Hi everyone. I'm posting this journal for any and all watchers to whom it may concern. This is an explanation; NOT a request for help or pity. I don't want free hand-outs.

I'm currently not in a great place mentally, emotionally, or physically. But I will be soon, I hope. I'm planning on moving in with my boyfriend next year; he lives up in Canada and I just want to get away from where I live now. I'm not going to get into details because just writing and thinking about my current living situation breeds the resentment and anger I am accustomed to feeling now, almost 24/7, but basically me and my family are trapped in an abusive situation and due to financial issues we cannot currently end it.

I'm not going to divulge further; I'm not looking for pity or sympathy or free hand-outs, but rather I am mentioning all this because it's simply an explanation for the reason why I don't draw very consistently and why I can't seem to motivate myself to actually finish pieces before uploading it. I only have so much mental energy to focus with, and with the current living situation making my OCD and depression exponentially worse, it means drawing has suffered.

However, I have decided, I'm going to start uploading some of my MS Paint sketches and pictures of pencil sketches just so I have SOMETHING to show for this year besides the handful of things I uploaded much earlier. All of the sketches I upload will eventually be moved to scraps, however, as they are not completed pieces and I am not 100% happy with them (am I ever happy with anything I draw? no) they will not be kept in the "normal" gallery forever.

Lastly; I'm 26 years old and I feel I literally have not improved skill wise with my art since I was like 17. I hate it so much. I used to learn how to draw / learn new techniques by watching speedpaints on YouTube in the old days (2007 - 2011), but nowadays, either anyone uploading the timelapses completely cuts all the tools / tool settings out of their screen recording, or they paywall their timelapses altogether. I'd love to watch someone with Clip Studio Paint who knows what they're doing with it, so I can copy their tool settings and then find ways to implement techniques they're using into my own workflow; I'm just nowhere near where I want to be and it pains me because I've been drawing my whole life. I feel like such a failure, but it's my own high standards for myself which I am failing; nobody forced me to get good or anything.

I find learning new stuff for drawing to be so incredibly difficult. I've been toying with learning to use my left hand to draw because it makes me wonder if I can learn new things with an "untrained" arm instead of my right. But I digress, I am rambling now.

I hope you all have a wonderful Christmas and a Happy New Year!