I have things I am supposed to be doing and I am having a lot of trouble focusing and getting them done.
I've had a cold this week which has been really crappy and I am tired and I feel emotionally dysregulated? Like I could easily go off into the deep end should it beckon. I could get angry and fixated on ruminating.
I want to bury myself inside a distraction so that I can feel a bit more normal but I don't really have the time to do that. I want to feel calm and numb. I want to just build out naturally from the stuff that makes me feel good like sticking to working out, or being able to draw something every day, thinking about the person I want to be because that helps me to feel more solid.
This week I was SUPPOSED to be coming up with some designs for a completely different project but then a friend of mine suggested some work I might apply for and I've been all kinds of insane about that instead.
It feels like the 5 stages of grief or something.
I've been distancing myself and then all of a sudden it's like hey there, remember when you used to try and participate in LIFE? Remember how you know things and people and you used to DO STUFF?
Half of me is panicking like: shit I have to do this, if I don't then I have less value as a person or some heavy shit like that. My friend will see how not functional I am and look at me with pity and disgust. I guess on some level I am ashamed of myself.
Other half of me is like: do I even want this? I would like the money and I would like the sense of accomplishment but I don't know if I would like the draining feeling that comes with talking to hundreds of people from all different age groups and backgrounds and guiding them through a creative activity. I don't like the anxious feeling before I show up and the mask I put on (successfully or not) where I feel like I am doing my very best impression of a person that isn't ready to fall to bits.
I've been thinking for a while that maybe I would like to do something other than participatory art. To me, that's an artform that should have more focus on ownership and the dialogue between artist and audience.
I think it would be cool to have a participatory art workshop where everybody works to hold something up like balancing a balloon filled with paint on a sheet or a piece of cardboard and when it falls down inevitably, then a mark would be made on the floor. Something where we physically share the responsibility and work together to create an artwork.
I don't know if showing people how to make lots of foam hats with (probably) government funding really pushes the medium of participation in art. It's a/ creative work but b/ feels exploitative to the artist and the participants. The work is usually low paid and often feels like sticking a plaster over much larger social issues.
Yes, people should have access to creative activites, and it is good for your mental health to do things with your hands with a group of people. But not INSTEAD of adequately funded mental health services and social projects. If I can get funding to do a 6 week creative project with kids that's great but there should be youth clubs!! Six weeks isn't enough to properly support young people through their transformative years and give them a place to go.
I'm kind of torn. I would probably enjoy working with some people and making some hats. It would be good to earn some money. I should at the very least try, I think. But it sort of bites too.
What if they don't even think I'm right for the position is the other thing. I am sure I could do this work easy. CVs and interviews and that sort of nonsense wigs me out though. I can barely sleep.
Stuck in my head: Under My Skin by Jukebox the Ghost
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wi8srR9B4bs
Reading: Paladin's Hope by T kingfisher
https://www.waterstones.com/book/paladins-hope/t-kingfisher/9780356524351
Watched: Apothecary Diaries
https://www.crunchyroll.com/series/G3KHEVDJ7/the-apothecary-diaries
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