Time for a change

Hi everyone!
'Tis I, Ms Always-says-she's-going-to-be-active-again-but-never-actually-goes-through-with-it here! *hangs head in shame*

One of the reasons I've been inactive is because of uni. I've found that uni work and keeping up with my dA, such as it is, do not go together. The fact is I watch about 200 people/groups. And yeah, I know, I could go through that list and prune it, but part of me just wants to say 'screw it, I'm just going to deactivate and that will save all this bother!' (no, I'm not actually going to deactive...read on...) Plus, I've tried pruning my watch list before and it doesn't work, I always end up only getting rid of completely inactive people that I watch which makes absolutely no sense.

The thing is, I used to feel like I NEEDED dA. In the time of my life before I went off to uni I was pretty lonely and didn't have a lot of friends, and those I did have I didn't feel like I could truly rely on, in case they rejected me, and sometimes they were cruel for no reason. Then when I went off to uni, I made loads of new friends. My self confidence improved about infinity times, I learned to look after myself and make awesome food and look after my own finances, and finally felt...OK. As in, not a complete dud. As in, my friends weren't all going to leave eventually because I was such a stupid annoying depressing person. I think I'm happier now than I've ever been. It's fantastic.

But the point is, I used to really find comfort through making art to put on dA. It gave me new motivation to actually finish art, so I could put it up, and I knew that some people would see it, even if not that many. It was brilliant being on a site where liking art and drawing was normal, and being a bit of an outcast was not really a problem. At the time I was doing A-level fine art, and then I did a Foundation course, and in each of those places there was a clear separation between work I did for the courses, and the type of work I enjoyed doing. On the foundation in fact they were occasionally downright snooty about stuff like manga and comic books and fantasy writing and metal and other things I have an affinity for. Bah.

However, things have changed. The work I make for uni and the work I enjoy making are one and the same now, and have been for about a year and a half. It's brilliant. Also I'm surrounded by people who love sketching (like me) and love illustration (like me) and it certainly helps that when you get to uni level you get much less of the whole trying hard is uncool thing, and far fewer (though still some) of those people who think that liking anything is totally lame. Or if they do like things they are always totally hipster/generic cool things.

So, though I may not need dA anywhere near as much as I used to, or be able to be on it as much as I used to, here's the thing: I still want to be on here. I love seeing other people's work and giving feedback, and I love the community aspect of the site, and I especially love devmeets. I have met so many awesome people at devmeets and been able to keep in touch with them on dA, and that is my main reason for staying on the site.


Tl;dr: My new account may be found here!! Please rewatch me here, I would really appreciate it.


Why move account? I want a fresh start. But rest assured I will go through my watch list very soon and rewatch all my friends and most loved artists on this site. This is not a time for me to pick and choose people, and the people I will not be rewatching will be those big name artists that loads of people watch and I just don't have time to look at their work any more, so hopefully I will not miss anyone out who is in a position to ask me 'hey, why didn't you rewatch me?'

I will also transfer the work I am really proud of to my new account, and if I do this I will probably delete it on this account to avoid duplication, but other than that the work will probably stay up. This is one of the reasons I'm moving. I have been on dA for years and my work has changed so much, so I want a new account that better represents what I'm doing right now.


************

One other reason: personal journals. I used to write a lot of overly personal journals on this account (and yes, I know I still have been doing this very recently! ) but I've begun to realise this is a bad idea. I might delete the worst ones at some point, and I'm going to try to stop doing them in the future. I'm going cold turkey from ranting about personal stuff online...to a point. Because rants are fun, both to write and to read, but overly personal ranting is a bad idea because you never know who might read it.


But what about that situation you wrote about a few months ago?
It's got a lot better. Which is not to say it won't get worse again, but I'm back home for the summer anyway so I'll have at least 3 months before it even has a chance to get worse.

By the way, to everyone who offered help and support when I was upset about that situation: I can't express how grateful I am to you guys. I read all your comments and you all really helped me feel less alone. So thanks, you wonderful people. You know who you are.