#hence i am doing fine now and able end the hiatus for real this time

[ofsluts]

Anyways the hiatus is over and I am back

[idolomantises]

Hello there! It's great to see your askbox open again because I cannot stress enough how much I adore your art style and storytelling.

I've got two questions, if that's alright.

1: How do you keep a consistent upload schedule of your comics? As someone working on a series myself, it's hella difficult due to real life stuff and trying to find the time to actually sit down and start illustrating and writing stuff.

And 2. Will we ever see The Seven Deadly Sins in MnG? I remember your Asmodeus design which was absolutely brilliant looking and am curious to know if you're gonna end up doing more with that really cool idea!

As always, keep up the great work, seeing your comics and art in my notifications is always a treat. Have a great night!

I actually don't want to explain this because my work schedule is far from healthy, and I'm only able to produce so much art thanks to my incredibly talented assistants. And even still, I don't have much free time! I'll just say, take a hiatus and start developing back ups ahead of time.

Yes absolutely, I actually planned to introduce Asmodeous WAY earlier, hence dropping her (she's female now) design so soon but decided to hold back, and fine tune her a bit more (she's actually getting and outfit update because I dont really like what she wears). I like the idea of portraying the deadly sins as Gods to these demons, so you very rarely see them and are only mentioned in passing. I prefer showing the demon descendants because it allows me to humanize them more while representing their sin. i dont want to portray the deadly sins as irredeemably evil (they'll still be. awful lmao trust me, none of these sins are good people), but I want to flesh them out a bit, without putting too much focus on them. so it'll be fun to see how people react.

[senfinity]

HELLO!

I have decided that I am going to come back to senfinity~ I know I technically already said this two weeks ago but me being me has to, of course, post a long text post in <small> font highlighting several points because honestly would it really be Tanya if she didn’t write an essay about every minuscule thing? Nope! So with that being said, the rest is going to go under a read more because I am fully aware most people don’t care and I don’t want to clog your dash. But otherwise you can click on (I’ll bold the main points for if you do care but also don’t wanna read a whole post), and also there is another piece of info right at the end so you can also just skip to that //nods//

I just want to warn everyone that I have a tendency to ramble and you can blame that on me having Mercury in the first house. I’ve also been stuck to the teeny tiny constraints of Twitter for much too long so I am just letting loose, clearly. But anywho!

In my goodbye post I said that Tumblr wasn’t a good place for me anymore because it had made me condescending, bitter, and unhappy, and that’s why I left in the first place and said that I most likely wasn’t going to come back. I remember when I posted my hiatus message before the goodbye post, I honest to goodness cried a wee bit because this really was my happy place and where I could express myself about Sehun the most, so having to leave it was a struggle and I remember being so weak that just the day after I wanted to return ;; But I managed to somehow stay off for 9 months so I think we should all be proud because I truly lack self control and that is a feat.

But after being off senfinity for a while and even attempting to start anew with a new blog and then Twitter, I realized a few things and that is what has led me to my eventual return!

Insecurities had resurfaced/were brought to light: I decided to make a new blog to be able to do what I love (talk about Sehun) while also not be associated with the negativity I attached to senfinity. However after the first few days of being on the new blog, I started to feel alone and isolated. Having senfinity and having been on there for so long and in a sense establishing myself in my own comfortable space, suddenly being completely out of it just felt really isolating, as if I had lost a big part of me. I started feeling really small, useless, and that nothing I said or did mattered. This sounds really dramatic, but I think it’s because I in general feel really isolated and have no idea what my identity is, but through senfinity I was able to belong somewhere and have at least one piece of my identity fixed, so I never used to think about these insecurities as much. So when I was out of that, I guess it made those resurface and taint everything to the point where I just couldn’t go on my new blog. But I couldn’t go on senfinity either because I just said I was going to leave - I can’t just come back a few days later. So all in all it just felt really isolating and lonely and that I couldn’t really go anywhere and it was making me sad.

I felt as if I had no voice: In a similar vein, now that I was isolated and had nowhere to really ‘be’ in a sense, I started feeling like I had no voice. As we all know I talk a lot about Sehun and that was what I considered one of my main voices because he’s a really big part of me. But now that I didn’t have senfinity which was my main platform for that voice, and I felt too isolated and alone on my new blog, my voice just felt like it was completely drowned out and eventually extinguished. Considering what a big part of me that voice was, having it gone like that was really emptying somehow and it just ended up making me more sad.

