This year on my resolutions list (or rather, themes of the year list) I have three major themes: read, run and draw. Even though these are already typical habits for me, these are habits that require A LOT of planning, attention and effort. Two of these themes are fairly private themes that I don’t feel the need to share with others (although I do have a public storygraph account if you’re feeling nosy and want to see what I’ve been reading).

Drawing, however, now that’s a different story. Drawing I do want to share, but in a very *specific* way. I draw a lot, usually. Although what I draw is often for work or other peoples’ projects, which I am super lucky and so thrilled to do. Lately I haven’t spent much time on my own projects, or on developing my skills in my own way. I also am pretty reluctant to share my practice publicly, generally wanting to save the post until things are *perfect*. Which is never. So then I never share. And then I look at my Facebook and Instagram* and feel like everything I see there is old (and also still not perfect, which grates me).

*For the record, I’m not promoting Facebook and Instagram here. These platforms are only for now the least barrier of entry for me to challenge myself on sharing. It’s easy for me, but it’s also riddled with problems of comparison, super problematic messaging, algorithms and politics. My intention is to eventually move off social media platforms entirely and share only on my website when I have a more strongly developed habit of sharing in general.

This month, I hopped onto a 30 day challenge with Wendy MacNaughton’s DrawTogether community on Substack. It’s been a boon to my daily sketchbook practice, which usually starts with a random warm up on something in my big sketchbook and ends with the 30 day challenge. That way, I know that I can start anywhere and I know when I’ll stop. It’s been SUPER GOOD for me so far, and about 13 days into the month, I feel my artistic muscles sore from so much work. Here’s what I’ve made in my sketchbook to this point, including some non-30 Day challenge images that I just like anyway.

One of the very *specific* ways I’m sharing art on social media now is that I kind of post with my eyes closed, literally. When I go to make a new post, I acutally close my eyes or avert my gaze so I don’t accidentally see the likes and comments. Why do I do this? Because that is the actual really awful part of social media for me: I tend to obsess over likes and comments, and feeling that I’m not getting “enough” will make posting even harder. So I’m actually actively ignoring those. If you happen to be one of the small number of folks who interact with my posts on social media and you’ve sent me a comment and I haven’t responded, well, now you know why 🙂

I’ll reply to emails on this website though, so all is not lost.

— <3 Jen