MIRROR, NOT OUTLET

When art becomes validation instead of just escape

My brain feels like TV static but inside my skull.

My skin feels wrong. Too tight. Also somehow not even on my body.

SSRI brain zaps or whatever. Chemical shit balancing out.

I want to sleep. But also I want to sort all my photos by color at 3AM because suddenly it feels super important.

Too wired. Too tired. Just too.

Last night I cried through Titanic like I don't already know the damn ship sinks. Like I haven't seen it maybe 100 times. Like those fictional dead people were texting me their goodbyes. My inner 10 year old crawling out from the depths of somewhere inside me.

Whatever.

Then something weird happened.

I found myself staring at this book I've been working on. Just staring. For what, twenty minutes? Thirty? Time gets weird when your brain chemicals are all messed up.

The book was looking back at me.

Not just looking. Seeing me.

Like it knew something I didn't. Like my hands had been trying to tell my brain something important while my brain was busy doing whatever.

Oh.

I started looking through everything. Music. Writing. Paintings. Designs. All of it.

Stuff I made once and never looked at again. Stuff I put out there and moved on from. Things I thought were just for processing feelings. Make it, dump it, forget it.

But that's not what they were at all.

They were recording everything. Every mood. Every hurt. Every moment I couldn't deal with. Every canvas, song, sketch, paragraph — a mirror showing me parts of myself I wasn't ready to see.

I swear they were all sitting there like "took you long enough."

My art wasn't just therapy. It was proof. It was evidence. It was real.

Each piece quietly saying: "Yes, I see you. Yes, that happened. Yes, it counts."

The music from 2018 wasn't just songs. It was a record. The sketches weren't just practice. They were documentation. The writing wasn't just words. It was recognition.

Now I can't unsee it. Can't pretend my creative stuff is just stuff.

It changed when I wasn't looking.

From outlet to mirror. From escape to truth. From dumping feelings to finding them.

I'm sitting at my desk surrounded by journals and hard drives and canvases. They're all buzzing with this weird alive energy, like I dug them up from some ancient version of myself.

Maybe this is what healing actually is. Not turning into someone new. Just seeing what was always there.

My art never needed me to be fixed or healed or stable or marketable or whatever.

It just needed me to be honest.

And it waited for me to catch up to what my hands already knew. What my subconscious was saying every time I picked up a brush or opened a notebook or hit piano keys.

I don't know what to do with this. Maybe nothing. Maybe everything.

I just know I can't make things the same way now.

I can't keep pretending my art is just product or content or distraction.

It's a mirror. It's been showing me myself this whole time.

That's the quantum leap... I guess.

Not changing into something new. Just finally seeing what was already true.

And I don't know if that makes everything easier or harder.

I just know it makes everything more real.