Tried too hard to gain those back to the point where it ruined the experience on Twitter: Because of me now not having anywhere to say or do anything, I decided to use my Twitter that was initially for Sehun updates as a new senfinity in a sense. It was fine initially, but after a while the same feelings that I got on my new blog were starting to take over on Twitter, too - only this time even worse. Every time I saw a Sehun stan or a post about Sehun, I started feeling really insecure because that’s something I wish I could do and used to be able to do but couldn’t anymore. It made my anxiety flare up because those insecurities were triggered again, and because of that, I started feeling like I had to do or say something to re-establish myself and my voice to get rid of that anxiety/insecurity and it just really began to ruin the whole experience because I was too busy focusing on doing something that would have use/impact instead of just enjoying being on a new account. Not to mention because of that insecurity and anxiety, I started growing this bitterness towards everything (mainly Sehun stans lmao), and needless to say it was exhausting and unenjoyable being on Twitter.

Stanning Sehun was no longer selfless: One of the things that was so special about Sehun in me loving him was that I was really selfless about it. I’m selfish for everything; 95% of the things I do is for a selfish ulterior motive, and if something doesn’t satisfy that, then I drop it (be it friendships or hobbies or anything) because I want to protect myself. That made me sound really evil lmao I assure I am not evil, though >:[ But either way. Loving Sehun though was the complete opposite of that. I just loved him for him, and I never once thought about myself or did anything for him in regards to benefiting myself; it was always just about him, for him, and because of him. I didn’t love and support him because he made me happy, I just simply loved him and it so happened that loving him made me happy. However because of the previous three points, that aspect started to disappear as well. On my Twitter I started focusing too much on myself - desperately trying to get my voice back and having an identity again, feeling annoyed when I failed each time, but trying again and again because I kept getting anxiety. And I feel horrible to admit this but I started, in a sense, using Sehun for a selfish purpose - to gain those back. I remember I was about to write a tweet talking about how loving Sehun was a selfless thing for me, but as I was writing it I realized that it wasn’t like that at all anymore. As soon as that realization hit me, I got so so sad because Sehun is my one good thing and he was special from everything else and here I was managing to taint it, to make him just like everything else, to make it something that was no longer enjoyable. I managed to ruin that one good thing, the only good thing I have, and it just made me feel so stretched thin and exhausted.

Wanted to leave: Because of that, I started even considering that - now that I don’t have senfinity, now that I can’t use my new blog, now that Twitter is unenjoyable, now that I’ve tainted my support for Sehun with selfish reasons, now that I just feel anxious and insecure at all these little things that shouldn’t be bothering me at all, now that this is no longer something that is good for me - I should just take a break from it all. I literally considered taking a break from Sehun, the one thing that has quite literally kept me alive for some years, so you can just imagine how bad it got that I even got to that point. I of course never did that because I really just cannot ever in my wildest dreams leave Sehun, but now that I had exhausted all avenues and tainted that one good thing, I just felt so sad and empty and didn’t know what to do. I no longer had a happy thing or a safe place and with my already dreary and dark thoughts, it just was not a good thing at all. I just ended up making Twitter exactly what Tumblr was to me previously and the reason I left Tumblr for, so I just got annoyed at myself for managing to ruin everything.

On a lighter note - the teeny tiny char limit on Twitter: As is extremely evident from this post and from my old tags, I talk a lot and having had the ability to write long text  posts and have 500-word-limit tags at my disposal was a blessing because I have a lot of thoughts, and for Sehun I have a lot of feelings, and I really just need to get them all out. However, Twitter with it’s previously 140char and now 280char limit, it was a struggle. Even if I had the ability to write threads, having to split up my thoughts into various tidbits and even then not even whole thoughts, just wasn’t the same. I had to squish all those expansive thoughts and feelings I had into this extremely tiny space, and it was too hard for me and became an annoyance to say anything at all.

