“God, I’m bored.”
“You look bored.”
“I AM bored.”

It’s been a strange few weeks for me, folks.  For reasons that eluded me at first, I have been quite down on myself and not dancing about like the productive photo-monkey that I’ve been in the past nine months or so.  Self-confidence plummeted, depression over money and personal issues crept up and when I get home from the office, I seem more satisfied with getting in my pajamas and watching a movie or reading a book.

Normally in moments like these I tend to stew quite a bit and there’s a lot of confusion as to what the actual source of my depression is, where a new problem slowly reveal itself when I’m getting over another one.  But this time, thankfully, the psychiatrist in my head showed up with an evaluation that he finished up after observing me for a few weeks.  The things that have been on my mind have been:

1. Artistic stagnation Just feeling like I’m in a rut with my work and am feeling, like most artistic folks I know, that at any moment someone is going to point at me and go “Hey, wait a minute!  You’re a HACK!”.

2. No steady pay For freelance work that’s a mix of  me not making enough calls and (in a small way) it being the season where nobody wants anything at the moment. Retail/Office work however…well, it’s not for lack of trying. No one just wants to hire me, it seems.  But yes.  I NEED MONEY.

3. The season I love Autumn, but right now it’s like a less soggy February out there, only more cold.  And that’s fucking depressing.

4. Being single Aside from the last week or so, this hasn’t pressed on my mind so much. But where a good portion of my friends are in committed relationships, it’s not too hard to feel kind of left out.

5. Body issues Have hit a bit of a plateau with my weight loss and while I have lost a HELL of a lot in the past year and a half (60lbs) I’m still not happy with the way I’m looking.

I’m glad that this revelation came up.  Now that I know what to do, I can work out a plan to nip these problems in the bud as best I can.  And for the past week or so I have been planning.  Oh yes.

1. Experiment with the camera.  This is an easy way to get over the feelings of stagnation.  Give myself some challenges. One of these challenges will be self portraits, which should also help deal with the body issue problem as well. Two birds one stone!

2. Make phone calls and apply for jobs. Network, network, network.  I must do more of that and I’m kicking myself for stopping it for so long. No more. Also, I will force feed businesses my resume. Then give them a copy to look over. Already this has given me a gig in Ottawa so it WORKS.

3. Curse God for bringing forth this weather. Well, it doesn’t have to be God, since we don’t know for sure, so anything works. Science, Batman, Warren Ellis, dude with a weather machine, whatever works. Will it help? No. But I’ve been looking for a reason to curse loudly at the sky.

4. Stop looking for someone. I always have to tell myself this. Online sites have always proven as useful as nipples on a ceiling and in-person stuff works, but I like making friends first. I will woo someone, of this I am sure. But I can’t do it with a one paragraph summary of myself. A person needs to get to know me and I them. So until I have a moment with someone that involves me dancing in the rain or something, the search is off.

So that’s it!  I have a plan, oh yes I do, and I’m sticking to it.  Slowly but surely I’ll be picking away at this crap until I’m feeling much more centered both artistically and personally. Although the two things are connected, so. Um. Yes.