Free Comic Book Day - July 3rd, 2004

Go to a comic book store, pick up a free comic. It’s that simple! Find the participating comic book stores in your zip code.

"A nationwide event meant to raise the awareness of how dang fun comic books are!"

Go check out what comics are like now. There are a lot of great free given out each year! Whattaya got to lose?

--Will

Life Drawing - Week Two

Well life drawing was a lot of fun last night. It's very different hanging out with this group of artists. There's so much history, and experience among them. Not to mention all of the accomplishments to back it up. I'm used to a lot of talk and hot air from my generation of artists. I'm guilty of it myself. It's refreshing to get away from that and into something more established. I think I can learn a lot from them. And not just with the drawing part of the career.

Anyways, my drawings were a little wiggy this week. Not sure why that was. I'm going to need to move to a larger paper and maybe start using some charcoals or conte' or something, to really loosen me up more with my lines. Right now I'm still drawing 8 1/2 x 11 with pencils. Its a bit confining. It's still a huge leap from the stagnancy I've been feeling with my figures of late. Hopefully it will keep getting better.



--Will

New Caricature Artwork

Newest Caricatures. Conan O'brien, George "Dubya" Bush, George Lopez and Snoop Doggy Dogg. What do they all have in common you ask? Wouldn't you like to know?



I'll probably have George L and Snoop colored tomorrow while I'm at the flea market. I'll post the colors when I'm done. Man I can't believe how frickin fast this month flew by. It's already July, do you believe that? Who's stealing my days? Is it you foul, foul computer? Me thinks it is.

--Will

In a Mood

Going a little stir crazy tonight. IT's one of those nights where my mind is moving too fast for the living that I'm doing. Can't get to where I'm going soon enough. Anyways -- the drama of the day is money. Course it's always about money, isn't it?

Tonight the issue, as it has been many times in the past, is that I could/should be making more money than I am with my talents. The example of the moment are my websites. I've learned certain ways to make money with my site and on the internet in general, but I've been A.) too lazy! B.) too distracted C.) Unsure D.) all of the above. Anyways, in the last 3 days I've been introduced to 3 successful examples of how to make money on the internet. Or at least a modest amount. And being one that tries to listen to what the universe is saying, I'm trying to reopen my mind to the idea. Luckily it's stuff that I'm not only already capable of, but in many cases I've already done half the work. Anyways... rather than bore you people with the details, I'll just lay down my overall goal.

"I will be making $500 a month reliably from my website by the end of 2004."

Now comes the hard part-- putting plan into action. Wish me luck!

--Will

Travis Nichols Art Show - Needies Concert Tonight!



Our Old friend and yours is having a comic art show and live
concert tonight and tomorrow night. Come if you can.

Support Lubbock Art!

--Will

Drawing Tutorials

I started tutoring a new student today. It's pretty groovy, I'm friends with a guy that owns a framing shop here in town, and I'm tutoring his daughter in exchange for free framing for some of my paintings - paintings for the art show I'm putting together for the beginning of '05. Works out pretty good, eh? Anyways, today was the first tutoring session and I think it went pretty well. In fact I think a lot of my lesson plans are starting to click better in my mind after working with her. Anyways, one of the tools I used was to do a step by step example of how to lay out the human head. And afterwords I decided to make some little animations out of the examples - I will probably be putting the entire tutorial up on my website as well in the next week or two. But I thought I'd share the animations here in the mean time. I know they're prolly too fast to be of any use as a learning tool, and too slow on dial-up computers. But these aren't the final product.



--Will

Updated Photo Album

I finally updated my photo album. It's mostly just funny little pics I've found all over the internet. If you've already looked through the album - you should start on page 18... if not, well have fun. There's lots of good stuff there.




--Will

Life Drawing

I joined a Life drawing group tonight. I've desperately needed to get back to drawing from real life. My drawings have felt stagnant and lifeless to me for several years now. And I've known that drawing from the figure was the only way to remedy that. Anyways, I went to the first session tonight, and it was a blast. Suddenly I'm remembering stuff I'd long ago forgotten, the lines, the structure, the flow, it's all coming back again. I can't wait to do it again next week. I feel really fortunate that this group let me join in. They've been together doing this for nearly 30 years. I think I'm the only person (other than the model) that was born in the last few decades. That's a lot of experience to learn from. So I'm very excited to see what comes of it. Anyways, here's some samples of tonight's work. We'll probably see a remarkable improvement with each week. That's how it was when I was doing figure drawing before. Each week was a thousand times better than the last.



