Today was quite possibly the first work day of the year that I've worked non-stop & left the lab satisfied with my accomplishments, (even managed to entirely avoid social media doomscrolling!)

I haven't been able to get "in the zone" for a long time—unfortunately my productivity is directly tied to my emotional stability & I've been struggling an awful lot with mental health in particular. So this was a very welcomed change.


I did some major organizing of folders on my hard drive & ended up hyperfocused on fixing small but important (to me) problems to my branding & product style guides for 2025.

These were things like adjusting the visual rules for shirt template scaling, cleaning up imperfections in my DNA logo, & rebuilt part of the Puppy design to make it more practical for me to work with. All this allowed me to finally prepare the oldest shirt templates on my list that are now ready to be sent to the printer.


I also got around to putting together some custom hybrid mockup designs for client approval & did another editing pass on my new client email/Telegram template... bringing me one step closer to my goal of directly contacting all outstanding clients on my list.


Even though some of these things weren't strictly necessary nor of the highest priority, what I finally allowed myself to indulge in today was scratching that itch a bit... This gave me a boost to my overall mood & made me satisfied with the work I accomplished, giving me a positive relationship with my career again.

I'm trying to wind down for bed but I don't fully want to stop work... that could be a good sign (but I am also wary of overworking). Unfortunately the drive behind inspiration is rarely convenient. I'm usually going to take advantage of it when it comes around.

(...This was supposed to be a quick update)

I have alluded to this before, but now I am absolutely certain, & it's a primary reason as to why I often find it hard to share updates: I am struggling with something called perfectionism writing OCD.


This is why I don't respond to clients in a timely fashion—not only do I feel an intense guilt & always assume negative judgment with all these delays (many outside of my control), but when I finally get the courage to open a message, it takes me 5 hours to re-write one paragraph twenty times or tweak until it's perfect. It's stressful for so many unnecessary reasons.

This explains why I have this constant fear & anxiety over using the "right" words in the "right" way. I am overly concerned about ensuring as much of my intent & information & tone is communicated properly... not just because of a perception of external concequences, but also because of the rediculous need for it to "feel right". I won't know what that looks like until I've experimented with a dozen different ways to write the same sentence. This is why I care about grammar & correct punctuation so much. I also heavily use the thesaurus.

This is why I make such heavy use of the edit function on Telegram when I catch an error. I often feel the need to go back & tidy things up even though I know the recipient will probably never see or realize this was done, so I'm doing it largely for my own satisfaction I guess. I will review the things I wrote over & over or day after day constantly making adjustments. There's no edit button on places like Bluesky, so I am very discouraged from sharing anything on those platforms. I also am obsessed with the formatting; it's like a stressful challenge to make it fit within a character limit while feeling like I need to keep the wording consistent across the board.

This is also why I am so stubborn about having someone to help do any of this for me. My perfectionism won't easily allow me to feel comfortable trusting anyone else to represent me & take over part of my work. I know I can have near impossible double-standards for myself, so I don't really want to burden anyone with these interpersonal issues & introduce possible resentment. I certainly cannot afford to pay for such a service either. Asking for & finding areas where I can direct that help is difficult.


I just sort of thought being a perfectionist was part of my personality, but it's way closer to being a compulsion. Perfectionist tendacnies affects or interferes with a lot of other areas of my life too. Sometimes this is a useful tool, such as my compulsion to want to tidy things up & keep them orderly seems to be countering the stereotypical ADHD problem of doing chores/cleaning... I actually like those rituals. But clearly there is a point where things go too far (like the hours I've now spent writing this instead of sleeping because I can't relax until this is done/posted, & even then I may worry it's not good enough yet & will still go back & edit it bit by bit until it locks in & I can't touch it anymore [like me adding this sentance because that's literally what I'm doing right now, 2 days later, having re-read it at least 5 times since it was first posted. SEE?] . It's all a compromise in the end I have to accept).


Long story (not) short, I finally have an explanation for what's going on here... & knowing is truly half the battle. I plan to talk to my new therapist about this next week.

[Notice] Today through Sunday I will be unavailable. However, I have a whole day of sitting in an airport on Monday & I intend to dedicate this time entirely towards client messages & updating the Trello!

This is expected to be a bit challenging for the reasons I outlined in my last update, but I am really wanting to change this behavior. My brain has been exceptionally unkind to me the past two years & I've often felt helpless in my own body & very confused as to what's wrong or how to fix it.

The first step seems to be exposing myself to the discomfort that my compulsions are seeking to aliviate, (much like "facing your fears") so I can work towards breaking this cycle. So against my better judgement I am choosing to try to be more casual, open, & even vulnerable on my "professional business account" to help me be less concerned about the way I am wording things. Maybe even misspell some things & not go back to fix them, who knows!

