Confidence game.

Here's a small image from the current Wrester Zero story. I don't want to mislead anyone into thinking that I'm producing an epic of some sort. I'm more than halfway done but I don't think it'll be more than 20 pages in length. I'm a single father and I work a full time blue collar job. I don't want to just throw something out there for the sake of saying I've published. I want the finished product to be the best I'm currently capable of producing. I've had to learn two important lessons recently: confidence and letting go of the perfectionistic mindset that leads to procrastination and ultimately anger and frustration. My art school is 365 days, 24/7. If you ask me what aspect of my work needs improvement I'd say "all of it". But for too many years I made the mistake of comparing my work to that of my idols and of course my work always comes up short to say the least. Couple that with a perfectionistic mindset and it's a recipe for paralyzing bouts of procrastination born out of a fear of failure and of not living up to the standards set by my idols. Somewhere along the line I seriously ran off the rails. As Matt Wagner so wisely wrote in Mage: "the past is there to inspire you, not contain you". I will always consider myself a student no matter how much progress I make. But I had to learn that enjoyment is also a part of artistic growth and that perfection has no place in my life. I will never be the biggest fan of my own artwork but I won't be the severe, harsh and unforgiving self critic that I've been all these years either.