--Will

Saying Goodbye

The Door Closes... The Song Ends... And with one swipe of my hand the candle wisps into nothingness. The long December is done. She is gone. And my thoughts turn inward and calm. All the history... the pain, the love, the passion, the secrets shared, the dreams forgot. Packed up in little boxes and suitcases headed for the shore. In hopes of finding peace and a better life.

Saying Goodbye wasn't all that it felt it should have been. After all the passion and expression and years of love and friendship... a hug, a handshake and moving on. I suppose it's fitting. We were never one to imitate any sort of normalcy. We were children of a different way. Bittersweet. Sweet yet bitter.

She was the first to dig herself into me. She was the first that wanted to know who I was. To ask the questions, to understand my emotions, my unspoken language, my hidden fears. She was relentless in that. It's hard to let that go. Goodbye old friend. Hopefully we'll meet again.

I heard the wind today... for the first time in a long time. Standing quietly upon an asphalt alter, watching the clouds spill over me. They're racing to some destination far away from here. And then the show begins... one of the rare treasures of living in West Texas. The lighting... silent and relentless. Clouds suddenly illuminate and radiate, lightning jumps from sky to cloud and back again. Without a single sound, except the rustling of the leaves, the creaking of the branches and my own echoing footsteps.

--Will

Justin Spearman's New Website



--Will

New Caricature Artwork

I've been practicing my caricatures a lot lately. I want to add more life to them, make them funnier and much more exaggerated. I'm loving my new airbrush, it's made all the difference in the world. Now what's reall left for me to do is learn how to really exaggerate peoples expressions, and some how combine that with my cartooning abilities. Anyways, here's some recent results.



By the way, I just got a booth for the South Plains Fair this year. It's a great spot too, right on the midway. I was worried I wasn't even going to get a booth let alone a great spot like this. I'm going to really kick my ass from now until then, and get really good, and make some bad ass samples, so that I can kick the other caricature artists ASS! I'm so stoked.

--Will

One Million Hits

My website www.lucidcomics.com reached One million hits yesterday, so I did this little animation to celebrate. Yea Me! Here's to One Million more!



--Will

Motivation

This is me talking to myself - Not particularly for public consumption - but it may be entertaining to those outside of my head - have no idea really. Sometimes when I push my own mental audience to the brink some of my other personalities step in to take control. In this case - A Bull Dyke has stepped in to smack around the effeminate prissy boy that's been bellyaching for the last couple weeks about not getting work done. Hey - we've all got them in our heads somewhere - I'm not the only one - really - no, seriously.

Will!

I'm sick of listening to you whine. How much do you really want this? How much do you REALLY want to be successful? Because right now it looks like you don't want success at all. It looks like you want to lay on your ass all day and night all pouty faced complaining that you don't know how to get motivated.

Wah! Wah! Wah!

Do you want to be one of those guys - that just sits around with his friends like a sycophant - giving each other verbal handjobs about your non-existant body of work - hypothesizing about how successful you'll be someday and babbeling inanely about all the famous people you've met and you're going to meet and remissing how wonderful things will be when success just magically flies out of your ass.

Or do you want to be like Alex Ross or David Mack? Pumping out real work. Every day. Excuse free, effortlessly, professionally. And developing a reputation as an artist that's more professional than anyone you work with.

If so - you need to get rid of the fucking distractions. Stop accepting your OWN lame-ass excuses, and take control of your time. Do something! Make a real schedule and stick to it. Put the computer in another room - away from your drawing desk. And either get rid of the TV completely or find another arrangement.

And for GOD's Sake!! --Shut the Fuck up and get back to work!!!!

It comes down to this, Will - You want to be the best - it doesn't happen while watching TV or playing video games or putzing around on the computer. That's when the people that are really working pass you by. It takes Sacrifice. It takes REAL dedication! Not verbal dedication, not mental dedication... it takes ACTION!

"Loyalty is defined by actions - NOT words."

