Depression or years-long-art-block?

Advice is always like ‘do something easy!’ ‘be creative!’ ‘don’t let go of your hobbies!’

Well. Uh.

I’ve completely lost the ability to draw/paint.

Used to be able to, breaking stuff down into shapes, figuring out lighting, making it all feel alive…but for the last few years, I just can’t. There’s no skill, no talent underneath it, it’s like a kid learning for the first time every time (but without the ambition). I can trace photos and then do decent shading on top, but that’s it. Everything else is just gone. Things don’t blend together, it’s all disjointed - like a badly photoshopped picture, rather than something that took days. I have tons of ideas and a lot of them are meaningful, but I can’t get them out.

I know exactly what I’d say to someone else in this situation - take a break, then back to basics, warm-up shapes, keep going over anatomy and poses and lighting and composition until it’s second nature.

I tried. I had so many ideas rattling around, it got frustrating not being able to express them, so I went back to basics. Warm-up circles. None of them even look round, how is that possible? Maybe it’s too boring, I’m just not motivated - let’s try one of the simpler ideas, just to get that out of the way. A little comic, sketchy style, doesn’t have to be accurate.

I kept trying for three hours. Three hours of drawing stupid little shapes, checking references, even tracing over them and still having it turn out wrong.

Eventually, I just grabbed all the paper off the table and put it in the recycling bin. Including the jotted-down ideas. There’s no point in pretending I’ll get round to it eventually, it’s just not gonna happen. Hobbies are supposed to be fun, and this hasn’t ever really felt fun - an obsession, maybe, but that’s all.

The table doesn’t look tidier. It’s messy and empty at the same time.

What a waste.