Six Months In

Dear Art Blog,

It’s been about five or six months since my last blog post, and I thought this would be a good time for an update. From my experience the six month mark is usually where I begin to slip. This is the point where I would take extended breaks because I think I deserve it, or run out of steam, or just come up with an excuse to not do the hard things.

I’ve been playing around with sleep schedules trying to find the best time for me to work on projects. In the beginning I tried waking up early to get about 2-3 hours of work in, then I jumped to staying up late, and then back to waking up early. These schedules actually worked decently well depending on whether I actually got enough sleep. Go figure. There would be many, I mean MANY, times that I slipped up. Nights where I should have been in bed I instead spent working late, or watching youtube videos, or dreading what I’m going to do with my life. As you can imagine I didn’t sleep a lot. By the end of the week I’m a sleep deprived mess.

I slacked on my health as well. I’m the heaviest I’ve ever been at about 210 lbs. I’ve exercised on and off, but of course there’s little benefit unless there’s a regular schedule. The only health habit I’ve managed to stick with recently is eating healthier. My current diet mostly consists of salads and fish, though there’s always the craving for something sweet which is my biggest vice. I’m also experiencing some joint pain which is probably due to getting older, though a bad diet and years of not exercising has probably played a part.

As you may have seen from some of my previous posts I have managed to produce some work. Right now it’s just Gothfield and Loodie illustrations, and oh boy is the turnaround super long. I can probably produce a rendered illustration in about a month. It feels as if there’s not enough time, or I’m just too slow produce illustrations fast enough. Probably both.

I am trying to put some things in motion so I can keep what little momentum I have going. I created quite a few visual assets so I can get back into doing livestreams. I haven’t done a livestream since 2020 and back then I was mostly playing video games. Let me tell ya. Those livestreams were awwwwful. Back then I tried streaming four days a week, and on certain days I’d go for streams as long as 9 hours. WHAT WAS I THINKING! I think if I were to stream again it’d be more art focused, and NOT 9 hours long.

I’ve set up a Ko-fi account to offer premium membership content. I don’t expect anything from it for a long time, especially with how long it takes to finish an illustration. At this stage I’m mostly experimenting with Ko-fi to learn how to best use it, and also just to get things started. In the event that someone does pay me for my illustrations, it’ll give me proof that there is value to what I have to offer.

I took some vacation days from work as I was getting pretty close to a breaking point. I was becoming overwhelmed with waking up early everyday to pursue my passion, and having to deal with the tedium of corporate life. I definitely feel the stress getting to me a bit, but I’ll just take it a day at a time. Just like with my illustrations, I work on them a day at a time and eventually they do get done. With that in my mind perhaps that’s how I’ll be able to reach my goals. A day at a time.

Thanks for reading,
Chuk Chan

P.S.
Here’s my Ko-fi page where I share behind the scenes content of my illustrations.