--Will

Time Management

So I decided to take a look at how I've been spending my time. The amount of time wasted is pretty pathetic really. That's why I've been avoiding.. er.. ignoring it. I'm a little embarrassed really, to be admitting how far I've fallen. I've gone from working 8 - 12 hours a day, either for someone else or at my drawing board drawing. To pretty much lazing about 24 - 7.

I'm a NEWS junky. I watch about 4 hours of news each day. The worst part about that is that after 2 am the news just repeats itself over and over and over. But I watch it anyways, because my mind is the consistency of a bowl of soggy oatmeal. And when I'm on the computer I'm constantly looking up CNN, Drudge Report, and BBC online. I watch about 2 hours of prime time TV nearly every night. Then every 2 or 3 days I'll watch David Letterman and Conan O'brien and crap like that. But my real weakness is 3rd rock from the sun. I love that show. It's on at 1am every week night. I've already seen every episode a dozen times but I still love watching it. And the internet... I don't even want to get into that. I'll just say that I'm on it as much if not more than I watch TV.

Anyways, what I'm getting at, is that I don't have any real obligations right now. I'm very fortunate in that. But that's also what makes all the time wasted all the more sad. But I'm owning up to it now. I don't need it to be my guilty little secret anymore. I can start letting it go. See, I was apparently wasting my time as a coping mechanism. I think what started it, was when I stopped sticking my nose into other people's business. I didn't have anything to do anymore. HaHa. Funny. So I turned the magnifying glass inward. And I spent so much time looking at myself; analyzing myself, criticizing myself, "fixing" myself. Learning my issues, learning to be happy. That in order to turn my brain off and stop thinking, I started vegging out in front of the TV and the Computer. But I think I'm done now. I think I've finally reached a plateau in my personal growth for now.

--Will

Looking Back

I've been looking into my past, trying to understand my process for work and reward. And I've found some very interesting answers. I've never tried to find the root of my work ethics. I've always had assumptions about them, but never really tried to understand them. Till the other day when I remembered something... interesting. I used to have chores, you know, take out the trash, clean my room, mow the lawn stuff like that. And I had an arrangement with my parents where I did all of that and they'd give me a small allowance each week. It was pretty good money for a kid. I remember it being like $7 bucks a week or something like that. And for the first few months it was great, but when our family was getting ready to make the move from Dallas to Colorado, my Mom asked if I wouldn't mind them paying me a lump sum once we finally moved. So I agreed, wanting to help out the family, and I worked and worked for several months. Counting the Gazillions of dollars I was gonna have once we were in the new place. But it never came.

What's worse, is once we finally moved there, the school district held me out of classes until midway through the semester, waiting for my family to find a permanent address. And as motivation for me, my Mom offered me $25 dollars for every "A" I got on my report card, if I worked really hard to get caught up. No easy task, considering that the Dallas school district was way behind Denver's. So one day I bring home a report card, my one and only report card ever with straight A's. But no money. Turns out it was more expensive to live in Colorado than my parents had anticipated. I understand it now.. as an adult. And I don't blame my parents, money really was that tight. But the little kid in me was devastated. And I never really tried to do good in school after that. I mean, stresses at home, and constantly being picked on at school because I was the new kid made it a little easier to shut down.

But looking back on my whole comic book art career, it seems like I've been working in the exact same manner. Not only did I pick a career in which the rewards are months, if not years after the work is done. But on top of that, I put these little road blocks and qualifiers in my way in order to keep the reward just that much farther away. I've never learned to just do something, and be rewarded for it. Everything is this monumental task that I have to overcome, and even if I've surmounted the obstacles, the reward may still never be there.

So what does it mean? I don't know really. I guess that I need to retrain myself to take on small, easy to accomplish tasks, and be damn sure that there is a real reward at the end of it. Which is what I've been trying to do in recent months. I'm just afraid that there have been so many failures over the years. And so many... Disappointments, that I've created a sort of "learned-helplessness" in myself. Where I don't fear deadlines, because there's no point to it anyways, because there's never a reward for accomplishing it. And making other people happy, just isn't enough anymore. Well, at least I'm a little farther down the path to understanding this.

--Will

The Ghost In Me.

