idk if this fits here, but i had allways had a relationship with art as a kid, it was eventally beaten out of me by my parents, society and life, and so i gave up, recently or for the last 2 years i have been on and off when it comes to drawing and still i realize that, i dont have the drive or motivation to draw, i see people draw like everyday, make their whole life about drawing, being super obsessed with it, and yet here i am just going trough the motions of life barely drawing at all or not consistent enough for it to matter, how do yall deal with this, any fellow artists? or maybe it just means that i was never supposed to be one
Many do drawing on and off like that. My drive to draw comes and goes. Right now, it’s asleep, been that way for the past year. Then, suddenly that urge to draw wakes up and I can hardly resist drawing everything I can. It just comes and goes. Well, you’re not alone with that. 
(i have many UFP’s = UnFinished Projects … In Crochet, it’s Unfinished Objects).
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then how do u balance living in a sh+t country and not doing what u love, cuz if ure not making money with ur art u have to make money somewhere else, ussually wage slaving, so whats the point if u cant do what u love
I do art for me.
As for money, you’d have to find a job that you can do and do your art during your time off. That’s what I did.
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Most people can’t do what they love, the clever ones look to get the job that hurts as less as possible while providing enough wage to put something aside. From this money they try to finance their dream bit by bit.
Often, that is not fun, but an experience many have to make. Be it in more or the lesser developed parts of the world, not everybody can be the boss, many bosses are not nice, and so on, I know that story, although I had a lot of luck in my earlier life (beside the things I wrote in my PM, and those I did not tell because they are too crazy).
Try to make your life as good as possible, it does not help to suffer on circumstances you have no influence on.
Michelist
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I moved your topic out of tech support.
Do you really have to be super obsessed with something for it to be your passion? I say no. Do you have to do it every day to count as your passion? No. Do you have to give up everything else to be allowed to call it your passion? Also No. What if it (art in this case) wasn’t really your passion all along? I say: Why does it matter? It’s perfectly okay to do thing just once in a while when you feel like doing it and you have time to do it. Passion and obsession is not the same thing, there is a reason the word obsession has a negative connotation.
Look at me, I only draw once every few month or so, usually I take time off work for a few weeks just to paint (usually during ArtFight which is coming up next month again) instead of going on vacation or something. Simply because I don’t have much time otherwise and I’m exhausted from my job. And there are also other things I also like to do (like playing video games and other stuff) that all need to get a place in my free time. But that doesn’t mean I’m not passionate about my art and I still love to do it even when it’s hard sometimes.
It’s easy to look at other artists and be intimidated by their output and the amount of it, and to forget that they often sacrifice a lot to do it. I know a lot of artists, even professionals and they have harder work lives than I have as a senior developer. They often work 12 Hours a day or longer, no weekends, no vacation, no free time to do anything else, and they barely make a living. Basically all they do is art and not because they want to but because they have no choice or otherwise they can’t afford living. Is that what you want for you?
We usually see only the successful artists online and think that’s how it works for all of them when in reality only a small bit of artists can afford a “normal work life”, this is what’s called Survivorship bias (article even mentions artists). The same thing that makes us humans believe that old cars are better than new ones because some of them are still around after half a century, or that surviving a dangerous pandemic makes us stronger.
Draw when you feel like drawing, and don’t when you don’t and if you at some point find that you don’t really feel like doing it ever again, that’s also okay. It won’t change the experiences and what you felt in the past. If you can still lose yourself in the process of drawing and have fun with it once in a while, that’s the passion. When you don’t feel passionate all the time that’s just completely normal. And why even be obsessed about being passionate, can just be a hobby you do once in a while and that is good too, isn’t it?
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but isnt that the definition of passion? be obsessed with it? to breathe, eat and sleep art?, i think it matters at least to me cuz i dont wanna be a wage slave, i wanna work a job i actually i give a damn, cuz u say they work 12h a day fair enough, but ill probs be doing that soon as well, just not in art and in some random wage slave job i hate, tho the survivorship bias is a good point ngl,
@NunoTheDudeYT There are multiple definitions of passion, but what you described isn’t one of them (I checked). Mainly, passion is just an emotion (a strong emotion which makes you move towards a goal, but nonetheless). You don’t have to feel bad about not wanting to do art all the time, and it doesn’t mean that you lack passion. If consistency is a problem, then maybe you should try doing a smaller amount of art each day, and then checking if you want to continue. I had an art teacher who assigned me to draw for ten minutes a day outside of school, and I was consistent with that.
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No, passion and obsession is not the same. An obsession is when you can’t stop yourself from something even when it hurts you. For example my grandma has a cleaning obsession and it very much hurts her body and mind, while it may seem just quirky and useful for the observer. Obsessions are pretty close to addictions, when they get out of hand.
You shouldn’t also forget that doing something as a job can harshly alter your feeling’s toward it. You may like art now but perhaps you hate doing it after you did it for 12 hours a day, 7 days a week and for years. Additionally there is more work that is not art, that’s related. For example when you’re selfemployed you have to deal with clients, taxes, billing, copyright law, licensing, merchandise, supplies, contracts, savings for the time you get sick and more. If you work for a studio as an employee things can be easier but on the other hand you have less creative freedom and can’t really decide what projects to do. Then there’s also AI giving real artists trouble. The field is highly competitive and you need lots of skill and determination to even have a chance. Mental illnesses like depression, burnout and chronic fatigue syndrome are plaguing many artists for a reason.
