It's december of 2023. I've only uplodaded two finished pieces of music online this entire year, one in june, Lunar Deity, and the other in march, Pedal. I've been mostly radio silent since then. With these last two semesters of college, this year was the toughest I had ever faced in my academic life. My grades were still stable, but my motivation to work on personal things was extremely shaky throughout.

Not having enough time and energy to do something you enjoy doesn't feel good. You get a sort of itch when you spend a long enough time like that, things just don't feel right. Projects accumulate, barely anything gets finished, and you have these imaginary people in your head that are waiting to see the next new thing you made. You almost want to tell them that yes, you're still making things, just stay tuned!

There's a specific kind of creator online that is in a perpetual state of shouting "I'm still alive!", giving reasons for their inactivity and updates on their daily lives, trying to explain themselves for suddenly flubbing their once frequent output. Something about spending more time talking about why you aren't making anything, instead of spending that time on actually making something, feels in-part ironic and in-part unfortunate.

Being completely inactive due to life stuff made me think about that. I've been trying to work on stuff in the background, so I haven't uploaded anything new in ages, but I think it's nice to be silent while getting a big project finished. I can put effort into making something instead of putting effort into promo videos, updates, the likes, just to remind people that I exist. Updates make people remember you exist, but actual finished works are what make people remember you.

(All this pretentious talk is really just me trying to justify my hate/laziness for making videos and promotion material though.)

That being said, the temptation to put something out in a rush gets intense sometimes. Having something you're excited about but can't show to anyone because it's part of a larger thing makes me feel like that one image of the sad ant holding a bindle.

The thing I'm most terrified about though, is announcing something that I'm not sure I'll actually finish. Motivation and inspiration are fickle things, you could be all excited and dedicated to a project for one month, and then not touch it for the entirety of the next one. Lots of creators cite external life stuff for why they might not publish things, but, at least in my experience, motivation and inspiration are already sporadic enough on their own. Finishing something is a hard thing to do.

Many might already know about this, but to those that don't: if you're tempted about announcing something for the sake of announcing something, that impatient audience in your head isn't real. In your own experience you might've looked at a creator you like that has been inactive for a while, go "damn, I wonder if they might come back one day" and move on to the rest of your day.

And when they finally do come back with something to show, it's a pleasant surprise. You might've forgotten about them by now, but if you're subscribed to them, or follow them, or you HIT THAT BELL or whatever, you still hear it.

...Does this sound like coping and seething? I feel like I'm coping and seething writing this BUT THE POINT IS! Don't feel obligated to tell people that things are coming! that you're still alive! etc! Because, at the end of the day, if you make something cool, people will eventually find it. In time.

6 months is a long while though, so I made a sneak peek to contradict everything that I said here. Like I said, that temptation gets intense.