male, red dragon, birthed human and and cursed to transform almost permanently to a dragon) and just naturally evolved to something of an identity... simple because what people associated with me, then that was how people began to see me and in turn how I saw myself. So eventually Tusami became female and silver/black because that was more "me". At one point I convinced myself that I was a dragon in a past life or had the soul of one or something (but that's another story).
So eventually I had an identity crisis in late high school as that whole thing just suddenly began to not fit me anymore, and I felt like too much of it was chosen for me or shaped by other's expectations and my shifting interests (even my name was not of my choosing) so I had gone down this fursona self-discovery path once before. I'm that same kind of perfectionist too in a sense- I certainly didn't want to be one of those flip floppy people so my choice wasn't made overnight, but I do gotta say visually representing this sona was waaaaay harder than any other stage of the process. Naturally. Cuz that's how artists roll. *dons sunglasses* Endless research on critters though, learned a lot of stuff. Some things were easy to cross off. But regardless, I thoroughly enjoyed the process.
I have also felt like I've been pretty dang adamant on how Riley has stayed the same over the years (with her "natural form" as it were), though of course the exception was I adding on hybrid Riley recently... and that's because my relationship to my concept of what a fursona is has changed and how I should relate to it. So that's really an important part is to decide how you want to relate to it. This is an "alter-ego" after all, it can be whatever you want. Your best traits, or maybe your desired ones. It could be an opposite reflection of you, or exactly how you are to a T. Ya know, minus the whole human part. The species chosen can be done so because of classic stereotypes surrounding it (ya know, the whole "lions are courageous" kind of thing) or based on their behavioral patterns. This is why hybrids are so common; it's hard to limit yourself so simply when humans are just so complex. Aaaaand when in doubt, make up a new species. ("I cannot be defined so simply! I am a special snowflake!")
I think the weirdest thing though was the transition from dragon to dog and how that affected everything. This is the only big name and character change I've had, and it was interesting to see what kind of people followed me over and who left me in the dust and why. To some people it was all about my art, to others it was about my character(s). That was also interested to see how differently people reacted to it... and apparently people can be weirdly prejudice against certain species for even weirder reasons. Stereotypes are also curious. Those who associate with a group of people who have chosen the same species are particularly interesting- they ban together, communicatie, and even trust those who are the same as them. There's a whole social structure to fursonas even XD This is why I'm very supportive to people taking the time to do some deep reflection before picking a character to represent themselves- whether you like it or not, it says an awful lot about who you are and how you think of yourself to the community. As well as how others will react to you.
So yes! Keep on soulsearching there and best of luck settling on an answer for yourself! :3
Also, thanks for the nod in there as well!
(PS I've always wanted to draw you something- but without you having a fursona and many visual representations of characters, I don't know what you'd want from me. But that said, I always HIGHLY prefer sonas because it makes the art so much more personal. So if you did indeed come up with something, or you at least want to test out an idea visually, hit me up! I'd be happy to give ya some awesome in return for all the awesome you've been towards me over the years)
I had a feeling that you would have some good insights into this, having been on a somewhat similar journey yourself.
I still remember the image that got me watching your dA account in the first place: The one where Tusami bakes cookies, only to have another dragon steal them all and then get chased away. That made me giggle! I really liked Tusami, such a magnificent yet adorable dragon. That's why I was somewhat surprised when you suddenly changed your fursona and became a dog. I was even, for a brief period, feeling like you were losing too much uniqueness by replacing the dragon 'sona with something that seemed so much more, for lack of a better word (and certainly no offense intended), "usual".
But, y'know, I had already been watching you for a while, but it wasn't until after the change that I started feeling like I was really getting to know you, because, although I wasn't fully aware of it at first, I was seeing more of you in the dog than in the dragon. That makes sense, right?
(And then we became good friends! How'd that happen?)
That's a pretty good example of just how important identity is. After all, if you don't know yourself, how will others? ...Or something like that. (I really have no idea how much of this is coming out the way I intended.)
Anyway, I like the phrase "special snowflake". It's a pretty good description of what I've come up with! I can't wait to show everyone the "new me"! It'll surprise a lot of folks, I'm sure.
(I probably should've been working on some reference art instead of typing all this! I've got nearly all the details figured out in my mind, but I underestimated how busy this week would be and haven't had time to draw or sketch anything at all. I was hoping to be able to debut my new fursona on Halloween, so it and I would have the same birthday, but now I don't think that's going to happen. Oh well, delays happen. "Life is what happens while we're busy making other plans" and such.)
I totally want to take you up on your offer! Your art skill and your eye for design would prove quite invaluable at this stage!