"Don't bend; don't water it down; don't try to make it logical; don't edit your own soul according to the fashion. Rather, follow your most intense obsessions mercilessly."
- Franz Kafka
Sometimes I wonder if I do have Avoidant Personality Disorder because I often won't read the comments or communicate with someone I disagree with. I will sometimes state my view and maybe listen to what they first say in response, but after that I try to escape because the situation will only upset me further and people tend to stick with their own preferred beliefs, regardless of what others say (I try not to be that way, but I, too, prefer my own opinions usually). I love doing creative activities like art and writing, but I'm not overjoyed at the thoughts of sharing it in any kind of competitive format or a situation where it's likely to be judged. I like seeing others' work and I'm not a good critic aside from beginners at art or with grammar so I tend to focus on what I like when I see others' work. When I show my work on LiveJournal or Deviant Art I'm usually open to suggestions, but it doesn't feel like I'm competing with anyone else - just myself. Also I usually am not totally satisfied with my work, even if I like a specific piece; I always think I should practice more before really showing it to the world or looking into competitive or professional formats to get more feedback or maybe have some success. It makes me really overwhelmed or anxious to send out a query letter, write up a letter or resume, submit slides, etc.
So being alone so much, being hesitant to communicate on instant messengers, refusing to look at potential conflicts, finding criticism hard unless I divorce myself emotionally from what I produced, etc. lead me to wonder if I do have Avoidant Personality Disorder like I was diagnosed by my psychologist who did all the personality tests, IQ test, etc. on me. However, she's the only one that diagnosed me with that condition and it was based on my personality tests high anxiety scores/high Avoidant Personality Disorder score. I often don't know how to respond to questions on tests like that, though, so I don't know how accurate it was. It's true I do have a lot of anxiety... I desperately want to be close to people, yet I fear bothering people in any way and that leads me to avoid a lot of situations even anxious people don't usually have a problem with. I'm always first to volunteer for an unpleasant task due to my anxiety about bothering people. I think those tests were right in showing my PTSD scores as much higher than my depression scores, an unusually low score on Antisocial Personality Disorder traits (12%, I think, when 50% is average), and a low Schizoid Personality Disorder score (30-something%). I am definitely Bipolar, though, and I scored in the average range on that. So the tests definitely aren't full-proof... I also think my IQ test results overestimate my abilities, which is rarely what I hear other people say. I am really not all that knowledgeable a person and my memory is in shambles since returning to Zyprexa. I'm also slow. I do have some strong points related to critical thinking, though, I will admit. I believe I learned that from dealing with my mentally ill, yet intelligent and clever, father and from my great tutors in high school.
It's not even that I hope for a positive response when I open myself up to critique/criticism -- I just feel embarrassed easily and dissatisfied with my level of work. Right now I don't want to show any of my work, except maybe some poems. I would send stories or art to people who asked to see it, though, in a casual way. And I will keep posting my art to Deviant Art and here, since LiveJournal feels like a safer way for me to express myself. People of all ability levels show their work on these kinds of sites, after all. I don't want to give up my creative activities and in recent years poetry writing especially has started to help me emotionally. I just don't need external validation to keep trying to improve my abilities or work on creative activities.
I also enjoy scrapbooking, which is creative, even though I'm not impressive at scrapbooking (at all). I'd kind of like to make an art journal where I write down things that inspire me or little poems/poem bits with pictures I draw or collage. It sounds like a lot of work, though, and I tend to be pretty simple in the kind of art I do. I'm reading a book that kind of makes me feel better about the last novel I wrote, despite my disinterest at the moment of querying. The book Shanghai Girls by Lisa See is about two sisters over the course of their life. It doesn't have a clear-cut "plot" exactly... There are a number of subplots in my last novel, but the overall "plot" is mostly just the growth and maturity of the protagonist over the course of several years.
For my next novel I want to write a young adult fantasy novel that does have a clear-cut plot. I'm going to incorporate fantasy and plot elements I like from all sorts of formats, but mostly fantasy-oriented -- other fantasy books, anime, live-action and animated fantasy, fairy tales, etc. I'm going to work on more brainstorming on that later today. I also will hopefully start drawing human figures again tomorrow, for practice. I'm out of canvases and need to buy some more this week. Then I will paint again with acrylics. I want to paint detailed Impressionism-type paintings like I used to do. I've veered a little away from that recently and some of my paintings I think are too simplistic. I will photograph the last few and post them soon. They're not very impressive, though. Oh well, I like to remind myself even when my writing or art doesn't turn out as good as I'd like that I'm still learning. Sometimes I can put the work aside for awhile and then fix it -- sometimes I just let it sit or even paint over it. I have a giant canvas I'm not satisfied with, but I'm not sure if I want to just paint over it. I'm also not sure how to improve it, though:-/
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