DRAWESOME

So, it seems to be time for a journal since my update log is getting a little long, and maybe it's time to share some thoughts. I am getting close to getting my about page done, and I am thinking about making some art for it. Perhaps I should make some special art for links and also the sitemap later. I hope that as I grow more with coding knowledge with some sites I've linked to really make it feel fun for me and others who may enjoy it. I think the biggest challenges may just be the museum and the gallery, but I will do what I can to make it work.

In the meantime, I've been building up knowledge more so with my art with SVSLearn. I do value much of the instruction, even if I am slow to complete the assignments. Though, going through the videos lately on perspective and environment have really been more eye-opening on the instruction I learned from the prior units about how to draw everything, usually through some of the basic shapes and forms. It's funny; one of the instructors for the advanced perspective course said while drawing some of the shapes for a bedroom with two points for a perspective grid said, "This is not math." I was too good at math in school to believe that because all I saw was area and later, volume. But it's good that I did see it because it really clicked with me! Thanks to my math teachers growing up, I do see how math does apply to reality a bit better, especially to something I like so much.

Otherwise, I hope to do a bit more studying on environments and backgrounds. For a while, I've always felt that my art was a bit empty since I focus on characters so much and tend to lack inspiration on what to fill in for a background aside from some shape with a brush or with the shape tool. Aside from what I have learned lately, I should look back on some of my inspirations and some other contemporary artists when it comes to that.

What I find interesting is that what I am slowly finding a bit of courage when it comes to being a bit more equipped with not being as anxious as I should be socially, while finding imperfection to be okay and also not taking rejection so seriously. I hope I keep it up to the point of really maturing a bit more through taking bigger steps to put my art out in town, since it's more welcoming to visual artists than it used to be.

Otherwise, my faith still stands on Jesus, the author and finisher of the faith. I know from my own experience from what I know and read from Scripture that he's proven legitimate to me all this time. Compared to what I have read about various leaders and figures of Christian movements I have read that contribute to a lot of stressful divisions in the church in America and other areas of the world, I am concerned of Christians claiming certain things about the Lord that doesn't look like him at all in the Bible, even with fantastic spiritual experiences.

Though, don't get me wrong: those that tend to limit the Spirit's work in the church don't always have the best attitude in criticizing certain excesses that they end up in error in other ways as well. Those people have the same thing in common with those that they criticize: they are lacking in the fruit of the Spirit, the attitude of Jesus.

I want to at least brainstorm an article in discussing some of these details that really reveal aspects of the Christian church that has its strengths in the remnant Christians who are faithful to what has been written and guided by the Spirit as well as expose those movements and historical leaders that have made a lot of unnecessary division and confusion to Christians and also former Christians who have been hurt. There's so much church history that isn't explained to us that answers so many painful questions about why certain doctrines and practices ended up in church where the verses used to support it don't have that understanding of its initial audience or an underlying long term principle to future readers.

Perhaps this would take more than just one article to explain...

Otherwise, I've gotten better on a personal end with some things I've faced about myself with the above and more. I've had some nice joyful things happen, and I am thankful for those blessings. I also want to stay mindful in praying wisely these days and spiritually sobering up with use of my time. Sometimes I feel more spiritually weary in looking at my country, especially at Christians who fear losing power that was not given to them. In begging for a King Saul, they may actually get a Nebuchadnezzar sooner than they think. 

These days have been pretty nice so far. I've been learning a bit more about CSS that I'm getting more comfortable with customizing my div classes and ids more. One video I watched was really good at explaining CSS a bit better through merely using a code editor and a browser from yeeears ago really made more sense to me. W3schools has been a bit more easier to understand all the ways I can test some things. Also I've found some wonderful pngs across Tumblr these days to decorate my website even further. I'm a fan of neat little images everywhere. 

Meanwhile, I'm getting more comfortable and confident about some of my art adventures from techniques I'm experimenting with and finding that they work for me. There's still progress to be made on some things I could depict more of, but I hope to accomplish those soon enough. Even though this is a rough time nationally, I still want to keep hope that I can still be a light to people where I am or anywhere I am online. Hopefully, that looks like healthy friendships among other relationships for me. 

A lot, as in, some great ups and some downs here and there. Nevertheless, persisting.

The good? My birthday, being featured in the local magazine, and some opportunities to create and teach art, which is great!

The bad? Some mental slumps and an annoying trip to the ER with somewhat disatisfying care that isn't fully taken care of. I'll live with it until it's done with, really.

Also, I hadn't updated this site because sometimes I felt that I wasn't as motivated to update and upload some things here and there. It's more than likely perfectionism getting to me. However, maintaining a website like Neocities has kind of helped me problem solve better when I want to give it a bit of a facelift, so to say. As someone who likes the visual aspect of webmastering, learning about CSS and what it does was tough for me at first. Though, like anything, it takes time. I have a long way to go on it, but I've learned a good bit more than I have before. Not to mention, some online tools have been helpful in making the editing more pleasant to deal with.

PetraPixel's generator has been the most helpful in getting my site together, and I'm happy to see the recent update to the code generator to make that happen.

And I am really excited to share the contents of my gallery soon! I've got the landing page for that already sorted out, so I have to make the galleries itself soon enough.

A lot can be said about fasting from social media, but when someone does it, even for a short term, there can be a lot learned. For me, it meant to set aside distractions that held me in a lot of anxiety and obsessive compulsion (some of it can be OCD related and other times can just merely be habitual). I took a mere week off and still found anxiety to be an issue, I found facing certain insecurities that set off the anxiety and performance I had from negative voices in my past that I had to let go of. In light of my Christian faith, I found that mentally and spiritually letting go of those through a sort of proxy forgiveness of the bitterness I held of the old memories to have helped me see the humanity in them.

Hopefully, I would want such people in my past who have hurt me, whether in my face or afar to actually change. Maybe they became a Christian themselves. Maybe they also changed because they have a family and are raising their children the right way to be kind and peacemakers. Because I think there's nothing worse than to pass our broken ways to our children to grow up betrayed in a world of hurt and wonder why it isn't working for them when they create those types of memories and children for themselves and with others. As Frederick Douglass once said, "It is easier to build up strong children than to repair broken men." That is why I would want to repair myself first as I even teach the children at the church how to build themselves in God while the time is nigh.