So, positive thinking didn't work exactly as I had hoped. It got me drawing. That's good. But I haven't really been productive. Something is better than nothing I suppose. I feel really unfocused right now. There are two or three things that I need to be working on. But when I can't focus on which one, that's when I tend to start another project. Brandon told me a couple weeks ago I need to work on my priorities. But I've yet to get my mind settled enough to even think about it. Maybe it's another stall tactic. Subliminally I'm avoiding what I need to do, by fuzzing it up with indecision. I don't know what it is. At least when I'm drawing every day, I don't feel completely worthless. But I need to get focused soon - times running out on some of these projects. I hate being so undisciplined.

They're tearing down this massive grain silo on the edge of town. I never thought I'd have such an emotional reaction to an eyesore like that. But every time I drive past, it makes me a little sadder. Before, each time I saw it, it was a stoic reminder of my Grandfather... he built that massive wall of concrete. Along with hundreds of other buildings in Lubbock. From the Godbold Cultural center (formerly St Marys hospital) To J&B Coffee shop's building, which in its day was originally a movie theater. But that grain silo... I thought it would be there forever. I guess, in a sense, I thought the same about my GrandDad. But alas, they're knocking it down, one careless swing at at a time. Progress can suck my big fat hairy toe.

I think I still carry a great deal of guilt with me over my Granddad passing away. He was my biggest supporter. My biggest fan (next to my Dad). But he never got to see me succeed. In fact, the last thing he witnessed was a string of my biggest failures. To tell the truth, I don't think I've ever succeeded in the way I wanted, for him to feel proud of me. I mean, he didn't have high standards, or great expectations of me. But he left a very big legacy. One that I may never surpass. He was ambitious, and highly disciplined. He was a noble and principled man. And he did it all, lived a HUGE life. He was a carpenter, a construction foreman, a teacher. He trained Glider Pilots in World War II. Was superintendent of a school district. And he was a devout, disciplined Christian to his dying day.

And my whole childhood until I became a man, I think he always thought I could do better. And it wasn't until way too late that I realized that he did it because... he loved me. I mean, it's the same pressure last year, that I was putting on all those I loved. It wasn't disappointment, or condescending, it was love. Though it was very easy to misconstrue. He wanted me to do my best in everything, because he knew I have that in me... somewhere. So I went most of my life, intimidated by this amazing man. Wanting so badly to please him, but feeling like I failed at every turn. He was always very saddened by how overweight I was, and of course, so was I. But we've all seen here how hard that was to turn around. And he wanted to support my comic book stuff, he even helped fund it at many turns, which made the failures all the more humiliating before him. When I closed up my store, I didn't even want to face him, I was so embarrassed. I remember thinking, "I can become successful really quick somehow, and that will make up for all of this.." But it never happened. He passed away a week after I closed the store.

That's what I think about every time I find myself wasting opportunity. That's all I can think about now. How disappointed he would be. And that grain silo disappearing, bit by bit... makes me feel like he's disappearing bit by bit. And the more time I waste the less there will be left of him to remind me of how proud he would be when I finally do succede. I know it's stupid. But it is as it is.

I don't know how his incredible discipline got so badly lost in translation from his life to mine. Maybe he was overbearing with my Dad, or maybe it was how my parent's style of "discipline" were completely diametrically opposed that we ended up with almost none. I don't know... and it doesn't matter. But it is one of my greatest struggles. I know that it is tied to everything I hope to do with my life. From work to money to every day living. And not to mention my own kids. So that's the struggle that I need to keep coming back to here. I need to understand "discipline". And I need to stop living with this Ghost.

--Will

Reciprocation

I've observed that when there is one problem in life - that usually it reciprocates in other parts of your life. You'll see it all the time in symbols. For instance, a problem you may be having will often "symbolically" manifest itself in your car. If you're having trouble getting started in life - your starter goes out. If you're having trouble getting work done(getting "traction") - your tires go flat. You're having trouble keeping yourself from doing something - your brakes go out. And if you ignore the symbols... well that's bad news. That's when the universe decides it's time to teach you a lesson. And that's when stuff breaks. Either you get in an accident, or your computer crashes, or something equally ouchie. That's why it's important to remain observant.

