I watched another one of Anna Howard’s YouTube videos. The genius who made that digital garden video that inspired me to relaunch my creative path and start this blog? Yeah, that one. She’s amazing and I love her content, perspectives, and the way her mind thinks. She also throws relatable memes & Tumblr posts in there which is actually so wholesome. I highly recommend you check out her videos.
This particular one is titled ‘convenience culture is killing our creative impulses’ where she hones in on the few critiques she’s received in her recent burst of viewers and how they mainly disapproved of the time it takes for her to get to the “point” of whatever topic she’s talking about. While acknowledging from a business/product take, that’s valid. The faster you ‘get to the point’, the better. But if that’s what you truly want, we have AI nowadays at our fingertips for that, at our convenience. But inconvenience is literally the basis of art and there are no rules, no bounds when it comes to artistic expression.
In her case, she tends to explain things, very much like an essay. She addresses the different parts of a whole, referencing Substack articles mostly and other artists/content creators if applicable to further elaborate on those parts. And towards the end, ties those parts into a whole. For a lack of better explanation and the sake of ironically getting to the point, I hope that makes sense. (Like I said, go watch her videos RIGHT NOW! I mean, after you read this, of course.)
Being a creative consultant for other content creators, one thing she said is:
Advice that I have given so many, probably all of my clients, is exactly what those critical comments are telling me of like ‘lets make the intro, get to the point faster, lets have a great hook’, I’d give them a formula for the best intro possible. And, in starting my own podcast, I become a bit of a hypocrite about that. And the thing now I wanna make clear before we get any further, now that I have more of an audience than I’ve ever had before, is that I hope that you stick with me long enough to see me become a hypocrite. Because I’m not afraid to change my mind, and change my mind in public–well there is some fear there, but I’d also like to highlight how beautiful it is to go through an experience that changes your mind about something. – Anna Howard
That really resonated with me! Especially because back in highschool, I made a lowkey/separate IG account and updated my tumblr username to accidentalhypocrite 😂 I came up with that username because it registered to me how, fluid, I am. How I can agree with everything and nothing all at once. How one day, I might really like my unique gap-teeth and tell myself I’ll smile in every school picture because fuck beauty standards, and the next I’m asking my mom for braces and never smiling on picture day again (spoiler alert: I got braces AND aligners-Damn. double homicide). Or how in January, my favorite color’s blue, but in February I’m all about that pink matter (😏😉). Not with everything. I was still very much stuck in my ways when it came to certain beliefs and mindsets. But overall, I was constantly changing, especially at that age. I mighta thought some shit like ‘I be hypocritical on accident…..accidenthypocrite….accidentalhypocrite! 💡🗯️’ and so that became my username on all my ‘hidden’ accounts, where no one I knew really followed me, and I could post whatever I want without the fear of being perceived. (I would post Tumblr quotes with loosely transparent/custom backgrounds + alternative people + band members, listing my moods as the captions. It was a vibe).
11 years later, I’m still one lost ass bitch 😂 though, now grown, more experienced, more knowledgable. Less enthusiastic/energetic, unfortunately 🤷♀️ what can ya do? But the name still applies, nonetheless. What better name to use for my blog? To use to share my everchanging thoughts and stories and identities? To sum up my existence? And really all of our existences. In a world, in a time where perfection and this idea of perfection is overexposed to us. Where so many of us witness and/or experience this tendency to curate this one-sided self-image when the truth of each of us is more like a myriagon. To where this sense of perfectionism almost immobilizes us.
I think back to this time I went to the lake with my family and this family set up next to us had kids that were catching fish, some with their bare hands (clearly they were pros). This caught my nephews interest and they gave us one of their kid-fishing poles. My brother spent some time showing them how to use it and fishing with them, but they didn’t catch any before we had to leave. And of course, my 5 year old nephew Kenzyn was sooo upset about this. Acting like it was the end of the world because he didn’t catch a fish that day. Trying to reassure him, I told him ‘It’s okay, Kenz! That was your 1st time doing it and you have all the time in the world! I promise youll catch one one day, you just gotta practice.’ He continued to fuss, say I’m wrong, and be upset. And I just laugh to myself, roll my eyes and go ‘Kids, right?………….wait….ahhhh damn, I do the same fucken shit’ 😂 (I swear I’m like Edward Cullen bro, forever 17. childish asfff).
But it makes me think: we’re so reassuring of kids and encouraging of them to use their imagination, and try again even if they fail the 1st time and to get better, and regardless of how crazy and ‘wtf is that?’ their drawings look, we still hang them on the fridge, still save them as keepsakes. We all know that kids quite literally grow and change so fast.
And then something shifts. At some point. All of a sudden, we get to a certain age where it’s discouraged. Not always outwardly, a lot of the times it’s subtly, in the messages we receive through others and overtime, internalize. Which is odd! Because we don’t just stop growing, stop changing all of a sudden when we’re grown. Being grown doesn’t directly correlate with getting everything right and perfect the first time, and not having flaws. But I too was caught up in that trap. Like, everything needs to make sense, everything needs to make money or it doesn’t make sense. So many ideas lost to inaction because of self-doubt and just not trusting myself. And accepting that I will fuck up and that’s okay. And that I will change, my beliefs can and will change, but that doesn’t mean I can’t nor shouldn’t be confident in how and where I stand while they hold. And that I’m never going to get a blueprint, a step-by-step manual from God himself on how to succeed on my own path, what that looks like. But I will still be fine. We will still be fine. You will still be fine. It’s not the end of the world.
Of course, easier said than done. It’s little to nothing to throw around a quote and logically make sense of things. Actually believing and embodying it with your soul is a different story, but it’s something that happens naturally on our own timeline. This transition is one I’ve felt, one I’ve actively been going through for the last month. I’ve always wanted to journal consistently but it never did stick. Yet, I’ve written more consecutively in the last month than I ever have in my entire life (well creative writing, not counting required school assignments, lol). I’m realizing that working through my thoughts is interesting in itself, and it’s enough. They’re not meant to be some final product. All of my creations from each stage of my life, they’re all beautiful in their own right. They’re milestones that I will regret not being able to look back on if I don’t make them, and ultimately they’re what will build my confidence, help me create even more, and improve on my craft.
So to sum it all up, thank you Anna. You’ve been helping the wheels in my brain turn lately and I found you at the right time.
Thank you @typewriterastrology for being the fly on my wall and posting the most accurate, inspirational horoscopes every time (go subscribe to her yall, that’s the best astrology page out right now). A quote from her detailed horoscope of my Leo Rising last week that also contributed to this think piece:
Stop offering only the most acceptable parts of yourself. The world doesn’t need your perfection—it needs your aliveness. The version of you that’s thinking through things in real time. – Typewriter Astrology
And thank you to everyone reading this. Let’s continue on this journey of self-discovery and self-loss together and be accidental hypocrites.
Sincerely,
Your favorite, tall thought-daughter
references
creating a digital garden to end my doomscrolling
convenience culture is killing our creative impulses
typewriter astrology (Website | IG)
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