I need to express myself but I had no room to, and because of that I started feeling unlike myself, unhappy, and empty: I am someone who genuinely needs to express herself and express herself well. For me, my feelings don’t feel completely real or valid or tangible unless I’m able to lay them out, hence why this post is this long already, because it’s a way for me to make sense of it all and to validate them. However there is really no room for me on Twitter to express my bigger, more significant thoughts, and so I started to feel really suppressed. I still tried of course, because I needed some release even if it was small, however nothing I said ever felt right or like myself, and I was never happy with anything I said. It didn’t feel representative of me and my feelings, and for someone who needs that in order to feel comfortable with them, it was really sad. All my real thoughts were stuck in my head and having been unable to say anything for what is now almost 9 months, it was all knotted and a mess and I couldn’t make sense of them at all. It was even getting harder for me to actually access my feelings for Sehun because they were all knotted up like that, and because of that I started to feel extremely empty. I even started getting anxious to say anything at all because I knew it wouldn’t come out right and I knew it wouldn’t make me happy but I still had to say something, and all of those feelings was making it hard to say anything at all, which ended up being a big cycle.

senfinity really was a part of my happiness: I didn’t realize just how important this aspect of my life was until now, because for the last few months I’ve felt especially empty and drained and have gotten into really bad depressive moods. From the latter half of 2016 to until I left senfinity, it was probably the happiest (or as happy as I can feel) I’ve been because I had dropped out of engineering and was in a program I liked, and I was in such a content mood. I didn’t realize until a few months after me leaving senfinity that having this blog played a really huge role in keeping me in a good head space and hence in a good mood because I was doing something I genuinely liked and found happiness in. Because of no longer being in a good head space and no longer having that one thing that brought me a genuine joy to do, I started losing interest in basically... everything... because I wasn’t in a good place and didn’t have anything to really keep me afloat. I know this all sounds dramatic and dependent, but as someone who doesn’t really know who she is, what direction she wants to go on, what she can do, what she wants to do, and so on, having at least senfinity - which had a part of my identity, was something I loved to do, was something that made me feel connected to Sehun, and so on - was something that was really helpful and was the base block for allowing myself to do other things. So taking that away stripped me of that positive aspect of my life and made everything feel cloudy again because there was no longer that bit of sunshine.

People from Tumblr ended up going to Twitter: Not to sound petty and vindictive towards some other blogs, but there were some blogs on here that had fed into some of my other insecurities (such as not being enough or that what I said didn’t matter which was because of a different set of feelings that still belonged under feeling isolated, but we shall not get into that!) and/or just in general bugged me, and they had made being on here less fun back when I was already feeling a load of negative feelings towards this site. Being on Twitter for a while was great because I at least didn’t have to see some of them, but then soon some of those exact blogs started migrating over to Twitter and now I had to see them there, too. With all my other anxieties and insecurities coming to surface and really tainting my time on Twitter, having these blogs that did that to me on Tumblr now on Twitter too to add on top of that, was really unpleasant.

The feelings I associated with Tumblr have now dissolved/I know what to stay away from: While there are still aspects of Tumblr that I don’t like all that much, the things that had made it so negative for me to be on here before either don’t exist anymore or I had realized how small in scale they were in comparison to whatever I was now feeling. Not to mention that because I had tried Tumblr, leaving Tumblr, making a new Tumblr, then tried Twitter, I had gone through all the options that I could and in the end senfinity was the least taxing and upsetting of them all. On top of that, now that I exhausted all those options and found that senfinity isn’t as bad and because now I know how much I need to have my own place to express myself, I really want to be able to make and keep Tumblr my happy place again because this really is where it all started and where my whole heart for Sehun has been laid out, and it was a little home for my heart and I want to come back. It’s where I can be myself the most and do what I love the most and all those other things that have now arose because of my leaving can now settle back down and restore a balance so I can stop being bogged down by such tiny, minuscule things in the grand scale of it all, and hopefully find my focus, motivation, and happiness again, not just for this but a gateway for everything else, too. Because I know what made being on here so annoying before, and because I know that this is my safe place, I will know what to avoid to ensure that it stays that way.

As you can see, a lot of stuff has happened to my mental state and experience in the time I’ve been gone. I admit that it all sounds really dramatic and quite lame because I’m sure people think that little things like blogs and Twitter and tags shouldn’t affect a person this much. Sadly this is me, and because of loads of other personal things and because I honest to goodness live in my head where there’s too much going on that for the most part are negative, little things like these truly have a decently huge effect on me because it tugs at a multitude of the thoughts living in my head.