Anyways, I've also observed that the reciprocation works in the other direction as well. The solutions reciprocate, that is. For instance, my happiness. I suddenly became happy, when I decided "I am happy". I changed my perception of things. After all disposition is merely perception. And I realized today that I have the same issue with my productivity. I've languished in ignorance for a couple months. I wouldn't even acknowledge that I wasn't working enough. I'd walk into the studio and sit down at the computer and wouldn't even let the issue of discipline, or productivity enter my mind. I mean, I feel guilty about not working. But not enough to make me change. Guilt trips never did work very well with me. So I allowed it, because there were more important things happening, with my little spiritual reawakening and all, and I recognized that. But I'm ready to get back to work now. And really - it's as simple as deciding that "I am disciplined".

I'll wake up tomorrow and know that I am required to sit down and paint. Because I've had my play time, I've had my mental renaissance, and now it's time to get back to the drawing board. I really don't know any other way to explain it. Other than I've "decided" to be productive from now on. I'll finish a painting tomorrow, and do some sequential art tue-thur and some caricature samples on friday. But I'm obligated to do it now. It's my job. For at least 6-8 hours after I get out of bed and eat breakfast. I'm sure that a few months down the road I will need to readjust my perceptions once again, and force myself back on the tracks. But this is good, it's important to remain observant, and watch the symbols that life gives us. But that's just my opinion.

--Will

Party Caricatures.

Great night tonight - I did caricatures for a couples 50th wedding anniversary party. I hooked up my friend Nat, and had him come and do portraits with me. Over all it was a great experience. I did about 40 caricatures in 2 hours. Best of all I hardly stressed at all about it. Just did it. And even better than best of all... We made $250 for just 2 hours of work. Hopefully it's just the start. By the end of the year I hope to be doing 2 or 3 parties a week, on top of my regular caricture events.

I'm trying to apply that old adage to my life - work smarter, not harder - I mean, how can I go back to working $7 - $10 bucks an hour for someone else - When I can make $100 bucks an hour for myself. Entertaining people no less.

--Will

Brighter Meadows - Melting Sunsets

Some days you know who you are, and some days you can't remember your name. And then there's lately, where I can't understand the man I used to be. I've been rereading some of my old posts, and though the words sound sweet and beautiful, I no longer understand or relate to them. I can't believe that I've changed so much so quickly. But now the loneliness just seems so foreign to me. I truly had fallen in love with being lonely. I wanted to understand why though. And I think I've found the answer, and of course it goes hand in hand with all the other stuff I've been figuring out.

My one and only previous relationship, was a fairly good one. We loved each other very much. And in my mind it was a very successful relationship - well, as successful as an ended relationship can be. We are still very good friends, and will probably always be. But looking back now, I realize that I was looking for her to complete me. I was only half of a person, and I wanted her to make me whole. And when the relationship ended - most likely from an subconscious awareness that I was needy and incomplete - no matter how well I tried to hide it - I was unwilling to move on because I was incomplete, and somewhere in me I think I was waiting to magically become complete without any sort of work or introspection on my part. But it never happened. And I wanted to hold onto whatever relationship success I'd had, just so I could look back and say that someone loved me, or that I wasn't bad at relationships, or some other such lameness.

Really what it was... I wanted to avoid my own happiness. I wasn't ready to be happy, because I wasn't thin, wasn't successful, or because I wasn't with the perfect woman, blah blah blah. The same excuses I've been talking about all week. And really, I loved the feeling of being lonely. Though it was very subconscious I just wanted sympathy - from my friends - from my ex - from anyone that would listen. I craved the attention. So I wanted to remain in my ignorance and wallow in sadness for as long as I could. What better way to put off being happy - than to be sad!

You complete me...

I loved that line from Jerry Mcquire. It made the whole movie for me. Especially the way it was built up. Cuba catching the ball, Tom Cruise running home, "you had me at hello", yada yada yada... But now it just doesn't taste the same. I guess I have a different perspective on things. I don't want someone to complete me anymore. Because it insinuates that I am not already a complete whole person - and that neither is anyone that would have me. If you want to get literal - multiply two halves - you get one quarter. Even if you added two halves you'd still only have one person. That sucks. I see that now, and I see a lot of what I was waiting around for was because of that skewed logic. I mean it would be one thing, if we were both looking for someone else to complete each other, you really have to be committed to this sort of thing. And it may work out - but like true love - its one in a million.

