Looking Back
At a point everything felt so wrecked, pointless, and going downhill. A downward spiral, some call it. Bad eating and every-day habits, alcohol and tobacco abuse, poor social interactions/conditions, lack of good work opportunities and many other things easily make you feel the burden of a life in an "underdeveloped" country, specially when your mind has been shaped under such conditions.
It's good to look back while living in these much harsher times, after two years of chronic bombardment of the human mind with all C19 related stuff, plus the beginning of - did it ever stop? - WAR!, YET feeling VERY different.
What has changed? Actually, it's been a wild spin, but I can say that if I could try to sum it all up (for demonstration purposes only - haha), the main ingredient to flip it up is a bunch of persistence. But how to be persistent when your mere existence is a painful burden?
Perception
After years of analyzing myself, I've learned that it only takes defining something to make it real. For yourself that is. Our reality is pretty much only ours. I mean the whole of it. Unique realities are made up by unique perceptions of what we usually call - reality - in the first place. We have the might to change that reality, not through magic (only, lol 🤣), but through infinite means. Our real potential might lies buried beneath a pile of sheets of "wrong" (inconvenient, mostly) livings which we have learned through mimicking the herd - our parents mostly. The experts say we are like recording machines from birth till age seven, I don't make this stuff up! They're inside us all - the never-ending repeating patterns of physical, psychological, and emotional conducts of our ancestors. Not to say it's a bad thing when it's not, but I'm referring to the things that hold us down and keeps us from giving the best of ourselves. Not that we want to, but our brains are wired to do so without us even needing to. This alters our perception, meaning it alters our reality.
As you can see, in that first definition of the quality of being "REAL" (Reality), that objectivity actually refers not to perception, of course, because perception is subjective. Now the thing is, the way things work in psychology, that subjectivity can and is very real to us. It's so real, that we behave in certain ways because of it. We make up stories that relate to this perception.
Img by doodledanga.
Neuroplasticity
I wasn't talking about drugs when I mentioned mind-altering in that last paragraph, even though I do believe that natural mind-altering drugs have benefits in this process if used therapeutically under proper conditions. I'm not advising use to anyone here so please do your own research.
What I was talking about, is the shaping of our character, the bending of our personality, the sculpting of our ways. "This is how I am" is just an excuse to not do the work - that is the digging of WHO we are and WHY - HOW is it that we came to be, and HOW we can change that. Today, I saw a video where a guy talked about people not being able to afford psychological treatment in poor countries, so they don't treat them. I personally don't believe in these treatments as much as I do in water, exposure to sun, soil (this besides the contact with our hands with the bacteria in it), and nature, eating mostly organic native foods (check Dr Sebi - dig deep, DYOR - there's a lot of disinformation around him), exercise, fostering good relationships. All those can act as therapy.
And you will ask.. but again, how to get to those things if "I can't"?...
source in link above
... well, according to Dr. Bruce Lipton, you can - IF YOU THINK YOU CAN - You change your brain with repetition. By saying I CAN, we change ourselves. That's why and how to forge a path of persistence. Neuroplasticity.
Twist of Perception
As I mentioned in my earlier posts, I started to learn 3D because I bought an NFT that gives you the ability to visualize and build with 3D NFTs in your own 3D planet (Desolates NFT).
'March of Madness' tournament started - hosted by the Desolates team - and I decided to enter the last day of inscriptions. Time was short, I was lacking skills, but I started anyways.
The reason why I wanted to tell you about this in the middle of what I was writing before, is because entering contests is not usually something I do.
This is me trying something different, and with a different attitude. This is where persistence has gotten me, and it's taking me further.
It was a tough ride. It took me many hours of tutorials, a lot of bumping into errors, and I had to test models once and again into the planet so it took me AGES to finish what I had started. Last round specially, I went a little mad - like the contests' name, 'March of Madness'- I decided to build a whole planetary!
The idea was to make it a very awesome world, but I hadn't really realized how long it would take. It took me a few sleepless nights, and unfortunately could only add some of the art until de very end of the the contest. I'm only finishing this post until now - a little over a week of the end of the tournament - because I was still in recovering from the milestones lol.
I made it to third place!
Wish I could show you the trophy but they haven't been given out yet.
The point of the story is that I never gave up, not one single second. Frustration arised bit by bit. I tried to stay steady but I kept clenching my jaw, wanting to not watch the sun go out, again.. But anyways, the roosters sang and I kept going. I literally saw the sun rise a couple of days during the tourney, because I participated in ANOTHER contest (#AiternateCribs) where I ended up in ~ 7th place!
https://twitter.com/doodledanga/status/1508813286804004866
- doodledanga
Besides the persistence it took me to get through the tournament, there was also the attitude that got me to participate. As I mentioned, participating in contests is not something I usually do. I definitely didn't enter this contest thinking I couldn't win!
Determination has been another good thing to develop. It has definitely helped me with persistence. My deep desire to change the world and also making my art dreams real is what got me to this state with less friction.
Last Words
Some days are harder than others for different reasons, but we have to laser focus our attention on creating something different instead of trying to eliminate or correct the negative things, the things we don't like or specially the ones we would like to be different but can't change. We must keep ignoring them, not surrendering our emotional state to them. That means not reacting to different things to be able to feel good - or neutral - and carry on until the end until you get the gold, or third place.. knowing you gave it your best, and that there will be more mountains to climb and keep learning and transforming ourselves to something better than we were yesterday.. a moment at a time.
That's how I dealt with turning these sketches
Into this:
Hope all what I wrote can help someone to get to where they want to in life, because I think that's part of getting there. That's how I keep climbing the mountains I set myself to. I haven't yet figured many aspects of my life, but I sure have found the first steps in the direction to make my art dreams real. That itself is the REAL gold for me.
If you'd like to check out the planet, please click here
2D/3D Art inside available for minting in HIVE, ETH, SOL or TEZOS blockchains upon request. Some of the art has already been minted and sold.
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Crafting dreams through shapes, doodles, colors, good vibes, infinite creative energy, NFTs and fun.