Goodbye socials, hello blog!

It’s now time for me to say goodbye to my illustration Instagram, Threads, X, TikTok and Facebook accounts.

I’ve always struggled to keep up with social media. After all these years, I’ve come to realise that my brain (with all its underlying issues) just doesn’t work that way. The constant, highly specific effort social media demands just to barely stand out in a sea of billions of creators has always been overwhelming, to say the least. Yet, it somehow felt mandatory in a field like illustration, something you just had to push through if you wanted exposure and work.

But… I wasn’t doing it. I’ve posted illustrations irregularly, shared a few pictures when I’ve held market stalls and shown some behind-the-scenes shots. Meanwhile, everyone else seemed to be doing so much more and I just couldn’t bring myself to replicate that. This made me feel anxious, like a failure and an impostor, among other nasty things.

Some of you may know that I now have two very different part-time jobs: graphic designer/social media manager (ironically, a girl has got to eat) and zookeeper. These, even more so than the jobs I’ve had before, leave me physically and mentally exhausted, with very little time and energy to enjoy my evenings and days off doing the things I wish I could do. Drawing is one of those things, but it’s far from the top of my priority list.

All the work social media demands just to have the slightest chance of building a decent online presence and gaining something from it isn’t even at the bottom of that list. Yet, I felt like it needed to be in the top ten. Because it wasn’t, I constantly felt like I was failing, which led me into a spiral of doom and gloom, resulting in me doing nothing at all. If that makes any sense.

My social media presence has never brought me any paid illustration work. My commissions have always come through people I know or organisations I belonged to. I know I haven’t dedicated as much time to illustration in general, but… there are just so many other things I want to do with my life.

Also, the fact that these social networks have manipulative algorithms, spread misinformation, generate hostility and division, roll back safety policies protecting LGBTQIA+ people (especially transgender individuals) and other marginalised, minority groups, remove tampons and sanitary products for trans men and non-binary people from the men’s toilets in their headquarters, allow extreme homophobic, racist and ableist slurs and completely lack fact-checking (among many other dystopian yet very real issues) makes me want to run away as fast and as far as possible.

This doesn’t mean I’m disappearing from the face of the internet. I’m keeping my private accounts on Instagram and Facebook, mainly because of the contacts and the photos and videos I’ve posted over the years. It’s a little personal archive I’ve built for a small group of people I care about. I know this might seem contradictory given everything I’ve said, but I’m sure many of you can relate. I’m working through these feelings and it might even lead to me leaving for good someday. We’ll see.

I still enjoy sharing my creations with the world, even if it doesn’t bring me money. I just find it… nice. Why? Maybe it’s human nature, I don’t know. So, from now on, I’ll be sharing my illustrations, processes, how-tos and maybe even some photography on my personal blog on my website. Yep, that’s right. A blog. Tell me you’re a millennial without telling me you’re a millennial. You can also follow me on Bluesky (and fingers crossed it doesn’t fall into the hands of the next fascist billionaire) and continue to buy my stuff on Etsy (although that is another whole can of worms we'll open in the future).

Looking forward to seeing you around here!