Problem is that I'm also ADHD so I tend to ramble. I will type out whole stories & then decide that's an overload of information & delete it. I have to work like ten times harder in order to create & send messages, holding them back for a long time because it's not "perfect enough yet".

I am challenging myself to not re-read this message at all before sending it & not to go back & edit it. (Oof)

I guess this just my way of trying to show my audience how much I really want to fix things & how difficult the most basic & trivial things have been for no good reason. If there's a chance that people can relate & this post helps others, then I think it's worth putting it out there.

I definitely don't feel that I am deserving of your continued patience with me & this guilt of not being like my old self has gotten pretty paralyzing, which causes inaction which compounds the problem! I am terrified about my financial stability going forward facing so many challenges at once. Thankfilly I have an incredible support network of friends & professional resources.

Thanks for sticking by me 💜 (I'm suddenly tearing up quite a lot on this plane now, geeze).


I think what awaits me on the other side of this plane ride is going to help me a lot with my troubles [holy hecc TURBULENCE right as I type this. I mean a loooot. woah, adrenaline]


[Whew it stopped]

I know this is kind of a weird update post... I figured it was better than radio silence from me at least.

So I'll see you Monday! ^^
Be excellent to each other

MFF Friday orders have now been added to the Trello & those clients contacted

I finished rebuilding a handful of Metamorphic templates for some of my oldest shirt orders, using the new 2025 style guides!

Today's batch (that is now incubating in my partner shop) was for orders that include both a printed shirt & another shirt type or handcrafted product

MFF Saturday orders have now been added to the Trello & those clients contacted

MFF Sunday orders have now been added to the Trello & those clients contacted. I've still got like 50 unread messages in Telegram, I see you... I'm getting there!

Aaaaand now ALL of the Anthro Northwest orders have been processed too! 🎉

Surprise livestream! Working on creature costumes
3pm PT | 6pm ET | 22 UTC

mythimorph.com/twitch

MultiStream with DJ Recca & Avian Invasion is now over, but I've just about finished stuffing my duct tape dummy!

(Also chat made me jump into a pile of packing peanuts & take shots out of a syringe)

AND we met the tip jar goal, so live viewers got to vote on the next Metamorphic design! Learn which species won by turning into Friday's stream

Live on Twitch with Avian Invasion for a little bit this morning! Working on the next Metamorphic species design that was voted on during Wednesday's stream

mythimorph.com/twitch

With today's stream, the next Metamorphic species concept has now been completed. 🎉 I will be revisiting soon with fresh eyes & then hand-vectoring the design so it can be officially added to the catalog

It will be released to the public after the completion of my new website, buuuut you can always catch a live stream or become a Syndicate member to get a sneak peek 👀


Crowdfunding for design releases is a new experiment! This allows you to influence the creations that are brought to life in the lab. It's something I've wanted to do for awhile, so that I may be both compensated for the concept art & can dedicate focus towards the species folks are passionate about 💜

I will be developing this system further in the coming weeks

I am excited to now announce the winning design:
The Nardoragon, a VRChat Avatar by Nardoiri!

All of the FC orders are now added to the Trello & those clients contacted!

I have finally finished processing all my convention orders; so thank you so much once again for your patience. If you have made an order with me & I somehow missed you please let me know. I will now be able to start combing through the rest of my unread Telegram messages oldest to newest

I have a side gig working at a 4-day event this week up in Seattle & then will working remotely while out of town for the following week—I'm celebrating multiple birthdays for two of the most important people in my life (Avian Invasion & DJ Recca) :3

I've also had some really impactful therapy sessions recently, so mental health has been improving too

I am popping out of my cave once more to let you know I have been working super hard on the new website project all week (& scolded for not taking enough breaks while doing so). I made some big breakthroughs in progress & messed with a lot of complex nerd stuff (like AWS S3 Buckets & CDNs wheee!) which has allowed me to finally lay the site's foundations.

I now have a new host provider & server with a fresh WordPress install to provide a service to supplement or replace most of my social media posts & updates, an access control/membership service to replace Patreon, a "step-by-step product customizer"-style ecommerce service to replace Etsy/Square, & services to offload my site media for optimizing site performance.


Next steps are building the navigation & site layout, then I can start populating it with some data & eventually making things look pretty. It might kill me (because graphic design is my passion) but know that actual content is far more important to focus on... so the alpha version of my site might be a little basic in design for awhile in favor of ensuring core functionality.

But the goal of my website is to be actually useful!

