They’ll disappear for hours while they’re working, and emerge tired, but full of a satisfaction you don’t truly understand because you’re not experiencing it fully for yourself.
They’ll hate themselves and their work. A lot. Maybe they won’t even tell you how much, but oh, you can make an informed guess. How they deflect compliments, apologise for imagined flaws, feel ashamed of showing you just what they’ve been creating. You have to sit with them and tell them it’s not all trash, don’t worry, I still love you.
They’re constantly searching for something. They can’t just be. Neither you, nor they, know what they’re searching for. Maybe it’s a new subject to draw, or write about, or photograph, maybe it’s that feeling of satisfaction, self-love, that always seems to get further and further away.
You support and love them with your whole heart, though, you want them to do better, feel better, to keep excelling. You know how wonderful they are, and even if they’re the most confident person in the room, you know they’re still a little sensitive about the things they produce. Though you seldom tell them this, you love what they create. It resonates with you.
But it’s still frustrating, being an artist’s friend. They’ll ask you to read their newest poem, or share their art, or comment, and you have your own life to deal with. That’s okay, everyone’s busy. Your friend needs to understand this. Sometimes you just feel a bit lazy. It’s a lot of effort to leave visible comments, to share, to subscribe. And it’s fine–your friend knows you care, they don’t need to see it on a screen.
Artists can be so frustrating.
But just imagine how frustrating it is for an artist to spend hours and hours producing works that they love, but also hate a little bit, because all they see are flaws and failures and ‘I-could-have-done-that-better’s, hoping against hope that what they’ve put so much effort into–days, sometimes even weeks and months–isn’t ignored, forgotten about.
Because every creator knows that deep down, nobody actually cares. Everyone’s got their own thing going, and unless they’re famous, unless they’re relevant, nothing they create will matter to anyone. Harder than the act of creating is the act of making other people care about their work. Making other people want it.
It’s at this stage that many artists tend to give up.
Creative fields are difficult already. Please support your artist friends. Share, leave comments, buy their art (if you have the means). You may encourage them in person, you may support them without even making it obvious, and that’s important, but it doesn’t matter unless you do it where it counts. They may have spent 5 hours working on one drawing, or one poem. You can spend 5 minutes leaving a public comment or pressing the share button. It’s a very small gesture, but I assure you, they mean everything to your artist friends.
Stories never really end…even if the books like to pretend they do. Stories always go on. They don’t end on the last page, any more than they begin on the first page.
Writers who may be feeling insecure out their own writing, yet still enthusiastically reblog and comment on someone else’s fic.
Writers who may struggle to find time to write their own stories, yet still read fics and take the time to let the writers know how much they like it in tags, asks, comments.
Writers who can appreciate and share a fic even though it might not be their ship or their “thing” because they respect the quality and the writer.
Writers who have tons of followers and share lesser known fics to help them get exposure.
Writers who have a small number of followers and will still reblog the popular fics.
Writers who will help another writer brainstorm or get through a tough part of their fic.
Writers who beta for other writers.
Writers who are kind and secure enough to support other writers.
I see you, and appreciate the hell out of you.
So grateful for my writer friends who take time away from their own work to help and support me
A conversation Emery has with her husband every three months or so… He always feeds it, gives it a bath, and then finds a new home for it. She never tells him she’s always wanted a huskie, but when he happens to bring one home? It’s allowed to stay…
avenger-nerd-mom 