But now that I've finally figured it all out, I realized that coming back to senfinity really is the best thing for me to do. I’m excited because this really is my own little place. I’m excited to stop being sad over everything and anxious because of useless things and to be able to move tf on and find a happiness not only here but elsewhere as well. And most of all!! I'm excited to finally be able to talk about Sehun comfortably and to my heart’s content again because I am overflowing with so much love for him and my words were always the one thing that I felt was a way to return that sunshine, warmth, and love he gave to me back to him.

Extra piece of info: With all that said, I am still going to be using my Twitter account to talk about other things like random tiny thoughts or tidbits of my life or things I feel I can’t say or don’t want to say on Tumblr. If anyone wants to know what my Twitter account is, you can send me a DM or a message off anon along with your Twitter account and I can let you know! My account is on private right now for some reasons so that's why I’ll need to know who is requesting a follow~ A warning, though: I am quite bitter on there about things regarding fandom and Sehun and my tone will be a lot more blunt not only because there’s not much room to fluff things out but because well... I am quite a bitter person alskdf. senfinity will be a place where I keep things positive and happy for me and everyone who follows me, unless I have something I really want to say that requires my tags or a text post, and so that is why all my little bitternesses and pettiness will be kept to my Twitter account. Not to mention Tumblr quite frankly can’t handle certain things so... If you’re curious what that side of me is like then you can follow me on there~ Don’t be surprised or think I’m two-faced, though orz. The way I talk and feel and the things I say on here are still 100% genuine and 100% me, so while my tone on there will be a 180 from mine on here, it's still all me. Seriously, though, my solo stan side shows a lot more on my Twitter and I am very loud about only caring about Sehun on there and anything that affects him so I hope no one who does end up following me on there holds that against me or thinks I’m some kind of ass. This has been a warning...

The End

[lifewithmarah]

When God Breaks Your Heart

I don’t know where to begin.

That’s the worst thing about depression, you don’t know where exactly it’s coming from.

If I would do a quick backtrack of my life, all I could remember was two years ago I came back to New Zealand from a trip to the Philippines with a broken soul, I was able to bounce back a year later, then I have experienced death for the first time in my life last December and every aspect of my life started to go downhill from there.

But I still am clueless of what the exact root of this all, and if there is one.

I just know one morning I woke up I didn’t want to live anymore.

Yes, I had suicidal thoughts but I am not suicidal. I never entertained them and never did I try to kill myself. I just wanted to disappear. And there’s a fine line between ‘I want to kill myself’ and ‘I want to die’. And I was somewhere in between, but more on the latter. At first, I thought it was just my hormones acting up. But melancholy stayed in my heart for months, and I knew this wasn’t just another PMS. This was something more.

I was lost. I felt nothing, but pure sadness. I isolated myself from everyone. I felt alone. I was confused about many things. I had a lot of questions in mind. There’s emptiness in me that is always waiting to be filled. I struggled with self-doubt. I felt I wasn’t enough, and the world wouldn’t give a care when I’m gone. I was a mess. Hence the blog hiatus, weight gain and walls I built from people. I don’t think everyone realises that depression is as real as cancer. It’s a silent killer, and you have no control. It will conquer every fibre of your being--bit by bit--until there’s nothing left on you.

I am a big advocate of life, and falling out of love from it was a tragedy. I have always believed that my life-purpose was to inspire people to live a life they will remember, yet there I was, doing the exact opposite. And waking up every day with no purpose in mind was truly heart breaking. I tried to seek for answers, until I got tired on my own search. 

I lost the life in me. I lost myself.

I was known for my brightest smile and positive soul. If I told you I have depression before, you probably have laughed at me. But that’s the thing with depression, it has many faces. We see people smiling, but we have no idea how much they’re dying inside. Depression doesn’t choose too. It’ll hit you even you feel like you’re on top of the world, but you just can’t explain to people that you’re acting the way you do; because you have mental illness. We all know how judgmental our society is.