So I want to be a whole person now. I want to be responsible for my own emotions, and my own actions. I want to be complete. And I want that in whoever I spend my life with. I want someone that makes me better than whole. And best of all, I want someone that is that way herself. But we're not perfect, none of us are. I sure as hell am not. I'm just now stepping into the hall of maturity, to take a curious look around, hoping someday soon I will know this place like my own home.

She's a jar.. with a heavy lid...

So where does that put me now, with my current relationship. Really it changes nothing. Those expectations of being with a complete, whole, person (and vice versa), will never change for me. But those expectations are for the woman I will marry. If she grows into those things, as I hope to one day do myself, all the better. If not, I still very much enjoy being with her. And it's easier to enjoy a person as they are, without imposing some sort of unreasonable expectations - like them making you complete. For now, I'm just happy. I'm comfortable with someone, that's something I've never experienced with another human being. And as long as we are happy and making healthy choices in the relationship, and continuing to grow, and continuing to put "true" intimacy before "sexual" intimacy... we will be fine.

"No worries.. No expectations.. Having fun."

--Will

Keeping Myself Away From Me - Part.Two

Learning to live. We all struggle with it. Though we are scared, and tired, and some of us just don't know what to do. We continue to struggle to learn how to live. It's an uncomfortable feeling to think that I've come to know less as I've grown older. Because I did, I knew it all when I was 20. But I guess the truth is... the uncomfortable feeling, is that as I've gotten older I've realized how much I don't know. And it has humbled me. It has brought me to my knees and brought me to ask forgiveness for my arrogance from many that I have loved. And as I finally stand again, brushing the dirt from my humbled knees, I look around as though for the first time. I thank God for the gifts in my life, I thank God for keeping the wonderful things... and people in my life, in spite of my arrogance and naivite'. Then the need to understand sets in. I believe that God intends this life to be easier than the way I've lived it. I believe that, in my unlearned ways, I am fighting against the natural currents of life. The change in the last 6 weeks have proved that. Before the only strife in my living was there because I caused it. But I didn't know any better.

I am a helper. I have a great need to help others. It comes from my parents - My Mom, the social worker, wanting to help the people around her - and my Dad, the Engineer, wanting to make systems, organizations and processes better. It's in my blood. It's what I'm good at. Unfortunately I've also inherited their tendency to overfocus on those things. It's something that we're all working on. My tendency, for as long as I can remember, was to focus on helping others, so much, that I lose myself. And in a way, that overfocus was a tremendous issue of avoidance. As long as I could focus on someone else's problem, and try to help them (through positive and negative processes) then I would not have to pay attention to my own inadequacies. I could avoid being happy, as long as I could focus on making someone else happy. I could avoid finishing work, as long as I was focused on someone else with the same issue. I could avoid dealing with my own insecurities as long as I was focused on someone else's. I was an avoid-aholic. Some people use drugs/sex/alcohol to avoid facing themselves... I used love.

And it goes back a long, long way. But it was most prominent in my past relationships and especially in working with people in my comic book company. It took a long time to realize there was a problem. But I remember this little voice in my head asking from time to time... "How can so many other people be the problem?" But I always quickly brushed the thought away - afraid to consider it - because, IT was for all intents and purposes - THE basis of my entire structure of being. So, sometime around the end of last summer. When I'd pushed nearly every person I loved to the point of breaking, due to my hyper-critical behavior, and immensely high imposed expectations. I found myself in my studio crying... broken... before one of my closest friends - one of many at the time - that I'd hurt because of my naive arrogance and misplaced intentions. And then suddenly I realized that everyone I loved had started to resent me for it. My world came crashing down. The structure of my being was completely destroyed.

And I went into hiding.

It was all out of good intentions, of course. I wasn't out trying to hurt people. I simply have that high of a standard for myself. And I expected anyone that implied they had similar goals as me, should also have such high standards of themselves. But what I didn't realize, was that 99% of the population does not feel the same way about achieving their dreams. Most people are happy just to be doing something, and if something comes of it, all the better. So my intentions were misplaced, and misinterpreted. And everything I knew to be true... was gone. And it wasn't till I started breaking down that whole value system, that I realized that I was avoiding my own faults. I was avoiding.. living.

