Who has not felt emptied, without energy and desire to do nothing in this long period of pandemic?
It's burn out, which means stress has taken you to a level where everything is difficult and you're demotivated and at worst even depressed.
For those who work it is not such a remote syndrome, if anything the term is taken to the news with the cloister imposed by lock downs, rare interpersonal relationships and staying at home even to work, which often leads to never detaching.
In fact, if detaching means going shopping after a while you consider the supermarket no longer as a "non-place" but as a saving association!
While buying the salad, chat with the nearby neighbor at least a metre and a half away who buys the tomatoes, at the checkout you stick button with the cashier undressing -let us not forget that in addition to the health workers there have been many categories of workers who have made our lives easier by sacrificing their time and taking high risks.
I myself have been and maybe still am under burn out.
I hadn't painted or drawn for months, even the TV had tired me, the creativity was there but the desire was really little or nothing and at the end of the day of art I had done very little.
Then, as I often do, I looked in and out in the mirror and decided that the burn out will not be right for me! I have worse habits (smoking two packs of cigarettes after 24 years of vice for example... if I think about it I hear Freddie Mercury singing "We are the champion" just for me!).
But how to do it?
Creating a new routine, also thanks to the net advice given by other people who had defeated the dragon.
Yes, because for me burn out was becoming really deleterious, I slept little even though I woke up late, I ate badly even though I had the opportunity to cook healthy things, I was nervous and irritable because being with my hands in my hands is really bad. It is not a holiday but a block, a total freezing of one's abilities, cravings and lifestyles, just when you think of the pandemic but extremely dangerous for mental health.
Giving me precise tasks and deadlines helped me slowly to unhinge the apathy in which I had fallen leading me to start creating, painting and drawing again.
So here @inktober that is a test of creativity, without prizes, organized both for the whole month of October and throughout the year.
For now I am dedicating myself to the one @inktober52 such as the weeks that make up a calendar year or @inktober2021 to diversify it from that of other years.
Every week the organizers, led by @JakeParker, let you know that is the theme and the artists creating according to their creativity and imagination one or more creations with ink, black and white or colored. You can also mix the techniques and then go with the watercolor!
The beauty is that you don't need to be Picasso, you don't have to account to anyone but you, you can stop or how I did start whenever you want.
It's a grimaldello for a new artistic routine that doesn't make you think "Oh my God I have to draw something" but that makes you draw like you have an e-commission (I take it that way at least) and respect the times.
I'm not sure I can finish the one next October, 31 drawing in a month, one a day, well done and stimulating is not an easy feat.... but I don't take anything for granted, after all until a few weeks ago I was holding a pencil or a brush and now I growl in ink or nib if it doesn't go the way I want.
Yes, it's not really easy for a competitive one to ;)
I hope it never happened to you, but if so, how did you deal with the situation?
I also hope that this article is useful to you because to me feeling that I was not the only one to experience certain emotions and sensations helped me a lot!
I'm leaving you the creations I've made so far... we'll get back on later!
A hug
Alessandra