What art job did you even had in mind? There are many with different requirements.
As for being selfemployed, you can basically just try this right now. Make a portfolio, start offering commissions on social media and see if you can make a few bucks on the side. Calculate how much this will make you when you would do it full time based on the commission you got. You will probably notice it’s quite hard to make enough for a living. But most importantly you will get a feel for “do I want to do this every day for the foreseeable future?”.
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And do not forget that you will have to paint and draw what your customers ask you for, often this won’t be what you like to draw or feel comfortable with.
Michelist
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Very good point, I know a few guys who hate drawing weirdly feet focused artworks but it’s what pays the bills.
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sure bt yknow what else i hate, working min wage and being a wage slave so ig id prefer that poison, id like maybe an nsfw job for the money and then my own projects on side, ive tried coms but i allways got 0 views and stuff
You already faced one of the hurdles I mentioned. That’s the thing about art being a competitive market. And it also doesn’t help that algorithms keep you down. Try social media like mastodon that doesn’t have an algorithm that pushes or hides content (or learn to manipulate the algorithms on social media).
But it’s simply the thing that if you’re a no one you will have a hard time finding work in arts, no matter what. All the successful artists already put thousands of hours in their work before their breakthrough. You can’t really expect to just go online and be a successful artist. I don’t say it’s impossible, just that it’s very unlikely. Most importantly whining about wage slavery won’t get you anywhere. Only you can decide what you want to do with yourself. And you actually have to do it instead of just talking about it online.
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Excellent replies all around. I just wanted to add that art is one of these pursuits that make you second guess yourself all the time.
It’s a combination of it being really difficult and requiring immense time investment. As a result you keep wondering if you can really do it, if you’re wasting your time and money, were you just lucky before, if you’ve already reached your limit, it goes on and on. Combine that with the expectations and challenges of real life and you have one nasty cocktail.
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I had this same issue a few years ago.
Art is definitely still a passion of mine, a lifelong one at that. But I think people misunderstand what a “passion” can be. It doesn’t have to be something you dedicate all your life to, or make a career out of.
I went to art school for lack of any other direction in life. thankfully just community college. I LOVED my professors and classes and I learned so much valuable info and improved my skills a lot. But when it came time to transfer and “pick” what art I wanted to focus on, I realized that I didn’t want to make it into a job or continue going to school for it.
To be honest, I was already pretty burnt out and being in shows etc took a lot out of me. I realized if I kept going on the same path that I would end up hating art. So I dropped out of the 4-year university I had transferred to, got a job at a fast food place, and here I am 5 years later.
It took two or three years of not making art at all before I got back into it. and only in the past year or so have I really taken time to make art. And even then, I only got my “groove” back in the last couple months.
Don’t sweat it. Giving yourself permission to give up on art will probably help you get back into it sooner. If you try and force it you might end up disliking it. So just chill, focus on other hobbies or interests. I got really into writing and tech when I stopped drawing/painting. Now I’m super into Linux, FOSS, and have plans to start working on some original novels!
You can take a break from making art, I think, but you never really stop being an artist.
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what jobs did u do to fill the void? im in the boonies, so no friends no gf just wasting youth with no purpose or art, what do i do in the meanwhile? just rot away and waste time doing wage slave jobs, sleep and repeat?
I’ve been working the same job since I left school, it’s just crappy fast food work. In my free time I started writing a lot more, reading, etc. Most recently I picked up blogging and started building my own website.
It sounds like that this might be part of a larger mental health issue for you bud. Been there, too.
Can I ask how old you are? From 18-23 I felt similarly and wasted my time getting high, drinking, etc. Focusing on taking better care of myself helped snap me out of it but it was a long and difficult road to get where I am today. It gets better, though, as cliche as that sounds.
im 24 rn
While I was unemployed, I saw many ads that included the word “love.” For example, in ads looking for designers, this text was standard: “If you love design and want to join our team… etc., etc.”
My first thought about this concept of “love,” in terms of a profession, was that it was unrealistic. Many people work more out of necessity than pleasure. If you doubt this, ask lottery players: “What’s your dream?” Most will say: “To be rich and not have to work.”
At this point, someone will say I’m wrong: “To love” would mean: “To accept the good and the bad sides of the profession, the advantages and disadvantages… and stick with it.” Okay, here we have something more acceptable… although I still doubt the concept! 
In my case, when I worked with fabric print designs, the most accurate thing to say is that I loved… drawing! Not necessarily the prints I designed. Some were very beautiful (in my opinion), while others were completely strange.
It worked for me because I let go of concepts like “I like this” or "I don’t like this" and also “Can I do this or not?” I simply started drawing.
I loved that process and set aside other considerations. It was an experience, a new approach for me. I think it worked, at least during the five years I worked at that company…
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It is a rare thing indeed to have a job doing something you love and continue to love doing it. Once it becomes a job, all the unfun stuff involved can no longer be ignored or pushed aside, as it can be with a hobby.
Everyone is a wage slave in some way, gotta eat, sleep somewhere, all that. If you are good at something, your slavery is less of a burden. Being the boss is, IMO, worse. All the BS becomes your problem.
Find something you can do without going crazy, and use your spare time (if any) to unwind. The stereotype of the “starving artist” has a long lineage.