Hey y’all, I got some time to sit and stop for a second and wanted to write a blog to catalog what’s been going on in my life this fall and winter. If we have met recently and you decided to click through to this blog out of curiosity, welcome! I have been blogging for almost 10 years now in various forms, and I’ve always enjoyed conversing and sharing my real life, unfiltered thoughts and experiences here. I consider this blog my “real" social media,” or not really social media at all, but a place where I like to process and share what I’m going through life. I try to be as transparent as possible because I believe that our world and the society we live in is looking for things that are real, although the 99% of things we look for or engage with on the internet are illusions, fabrications, half-truths and almost too often, straight up lies. I hope that for any of you reading you might find yourself in my writing. As you probably already have realized, life is very complex and sometimes it is really nice to know that someone else out there has the same questions and struggles you do. I’ve always decided with this platform that me being judged or embarrassed by some is a fair trade for the others of you that find a dose of healing here. So, whether you’re a new reader or have been reading for a long time, thank you for engaging in my perspective and I hope it is helpful.
Turning Pages.
In August my life changed. Like really changed. As many of you have seen, I started the first leg of my journey to becoming a tattoo artist as an apprentice under Atlanta artist and tattooer, Miya Bailey. We would need to sit down in person for me to tell you what this opportunity has meant to me, but to some it up shortly… I felt like my time in life had come. Almost everything I had experienced, and all those experiences taught me, seemed to become ultimately useful for this one moment in my life. The things I had been developing in myself as an artist and a person seemed to become ultimately useful and appreciated within this one opportunity and to be completely honest, it felt like my purpose and my destiny was really revealed to me in a massive way. I would consider starting my apprenticeship at Peter St Station under Miya the most important singular moment in my entire lifes career as an artist and creative, and a pivotal point of growth for me as a person.
From that moment on August 9th, I saw a vision and an opportunity and I ran as fast and as hard as I could through that door. Since August, I have done a little over 30 tattoos, sold almost every painting I’ve painted (with the exception of 2), booked commissions from buyers across the United States and have experienced countless “out of body” moments, realizing how lucky and exciting my life had become almost overnight…I feel the love, I feel like I have an entire army of people behind me cheering me on. To be honest a lot of it has been awkward to handle, because I never envisioned myself having experiences remotely like this at all but ultimately I feel like it’s so strange for me to be here that it has to be meant to be.
But, as exciting as it all has been, this time has also presented some intense challenges. First of all, I just realized as I was able to take a moment off that I have not stopped working since August 9th. Like, I have not taken a day to do nothing and to reflect and take care of myself. I havent been sleeping, I’ve lost 10 pounds, my diet became chicken wings and weed. I stopped going to the gym and having outside hobbies. I have been fully immersed and fully focussed, almost to a fault now that I think about it. I’m realizing the importance of rest, balance, and taking care of my body soul and mind, something that I had neglected for the idea of “trying to make it.” I’m currently working to reset, rest, and develop a life structure that allows me to work really hard but rest really hard too.
Another incredible challenge for me was the transition from white evangelical Christian culture and predominantly white culture to an all black culture. And my God… where would I even start. Then add the fact that I’m Asian in the midst of all this? Can we add another “WHAT THE ” to the equation? This could be an entire series of blogs or hours long of conversation but what I would say is this; it was been invaluable, eye-opening, and humbling to learn about an entire different culture and to hear personal stories of how my friends have experienced white America from a black perspective. Most of the time, the stories I hear are nightmares, and has challenged me to really dig into and understand everything I’ve believed or understood prior. It has also forced me to be willing to change my own mindset, as I discovered my ideas of black America and black people were mostly created through messaging from white America and not through my own experiences. It has taught me to think critically about our history and our systems, and ultimately this all has started me on a journey of forming my own viewpoints and beliefs from the ground up, and not just going along with how I’ve always been taught to think by white america and especially the white american church.
What I’ve seen and heard in the last four months has landed me in a place where I feel embarrassed, embittered and angry that I was a part of white evangelicalism and a distorted form of christianity that historically judged, neglected and abused everyone that didn’t conform to its cultural guidelines. I cannot currently look past the systems designed to control, manipulate, and ultimately capitalize off masses of people in the name of “God.” It’s unfathomable to me. and I know that a lot of you were involved in these churches and still are, and please hear me that I am not passing judgement on where you are at in life or what God you’ve chosen to serve.. I am just challenging you to really think about the places and people you are involved with. Compare your church’s values to the values you read in the bible, or even values you would believe to be “good and Godly…” and make decisions from there. I believe that the american church, and all its industries surrounding it, is the nasty monster capitalism disguised almost seamlessly as “God’s plan and will.” and if you do not believe so, I’d like to ask you this question: have you been to an american church where the church and the leading ministers therein seem to care as much about serving the community as they do the growth and popularity of their own church and ministers? Let’s start there.
Anyways, all of these experiences have happened so fast and in many ways have been overwhelming to me. There are times where I feel my entire experience as a christian was a complete lie and I’m starting from nothing again. I am realizing through my apprenticeship, as I have watched and learned from those older than me that I would like to become like, that I had actually lost touch of (ironically) some of the most important and simple ways of decency. I am re-learning basic respect, etiquette, patience, communication, justice, loyalty, and honesty… all outside the walls of evangelicalism… where these ideas seem to be completely foreign. I feel like I’m learning to think critically again, and my conscious is coming more awake to the truth about how life works and what is good and true in the world. It has been very painful, and I have had to let go of many ideas, beliefs, and relationships, but I believe that I am only growing in compassion, understanding and ultimately love, one that is willing to walk in another’s shoes, despite my anger and confusion towards the ideas that I used to believe.
So, to conclude all this… I feel like for the first time in my life I’m allowing myself to believe what I believe… without fear of judgment. Ultimately, what others judge you for are merely a reflection of their own fears, insecurities and faults that they cannot look at themselves. I am allowing myself the right to change my mind, to say things that I will take back later, and to share my findings and ideas with people even though my thoughts are all in process and incomplete, hoping that people will understand or even take the time to listen. I am practicing the elusive idea of “being in the moment,” which includes not just your joys and victories but your confusions, griefs and doubts too. Experience and explore it all… after all, the truth about what you actually feel and believe will express itself at one point or another. Might as well take the questions as they come.
I guess where I’m at now is, I am asking all my questions and allowing myself to grieve things that don’t fit my life anymore. I believe in God, but I also believe through my observations, conversations, and experiences that human beings over all of history have been very very clumsy with power. I believe that the truth might fall in between the lines, in the subtle justices in our lives… not in the grand powerful statements. Perhaps God lives in the miracle of being able to have hope in a world that feels so baseless, chaotic, and cruel. And maybe God can be much more found to every human being, despite the hoops and conditioned we designed along the way. One thing that gives me comfort and joy right now is my art, it gives a place for all my swirling thoughts to land and helps me feel that beauty and good can be made through very weak means… and that right now is my little light of who God might be… It’s not much but a good start in my mind.
Anyways that’s it for me. thank yall for reading. Til next time.
extra credit: each post has a header image. The image comes from an archive of thousands of film photographs I have taken over the years. I choose an image that expresses the sentiment of each post and at the end of each post I share a little extra credit about either the photo or some other random thought. This photo is the view from my little apprentice desk, where I draw, do work, and talk shit with Ro who usually sits next to me in the mornings. This has been my view for the last 4 months. I have seen many random things through this window and I guess on this day I liked this red car.