A Summer of Slump

As I was browsing the 99u website, the article Are You Trapped in a Shadow Career: The Artist vs. The Addict, immediately caught my attention. While reading the article, I unfortunately noticed several similarities between myself and the author's description of the behavior of an "addict." My thoughts immediately flashed back to the long four month summer, and how I spent a majority of my time hanging out with friends. In reality, I barely spent any time creating works of art. In my sketchbook, I drew various doodles, but I never really created anything significant. For a moment, I paused from reading the article out of fear, and drowned myself with thoughts like, "What if I lost my ability to be inspired," and "What if I'm not as enthusiastic about art as I always believed."

When I finished the article, I dismissed these fearful thoughts immediately, because I knew that regret wasn't going to help improve my situation. I realized that throughout the entire summer, I allowed myself to fall into an artistic slump by devoting a good portion of my time on leisurly activities. Because I want to pursue a career in graphic novels, I immediately made a vow to myself that I would focus more time on developing ideas and creating. Soon enough I was back to the world inside my sketchbook, picking my brain for any sort of concepts I could find and transfer down on paper. As I began drawing, I realized that I haven't felt as nearly as confident and content in those four months of living through an inspireless summer as I did right then while I was creating.

An actual doodle I made over the summer while I was messing around with friends:

 Article cited: http://99u.com/articles/7192/Are-You-Trapped-in-a-Shadow-Career-The-Artist-vs-The-Addict