My creative self
2025.4.2 | Pittsburgh | Spring | Freshman Year
It’s cloudy.
It just came to me that I should write about my anxiety. As a person who poorly communicates, I hope that putting them down as text can help me find myself.
Ever since I stepped into CMU, anxiety has been constantly by my side. There were and are few times that I could get away with it. It only stops knocking on my door when I am working, building my worlds. But as soon as I stop, it returns.
I hope that it’s less terrible than it sounds, but anxiety is deadly to creativity as it leads to low productivity. I don’t and can’t fight it, so the best solution is to escape.
But if you escape, a horrible amount of work awaits. This school won’t give you time to rest, especially when you have ambitions. If you fall, it’s hard to come back again.
The wheel just keeps grinding forward. I guess that’s how so many people break down.
I am unfortunately aware that, right now, this school is the only place that will provide such rigor academic education, such vibrant communities, and such diverse opportunities for me. As long as I seize every opportunity and work like a mule, I have no doubt that It will turn me into a well-rounded artist and technician.
But at what price?
After a few weeks in the spring semester of 2025, I noticed an extremely unhealthy pattern in my creative work that greatly undermines both my physical and mental wellness. Since I will never stop pushing myself to work, I soon realized that anxiety will always be by my side.
I should make peace with it.
The solution, I assume, is to find out where my anxiety comes from.
Arrogance
If there is an original sin carved into me, arrogance reigns supreme.
Arrogance brings about almost every part of me: my pride, my confidence, my aspirations, my talents, and my sense of who I am.
It also brings about my jealousy, my self-denial, my aggression, my despise towards artists of the same practice, and all my self-centered acts.
It determines who I am.
Pride
Pride is the first child of arrogance. It has a sibling named confidence.
Somehow, it’s hard to tell pride from confidence In a person like me.
I’m confident of being what I am, of my personality, of my talents, of my look, and of my way of speech.
I am by no means suggesting that I am the top among all these facets of an individual. But I do know that I am presentable, approachable, and don’t look too bad. I would not be surprised upon hearing compliments and I have confidence to leave a good impression on all kinds of people like I always do in conversations.
I know where my charisma lies and I know that I have certain talents. I am sensitive, observant, passionate, and emotional. I am born to perform a creative profession.
This grants me strong self-awareness.
Self - Scrutiny
I’m proud in a sense that no one but me holds the right to judge my soul. I sit on my own judgement, and I serve the sentence.
It is only my consciousness that can comfort or hurt me.
Ironically, I am extremely sensitive to how people view me.
My consciousness would take in their negative feedback, distort it, exaggerate to a morbid extent. Then I would madly improve until when I meet my own distorted criteria.
I cannot tolerate even a single bit of me for not being viewed in the way I imagine myself should be. Nor can I accept acting in a way that disappoints myself.
In the end, the solution to anxiety lies in whether or not I forgive myself.
Perfectionism
I suffer from Perfectionism.
This comes with the premise that I have absolute faith in my aesthetics and taste. I have an absolute say on beauty and instinctually despise the hideousness.
I possess also the faith in my creativity. This is what I believe as the sole purpose of existence. I know that every creative idea and design I yield is extraordinary.
If one taints my aesthetics and creativities, he is denying me as a whole.
I yearn to pursue the climax within my cognitive reach. That’s what perfection means to me.
Perfectionism is the ever-faithful guard of my works’ quality. I would never publish a work that when I am not satisfied. And as my aesthetics improve, the quality also improves.
If I genuinely believe that my past works are stunted, then I’ve improved.
Reconciliation
Even my reconciliation seems morbid.
I do allow myself to do bad since I am aware that each individual has his limits.
Yet I also believe that if I want to succeed on certain things, I would.
For example, I tolerate my ignorance on Coding because I am not a logical thinker and I am not intrinsically attracted to the language itself.
I am rather interested in applying them as a tool and see what I can produce within the limitations.
I also allow myself to be terrible at Fine Art production because I never received systematic training of any kind.
I did not have actual art mentors that show me the way to be better at depicting word with paint and brushes.
I am infinitely interested in beauty itself, but not necessarily in its mere reflections.
Pain
I think I have found the reason to all of my pain.
I will be forever enslaved by the cold-blooded judge of my own consciousness.
I will always strive to be the best.
I hope that one day I can reconcile with myself, but this is what I am.
4/14/2025
I think I am doing better.
平和
