Floating

The past couple weeks have been a blur of prioritizing other people over myself, and I’m exhausted. Of course this happens all the time as an adult, a parent, a husband, an employee. You strive for balance. It hasn’t felt very balanced. It was made worse of course by my complete failure to organize the time I did have for myself, instead falling back on bad habits. Wasting time on the Reddit, or Youtube is easier to justify when you’re mentally and physically wore out. It’s hard to create when you’re in this state, but it’s not impossible.

Random experiences are important for new creative ideas, and putting yourself in the path of randomness can be beneficial. Many years ago I’d sit in a public place, like the food court at the mall, and sketch the people and things I saw as they wandered by. You never knew what you would see. But even without the sketch pad, placing your mind and body in the way of the new and unfamiliar is the point. Maybe creating while tired, if you can convince yourself it’s in the same category, could be something very similar. Your mind does some strange business when it’s not operating at full capacity. It often connects some odd dots. Isn’t that the headspace artists are looking for?

While I consider how to better use the little personal time I have, please enjoy this silly drawing of Robot stranded on a floating rock. It has no connection to anything I’ve written here today, which I guess makes it random, and therefore wholly connected to everything I’ve written here today.