You got me writing!
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Heh, now that I read this I think I agree with you too 
I think thereās a difference in intent between pursuing a hobby for personal fulfillment and getting good at it because you like it vs. pursuing a hobby because thatās what youāre supposed to do and getting good at it because you receive social reinforcement for doing so. Intrinsic vs. extrinsic motivation and all that.
There are also some skills that take a lot of practice and depth but donāt have the form of a hobby. Writing is arguably one of themāof course if you write a novel or a blog, then you can publish that, but some people love writing personal notes, cards etc. with a very specific recipient in mind. Itās not immediately obvious that this is a āhobbyā you can āget good atā until you stop and think about it. Another example would be being a good conversationalist.
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After having experienced the longest unexpected water supply disruption in my life back in late May, I could have never predicted that I had to go through another unscheduled long water supply cut in the same year:
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Farm to Taber is a treasure!! I love listening to her mythbust our farm subsidy systems. And glad you finally watched the Dark Crystal!
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can u tell my contract work is mildly stressing me out? LOL. mostly a food for thought blog post that itās hard to not look at your own skills for enjoyment and try to think on how to squeeze money out of it, especially when job hunting desperately sucks in the first place
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Wrote a little about the minor relief I feel after the latest Dutch general election.
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just saw this pop in my feed and honestly i realize thatās also how i approach things; facet myself over other parts as much as i can!! some bleed-out happens over them (hard not to when i do keep some friends in loop w/other things), but having different pools you can dip into, different avenues to explore, different safety nets of things you can talk about with some people, but not quite with others
interesting read, thank you :]
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I gave replying a go!
Giving oneās all keeps things at a binary (a legacy system that still serve the most successful people). To not give oneās all imports a gradient - which perfect informationthat is (Mine (Ours) Yours) throws errors over until that binary is returned. Venusās zero and Marsā one can rip Earthās trans body to shreds, Iām never give up the gradient that lives here. Itās my orbit, my friction, my quiet fire. Iām here to live it, as approximally as I always have.
Oh! And have a rage zine I made! Pretty!
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wonderwander - This is gorgeously mindful! Iā:e opened some of the small tales and will be reading through them as the come up in my tabs. (My style of browsing is I open a bunch of tabs and then close them with a hotkey, which then pulls up another tab, at which time I usually decide whenter to dive in, bookmark, or close.)
Thanks! Hope you enjoy them.
I wrote a POV trip to Halloween Horror Nights of what it would be like to go with me. Itās a fun way to experience the park if neither of us got to go! Enjoy
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Iāve been enjoying all the gigs Iāve been managing to get to recently
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Wrote a bit in response to a NYT magazine article profiling people who are in romantic relationships with chatbots. I think I get where they are coming from?
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I think I come down on team āfaceted selfā in the end, too. I mean, thatās what Iām doing with the whole convexer identity.
But I also wonder if my need to have different online personas is ultimately a failure to have the courage to really ābe me.ā Nothing I write as convexer could get me fired or arrested; Iām just an anxious person who worries about someone from real life trying to take my words out of context and use them against me.
I have an IRL friend who is a working professional who writes fairly smutty fanfic under a variant of her real name. Itās never been a problem for her, because nobody in our demographic would try to hold that against her, and if they do then fuck em, right? Still, I envy her willingness to just embrace herself and not care so much.
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it was a very busy week but i wrote this yesterday. it was fun to write a letter to the cat that sits outside my momās house
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i had a similar experience, being unable to find work after graduation and then attempting to monetize my hobbies (art) by freelancing. i personally did not enjoy it at all; on top of feeling bad about being jobless, i was not getting commissioned (which made me feel double-unemployed), and the art i was producing at the time had to be looked at through the lens of āis this worth selling,ā exacerbating every flaw and insecurity, and it completely shattered my relationship with art during that period.
not to say that freelancing isnāt possible, or that occasional commissions will ruin your relationship with your hobbies, but i think monetization needs to be a very intentional decision. obligatory: employment does not equate to worth, neither does productivity or success - i know firsthand that itās a hard feeling thing to shake when these systems have been so deeply ingrained in us. i thankfully donāt need money to live right now, and during this time iāve felt so much more fulfilled working on personal projects and making free assets/games/layouts that everyone can access rather than the spending money iād make from commissions. being able to distance myself from the side-income small business grindset has been really good for my mental health and my relationship to my creative outlets.
but thatās just me! iām sure youāll be great at making layouts if you do go this route (thereās also the option of tip jars - iām sure you know of ko-fi, and itch has the option to make uploads free with optional donations). every situation is different and people need money, especially right now, itās just very tough. so yeah, solidarity, and wishing you luck :]
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very interesting to see everyoneās responses to this! in college, i considered telling some friends about my art and personal projects under this name, but after a pretty nasty fallout with a few of them, i really cherished the privacy of having a space completely separate from my real life. especially regarding queerness, it was so nice being able to let my guard down posting about gay shit without having to out myself to the wrong people. it would be quite stressful if those people knew about this identity.
itās also interesting gaining a āfollowingā as this name, because as i make more acquaintances and as more people see my work, the less i feel comfortable with being vulnerable. i wouldnāt publish most of the blogs i wrote at my siteās conception nowadays. should i further subdivide under a new name to try to create a new space where i donāt have to perform? itās kind of paradoxical (and maybe a bit sinister?) to think about this for an account i started as my āsafe spaceā on the internet, but i think iād personally value that privacy.
i believe thereās merit to breaking down facets, though: i used to keep strict identities for different hobbies (art, game dev, writing), but lately iāve been integrating all of my creative work under one name, and i think itās been working out! there are a lot of cool people that exist in the venn diagram of games, art, and writing that i wouldnāt have met if i kept those identities strictly divided.
(also, dunbarās number being 150 feels super high to me lmao? maybe i need to get out moreā¦)
thought-provoking topic, thanks for sharing
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oh yeah i forget itch could also host that, i use my itch so infrequently that i forget, so i may consider that!! i have my ko-fi already hosting my carrds, but i also donāt get tips much haha. not that iām really making it obvious anywayānor expect it. thank you tho ;_;
to be fair i have been freelancing my art for 7ā8 years now, so thatās a longterm relationship that hasnāt changed much, but iāve been thankful iāve been in a place where i donāt need to survive off it otherwise iām sure it wouldāve had a deeper rift. itās the new things that iām wary about monetizing, especially cause at one point i was making VRoid models and burned out so badly that even after 3 years the concept of using vroid just makes me feel tired (the desire is there, but the weight is heavy + people have evolved so much in how they do models that itās a learning curve i dont wanna handle anymore), and i dread having that happen for something like websites
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I got creative with your prompt! My reply is here
Itās a beautiful place to set sights: what is a world where everyone knows what they want like?