I am struggling with bringing myself to do anything I love. It’s not exactly that I don’t have any motivation, although that is part of the issue, but I used to be so hyperfixated on crocheting and art and crafting that I would stay up all night to craft and I’d forget to eat and I’d bring it everywhere with me, and now as much as I want to craft and crochet and do art I can’t bring myself to do it. I have no clue why I lost that love for crafting either. I struggle with many different clinically diagnosed mental illnesses (AuDHD with major EFD, Anxiety, Depression, Alexithymia, and trauma based Recurrent Psychosis) that make any sort of task or hobby hard to have a healthy relationship with, and sometimes, even enjoy. My question is does anyone have any tips for how to get myself to love crafting again? I’ve tried many of the things that usually get me to move and get stuff done and nothing is working. Setting timers, scheduling time for me to focus on a hobby, drinking coffee as I work, listening to music, watching a YouTuber I like, having a comfort show on in the background, getting someone to yell at me or hype me up, getting someone to do a progress check on what I’m doing, rewards system, etc. Nothing is working. I feel like I’m at a loss. I want to craft again but I feel like I just can’t and I feel so guilty and mad at myself because of it. Can someone help?
I hope I put this in the right space, if not I am sorry!
That really sucks. I don’t know if you’ve tried this, but take a break for a while. Once you start to miss it and find your inspiration again, then try it! If you don’t find your inspiration again, then maybe try another craft.
Good luck!
I haven’t done any crafting in about 4 months. For other crafts it has been longer. I do miss it and I have the inspiration, but as soon as I sit down and start to do it, I can’t do it anymore and I don’t know why. And I recently did pick up a brand new craft of loom banding, but I can’t even do that anymore either.
Not trying to put down your response, please don’t take it that way, I do appreciate the help and I forgot to mention all that in my original post.
Sometimes the best I can do is a round or 2 but I let that be ok I like to have a fun show or snack kinda like a reward that I only am able to eat or watch while doing my hobbies!
I might try the organizing one. I thrift my yarn so I have way too much. I may or may not have 10 different 20 gallon (about 76 liters) bins full of assorted thrifted yarn. Because it is thrifted, some of it is really tangled and I just don’t feel like fixing that. I did recently get a yarn winder so maybe I can sort that out and organize the bins to some capacity. Thank you!
Sometimes, I find that I just hyper fixated a bit too long, I need to focus on other areas of my life, and then I can pick my projects back up. Don’t be afraid if that is just what you need. I usually take around a month long break, or at least a tone down, for my crochet projects.
The other thing is, make it be very worth it to you. I know if my patterns never got any sales or income at all, my motivation would fizzle out big time. Maybe make the projects you are working on with an end in mind. So know where you want them to go, and what you want them to be. For my art, I usually make a mini sketch book (out of a page folded in half twice) so it has 8 pages in it, and draw until my booklet is full. By then, my drawing talent is usually used up. Haha. For my crochet items (not patterns) I actually have the hardest time crocheting for orders. The motivation is so low. But I can crochet a ton of stuff just following my inspiration and ideas. But then I am left with a ton of crochet stuff with no home for them.
I have been struggling with this too, and i’ll also get just rlly random spontaneous motivation that dies off in a day or two.
What I’ve been trying to do is balance out my crafts.
For example, I love to write poems, songs, and books.
I also love to crochet, paint sinker eyes, read, and play my violin.
What I’ll do is I make space to do one of my favorites at least once a day (usually either writing in a book or playing my violin) and I’ll do one of the extras, switching them out every couple of days.
Don’t force it, that can sometimes make it worse. Take a break for a week or so let your mind free and do what you want to do in that time. If you found inspiration again that’s great! But things like this take time, I once took a 3-5 month hiatus because I just didn’t have time or interest.
It kind of sounds like you’re putting a lot of pressure on yourself to craft in any kind of way possible and feel guilty that you’re struggling to do something you once devoted a lot of yourself to. If that’s true, the added pressure often doesn’t “help,” and you may need to move on to accepting that where you currently are in life isn’t conducive to you crafting as much as you used to, or at all, and possibly for a significant amount of time into the future or forever. This process isn’t easy since we often tie up a lot of our identities in things like crafting/being an artist, so this shift can come with grieving since we feel like we’re losing part of ourselves. At least this has been my take on how I’ve processed changing hobbies, jobs, majors in college, etc. And sometimes the changes happening in our lives that are closely linked to our identities happen outside of our control, which can be particularly devastating.
I’ve experienced the grief of “losing” parts of my identity from things being outside my control or because other things in life became a priority. But I now realize that it’s not really a loss since whom I’ve become via all of my experiences and changes in life never really left me. I’ve also learned that grieving what feels like a “loss” is okay and part of an ongoing process since life always changes (the only consistency in life is change). And it’s okay to allow myself to grieve in whatever ways my brain feels like going about it as long as it doesn’t harm myself or others. I’ve found that thinking about it in this way helps to have a more positive attitude about changes in my life that aren’t always welcome/my choice.
One caveat to this is that it can be easy to settle into a new pattern of life without the hobby or whatever the change was, while doing things that are harmful to me or others without realizing it. So, it’s been helpful to process changes like this with others, which has been friends/family or professionals like therapists. I also have many mental and physical health diagnoses, so it’s important for me to make sure these aren’t affecting other areas of my life in ways I might not realize. So I also try to talk to my doctors and mental health professionals about changes that they may need to be aware of, and sometimes being part of communities of other people with similar challenges is helpful in processing things and/or knowing what to bring up with professionals on my care team.
Anyway that was kind of long winded and hopefully not too much “telling” when you may need more someone to listen! But lmk if you have any questions, etc. as I may be able to help given the amount of changes I’ve had to process throughout my life! Hope this helps!