I'm not just talking about the importance I'm placing on accessibility, pageload speed, mobile-friendliness, RSS compatibility, etc. but also to strive for providing excellent information/content & create a real space of value for my audience that could serve everyone's needs better. My attention is too divided trying to maintain a dozen platforms (poorly) where I have no ownership & tiresome limitations.


And so, with the insanely unhealthy impact of social media on humanity & the implosion of Twitter stripping me of an internet home, I have decided to be the change I want to see in my world. I am making a greater effort in curating my experience, starting with the effort of inventing a new place to live online.

I am back home in the lab & looking to establish a productive routine again! I will have no more schedule-interrupting events planned until the very end of May / start of June for a camping trip, so things are looking good on that front.

However, I am extremely behind & have a lot of unread Telegram messages (51 at the moment). I really do want to give each of you the time/attention you deserve... but this has particularly challenging for me to deal with for a number of reasons I've babbled on about before, especially as one person.

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The Situation:

The biggest thing stopping me from trying to dive into banging them all out in a day is because I know like 90% of them are older clients looking for an order update (based on the color square emojis).

My oldest clients I feel especially compelled to give extra attention to. Back when I took these orders, I did not have quite as good of a system in place for relaying information & alerting them of delays. So I really want to take the time to explain in detail what went wrong & how their orders have been impacted specifically, as well as new info to stay on top of tracking new developments.

This is an area I very much want to not drop the ball on for my newer clients & going forward, which is why it took me so long to process all my winter orders to make sure I did a more thorough job this time.

But the reality is that don't have the appropriate ability to give individual attention right now while I still have so much work ahead of me. My priority needs to be on production but I feel so torn away by everything else.

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The Solution:

This is why today I am working on a section of my website to address the CURRENT STATUS for each of my projects, products, tools, & personal performance—including highlighting accomplishments in fixing or improving these issues. Something like a knowledgebase or changelog.

I also want to be able to share with everyone—not just my oldest clients one-on-one—an updated story about what is going on right now, what has happened in my life the past two years, & how it has impacted each area of my work. I will give the TL:DR versions as well as the long rambling ADHD explanations to satisfy all curiosities.

And I want to be able to deliver all this in ONE organized space, so you don't have to go digging back through all my long list of poorly tagged Telegram announcements.


I want to feel understood on how I got here, because this is absolutely not supposed to be my normal mode of operation. It's not where I want to be as an artist nor as a responsible business owner & the weight of this shame holds me back a lot from making progress.

I definitely place far too much of my self-worth on getting approval from others (& that's something I'm working on), so I'm trying to create a system that better serves my clients. Because I want them to be happier with me. I want my clients to be satisfied with the access & detail of information, to feel seen/heard/considered/appreciated through this rough process.

I want to help make up for my lack of communication when I lack the spoons. I am also trying so hard to improve my work, despite it causing even more delays, because I always want to give people the best versions possible. I hope that people will feel that the more durable, improved design, & higher quality product was worth the wait in the end. It helps so much to be recognized for all this effort too, it's amazing how encouragement works sometimes.

Remember:

Cancellations/refunds are ALWAYS on the table, no hard feelings—I promise I'll very much understand your reasons, & I am quick to deliver on this just as soon as I actually see/read your message.

To combat this problem, I am now adding a new emoji to my auto-reply list that guarantees I will see it same-day or the next morning. I only respond to work messages for limited hours on weekdays, but may make exceptions for cancellations. Message me with this single emoji: ⚠️

(Just please also try to be kind & respectful in your request? I take criticism very seriously, but really don't need to be met with a cold, combative attitude, threatened or insulted. It would just harm my ability to work even more. We're all going through a lot right now!)

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Personal Update:

In related news, my new therapist has very recently helped me discover that I have a pretty interconnected & deep-set belief that I am "defective"—both as a person & within my society/perceived expectations—which has led me to establish certain maladaptive schemas very early on in my life.

It explains much of my behaviors, emotions, & challenges, so we're now tackling the root causes behind all this guilt & shame that hopefully means a trickle-down effect into healing every area of my life.

I wish so much of my productive ability wasn't so closely tied to my emotional state, but I am an emotional creature... & that's not a bad thing.

I'm trying to gain more self-acceptance & practice at letting go of things



(Short updates are really hard for me, lol)

For those waiting on the Neon Rise shirts, I have some good news for you:

Today I have taken the time to re-build the cut templates with the final-final-final-final-final.svg version of the design & it's time to start cutting!

Working on these ancient orders will be my focus for today. I've been subjecting my personal shirt to durability tests for about half a year & I'm now ready to release them into the wild!

Thank you so much for waiting while I solved the numerous quality issues that have plagued this project since June 2023

The Neon "Rise" shirts are now ready for production! Each shirt uses over 50 individual hand-placed pieces & I have enough here to make about 20 shirts