Beginnings

When starting this blog, to be honest, I had no idea what to write. Not just for that first post (although I didn’t really say anything, I just rambled) but generally, I had no idea what I was going to say, or what I even wanted to say.

This is largely due to the fact that beginnings, for me at least, are a daunting thing. No matter what the beginning is, no matter how large, or how small, starting something new is daunting. At times exciting, of course, at others frustrating, but nine times out of ten, daunting regardless and so in turn, somewhat scary.

In the past, this daunting feeling of beginnings has repeatedly stopped me getting what I want. Be it achieving what needs achieving, completing what needs completing, or more importantly being what or who I need to be. The easy, less daunting route never seems to deliver what needs delivering, whatever that may be.

As most of you know I draw comics for a living, among a million and one other ideas I constantly have, but my nine to five (or 10am-3am usually) to pay the bills, is drawing men in tights. Every page, every single time, I have that daunting feeling, for numerous reasons.

The blank page in front of me is slightly overwhelming, all of that empty space needs to be filled with lines, lines that form pictures, pictures of a quality that someone will want to print. More importantly, of a quality that once printed, somneone would want to part with their hard earned money to take home and look at.

At times those pages come with frustration, knowing that it will take me hours to finish that page, when theres a million and one other things I would rather do… Which usually means I can find a million and one other things to do instead, usually still things I don’t really want to do.

And at times, a new page is exciting, exciting as I really want to draw what ever it is that’s going to be on the page. On other occasions it may just be exciting because I am feeling inspired, or like I want to draw.

Bizarrely, especially given my job or my talent (I struggle to write that, which I will explain at a later date), I’m rarely excited because I want to draw or feel inspired or creative, as I rarely want to draw, or feel creative, something else for a later date.

But regardless of wether I feel excited or frustrated, that daunting, overwhelming feeling at the pit of my stomach is there.

At this time, the blank page ahead of me that my life has now become is daunting. Daunting, scary but also exciting.

I have regrets and sadness over the life I’m leaving behind... No, i have regrets and sadness over the way i have lived the life i leave behind, over some of the things I’ve lost, the time, possibilities and options I have wasted, or let pass me bye. All due to one fear or another, lies I have told others, more importantly, lies I have told myself. Still, in addition too those regrets, I do have a blank page in front of me.

I have a few debts, relatively large debts, for how little I have, but money has never been a huge worry for me (maybe to my own downfall). I have a career I now want to build, and feel ready to build for the first time in my life. The fact I call it a career now is a sign of that and I am lucky in the fact that my career goes wherever I want to go. Asside from these small things, I have very little that now needs considering when I think about the direction I want my life to take at this point.

So like this blog, and like every blank page, I find the beginning in front of me daunting, exciting but daunting. But equally, like this blog and like those pages and things don’t get done, if blogs don’t get written, if pages don’t get drawn, I will have very little to blame but myself if life does not get lived. And like this blog and like those pages I wont let that daunting, overwhelming feeling stop me from getting things done anymore, like it so often has in the past

“Try not. Do… or do not. There is no try” - Yoda