I’ve been thinking a lot about trying to grow my channel and improve my reach with my artwork. I hate thinking like this, but I’ve been trying to find ways to monetize my work. I’d rather draw for the fun of it, but…
To be honest, I’m a little scared.
I’m disabled and living with my parents. That situation is not sustainable. I do get SSI but it’s not enough to live on my own. My parents are still in good health for the time being, but what happens in 10, 20 years? Eventually I’m going to be stuck needing a full income if I want to keep a roof over my head.
It’s why I was thinking of drawing some fan art on a regular basis, to try to drive traffic. Original characters don’t seem to draw much attention. I’ve been trying to figure out more interesting compositions, eye catching backgrounds, all that kind of thing. I’m super-proud of my progress, don’t get me wrong, but… getting attention is hard.
Browsing through recent popular art posts to get ideas is pretty discouraging, too. A lot of it is rather risque and while I have no issues with other people drawing, liking, and posting that kind of content, I… feel weird participating.
I get told a lot to participate in other communities to get my name out, but it’s like… I don’t know what to say?? Anything I can think of saying sounds hollow and/or has already been said a dozen times, so I tend to just stay quiet. Not to mention anxiety/PTSD. I barely even talk to my close friends.
What about the VN? I want to work on it, and will continue to as a side project, but it’s hard to muster through the self-doubt. Sometimes I wonder if a comic would in fact be easier, maybe just drawn one page at a time. But that’s just me grass-is-always-greener-ing between different ideas. Oh, a comic might be easier if I go just one page at a time, but then I can’t do music the way I wanted to. And also people would expect a consistent release schedule, and that’s just stressful. So I cycle back to the VN again, but that’s got its own hurdles to figure out.
I dunno.
Whatever I do, I need to pull myself together and do it. I need to pick something and stick with it. My livelihood literally depends on getting something to work.