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The pulse of the puppeteer

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Hi there ^_^


This is going to be a long one, so feel free to skip. In short, yeah, sorry, this is a bit of a personal one. I was debating even uploading this one at all, since it was very delicate to me.


For context, yes that Rayman esc character there is supposed to be me. I don't consider it an OC or anything, I just use it whenever I need to depict myself in art and need a stand in for myself. I doubt I will be using it much in the future, only really when I need to. I drew myself this way cause well, I love Rayman a ton and their easy to draw since they do not have limbs. I just slapped my hair and my clothes onto a Rayman character. I really did not want to waste the effort of drawing a human body for myself. There are better things I could be drawing.


To start, I just want to clarify, I am not looking for sympathy. I simply want to express my self here and explain a very neurotic side of myself I am not too proud of.


In short, I have a very severe form of anxiety which makes it rather difficult to be completely calm. Of course, anxiety is an incredibly common thing, it is the most common mental illness, if I am not mistaken. Now, don't mistake this for social anxiety. I am actually very well off socially, I love hanging out with people, and chatting, and am fairly extroverted. Everyone handles it differently. My anxiety is based off of constantly worrying, stressing over the worst case scenarios, and having my pulse go absolutely haywire incredibly easily. It has gotten to the point in the last few years where it is physically insanely uncomfortable with how active my pulse constantly is. So much so to the point where I sometimes will need to wear a heart monitor in order for doctors to ensure I am not overworking my circulatory system or anything else that is potentially dangerous.


It physically and mentally takes a major toll on me. It is rather hard constantly being under physical and mental unease. It is my own fault, however. I let myself become the anxious person I am today, and I am ashamed of it.


But that doesn't mean I am not combating it. I try and face my own fears every single day, sometimes I do well, other times I don't. One coping mechanism I found works wonders for me is practicing my yoyo tricks.


I'm not so sure what it is, perhaps it is being busy with my hands, or maybe its seeing how many different tricks I can do in one spin, but yoyo practice is a fantastic way of calming myself down. So much so to the point where I normally carry one on me at all times.


And that's kind of exactly what this is here. I figured it would be fitting to turn a yoyo string into a literal heart string, and the rest went from there. I hope the small poem I wrote is readable in this font. If not, I can repeat it here:


"With a flick of my fingers, you fall into a whir down below, and with a jolt of my hand, right back into my palm you go."


Of course, this is a simple poem, and one might think it is simply describing a yoyo being thrown down, and coming back up, however, not unlike some poems, it does have more of a double meaning. I gain some of that control of my heart's rhythm when I practice my yoyo skills. I feel as if I have more control over my heart strings. It's a wonderful feeling.


Sorry this one was a little more personal. If you read this far, thank you very much ^_^ I just want to let you all know that I am okay. There is no need to worry about me. I have a good family, good friends, and a good life. I am so much luckier than most people. I have my own hurdles, and I will get over them. Just because I am under almost constant stress, it does not mean I do not know how to handle myself.


I wish you all well ^o^ thanks for listening. I promise that very few posts will be similar to this one in the future.

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That... doesn't make much sense.
If you think and say you're at fault for dealing with what you must, implying you have power over it, why do you keep doing it? It clearly isn't a deliberate effort, so please note this is not, in any way, your fault.

About the short poem, I find it incredibly interesting and intriguing. I forgot the actual term for what I think it is, but I want to say omen. One of those short rhymes about prophecies and other more enigmatic/multipurpose/open things. It goes just like rowing a boat, back and forth...

Tl;dr This is the most interesting vent art I've seen in a while stg

IrisOfTheRepliforce responds:

Hi there. First off, thank you for the comment. Just a fair warning, this is also going to be insanely long AHAHA so if you want to skip this and not read this, don't worry, you do not have to.

To kind of start off, I know this sounds weird but I actually do not fully consider this to be vent art, which is why I did not mark it off under the vent art tags. I know, I know it REALLY looks like it, and one could argue it is vent art simply because it is insanely personal and it is revolved around a heavy topic that emotionally hurts to talk about, however I do not consider this fully to be vent art because I see what is going on in the art itself to be a happy scenario. I'm calming myself down, playing with one of my yoyos, and the pulse displayed here I drew out is stable on purpose. I wanted to highlight a sort of control I had over my pulse here, which is why I personally could not consider this to be vent art in my own eyes. But if others see it as such, that is totally okay, and I get what they mean.

Secondly, regarding my own mental health being "my fault", I personally think that it is. There is a very famous saying you may or may not have heard of

"Mental illness is not your fault but it is your responsibility."

Of course, this is a fantastic quote, and one that means very well too. It is mostly true as well, most of the time, it is NOT people's fault if they suffer from mental illness or poor mental health. It is so so so complicated, and everyone deals with things differently. People may also end up with the same mental illnesses but got them in different ways.

In my case and scenario, however, I have absolutely no problem with putting most of the blame on myself for my own mental health. Yes, I do things to cope, and I am a very functional member of society. However, I am fine with blaming myself for how awfully neurotic I am. I am a nervous wreck, and without going into an insane amount of detail, I practically ALLOWED myself to become who I am today, which is why I do consider my own issues with my extreme form of anxiety to be no one's fault but my own. Blaming myself doesnt burden me, oddly enough. It is rare for placing blame on anyone to result in anything good, regardless of the situation. However, I need to take account for my own mental health, and part of that is admitting that I myself am the problem FOR myself.

You are a kind commenter, not a therapist, so I will save you the trouble of explaining absolutely everything, of course.

Thank you very much for your support. Have a good week ^_^

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Uploaded
Feb 19, 2023
7:40 AM EST
Category
Illustration

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