I'm now a completely different person. By the Grace of God.

--Will

Keeping Myself Away From Me - Part.One

Growing is a funny thing. One sways between confidence and arrogance with each day the wind blows. Struggling to know what you know, and fighting the fact that you know nothing at all. My consciousness expands and contracts with each breath. As though wisdom, like air, were some invisible entity that can only be contained within for brief moments, then exhaled once more into the ether. Whatever it is, some days I'm a damned genious, but more often than not, I'm just as clueless as I was when I was a kid.

So what do I know now?

Nothing and everything. I know that I have a responsiblity to be alive. And to strive to live my life to its fullest. I know that happiness is not something you find - it's something you are. And I know that nothing should be taken for granted. I also know that my biggest problem in life is avoiding myself - Keeping myself away from me - I've gone to great lengths in recent months to mend this problem. But I must remain vigilant that I do not slip back into my old patterns. I had become so adept at fixing other peoples problems, and planning/dreaming about the future, that I often forget to live my own life. So I need to continue to live day to day, and focus on "What I need to do." "What my responsibilites are." and "Who I am." Those are my mantras for being a whole, complete, successful person.

I've been realizing this more of late.

--Will

Good, as good Goes...

I love the feeling of waking up. And that's how I feel all the time now. Everything has changed in the last 6 weeks. It's like I've been tinkering with some intricate, complex machine for many years, surmising what it might do when finally turned on, how it might work if life were finally breathed into it. That machine is now in motion. I am alive. I am living. And now that I've had some time to reflect. I've discovered that a lot of my "hypothesese" about what 'living would be like' were correct... and some, of course, were completely wrong.

It's interesting. I can tell you the day it started. April 20th. The day I decided that I am happy. The day I decided to enjoy being alive, and to no longer postpone my happiness. Since then everything has changed - I feel like I'm finally doing something towards my career - And I'm finding myself more disciplined - And I have a girlfriend - And best of all, I'm not constantly longing for happiness. Because I have it now. I am happy because I am. Not because I'm working towards something, or because I'm with somebody or because I'm preparing myself to be happy. Those are all things that make my life better, and make me better. But I have to be happy now in order to enjoy them - not the other way around. It's all very strange.

Actually there was a whole bunch of things I was going to talk about - but now that I think about it - they were all things that I discovered because I decided to be happy. Stuff like realizing why I was single for 3 years - because I had fallen in love with being lonely. Why I wasn't satisfied with finishing a comic page, or a painting, or a short story - because I wasn't finished with everything else. And then there was my constant insecurity over being overweight. But after deciding I am happy now - none of those things mattered anymore. I've even been losing 1 - 2 pounds a week for the last 2 months - without even trying. No diet, or exercise - just being happy with who I am. It's like I'm fucking NEO and I can see every 0 and 1 in the Matrix. I'm confident, secure, powerful. Because my strength is no longer external. My contentment comes from within me.

So anyways...

With all of that said, I'd like to explain why I haven't been posting much lately (other than the menial "this is what I'm up to" type of post). It's a new month, and I've decided to take a new approach to things. I mentioned earlier that I finally have a girlfriend (yay me!) and that it's been - what? - 3 years - something like that? It's pretty sad really. But it is as it is. The thing is, now that I'm in a relationship... I've been afraid to share my thoughts about it here. It's not like I don't have anything to say. Far from it. I've had more self-discovery in the last 6 weeks than I have in 3 years. But I think my initial reluctance to posting about this, is that there's someone else to think about now... and how what I say affects her, and her world. It's so weird, when you've been independent and alone for so long, to suddenly have to wrap your intentions and reality around someone else's. Granted, it's a wonderful burden.

The thing is, I have nothing to hide. If anyone has read this blog, and met me in real life, they know that I'll bore you in person word for word with nearly the same deep introspective dribble that I write up here. It's just the way I am. I'm not trying to be honest, or deep... that's just the way I talk to anyone. I'm transparent like a sliding glass door - I couldn't hide my thoughts if I wanted to. So I'm talking again. I have a lot to say. There are many details that I'll have to leave out - but the lessons learned - and the questions answered - those I will begin again to share.

--Will