I didn’t open up to anyone, because I was afraid to be judged. I tried to fight it on silence, until things become too overwhelming to bear. That’s when I decided to open up to my then boyfriend. I told him everything. Everything. He was the only person who knew what I was going through. He was patient and kind. He tried to cheer me up on days I felt really down. But when you have depression, it’s hard to recognise help. You’re helpless. And how could you allow someone to help you, when you can’t even help yourself? Afraid that I might be a burden to him, I decided to let him go to save him from further troubles and fix myself.

And so we broke up, but in good terms. It was too good that we still say I love you to each other after we ended things and he said he was willing to wait for me. Just when I thought he understood my pain, he did things after the break up that I never thought he was capable of doing. Things that really broke my heart into pieces. One betrayal after the other. Hurtful words were thrown to each other. Pointing fingers on who’s to blame. And this all happened at the height of my depression. I am aware that I have said things that hurt him, and we both messed up on trying to fix things. We tried our best to save our friendship, but after allowing him to be my friend again, he did something that deeply pained and angered not only me, but also our friends and ultimately, my family. And up to this day, I don’t think he realises the impact of his actions in our lives. That one person I thought who understood the most my struggle with self-love, made me question my worth over and over again. I swear, I’ll do everything in my power to save my sister, my friends and even my future daughter from that pain.

But here’s the plot twist: amidst of the brokenness, I was freed from depression. While everyone was expecting me to hit rock bottom, I found strength to pick myself up. A part of me died, but a part of me was also restored. I didn’t know where that strength came from. It must be grace acting on my behalf; for everything becomes possible because of grace. I woke up one morning with a will to live and to better myself. Who would’ve thought that I would find life again through heartbreak? After nights of asking God why He allowed that heartbreak to happen, I realised that I am actually in the middle of His will. It was meant to happen. It was all planned. And I accepted that it needed to happen, so finally, I could find myself again. So I could see Him in my life again.

It was a blessing in disguise.

Yes, I am still hurting from that failed relationship; but I have found comfort knowing that God has better plans for my life. He always does. I don’t know what the future holds, but my doors are open to the infinite possibilities this life could offer. I am just allowing Him to surprise me every day. I just know that wherever He’s taking me, I am heading on a right direction.

Sometimes God has to break our hearts, not to punish us, but to make us see things more clearly. To realise that some good things need to fall apart, so that better things can fall together. He shakes us from underneath our feet and takes us out of our comfort zone in order to grow. To be the person He has destined us to be. After all, most valuable life lessons are learned through pain. And honestly, If it weren’t for this particular heartbreak, I’d probably not realise my capacity to love and ability to bounce back after being struck down. Everything--whether good or bad--happens for a right reason.

And to the boy who breaks my heart, it will take a lot of time for us to heal; but I am a firm believer that time heals all wounds. In God’s perfect time, maybe I’ll greet you with a smile again. To be fair, I know you’re hurt too and I could see the fears in your eyes. But for what is worth, I am sorry. Despite everything that happened, I still want to believe that there’s goodness in you. I pray that you also find God in your life--this time, a real kind of relationship with Him. I really do hope you find Him.

And to everyone whose partner is going through depression, please love them unconditionally. I know it can be challenging, frustrating and tiring. But please love them more, especially in times they push you away. I swear, they don’t mean it. But love them most, when they are at their worst. When they are most difficult to love. Never ever give up on them. Pray for them. Unconditional love trumps everything, even any illness--whether it’s physical or mental. Unconditional love wins. It always does! 

And you, yes you, I don’t think you have to go through a break up to free yourself from depression. The journey can be dark, cruel and long. Words and hugs may not suffice to comfort your troubled soul, but I hope you find comfort knowing that there is God. Sometimes, He’s just waiting for you to call Him. Trust me, He knows what He’s doing. Let Him fill the emptiness in your heart. Let Him takeover. Don’t be afraid to ask for help. And never ever lose sight of the fact that you are loved. Always.

If I made it on the other side--alive--you would too. Isn’t it exciting that one day you would also share your story of how you overcome depression or whatever adversity you’re facing right now? And this story of yours will inspire others to keep going and believe that life is always beautiful regardless of its flaws. You never know, your story could save a life too! 

So please know: you are a living story, never give up. 

LET’S LIVE A LIFE WE WILL REMEMBER!

Love, Marah