Guess I'm Worn Out

I'm worn out lately, no energy. So I'm putting off the work to push the Patternflow project forward. Organizing the pattern-generation guide, planning and making a Patternflow intro video, sorting the documentation including the build guide, and so on. I just remembered and went and ordered the PCB test for v3, the one for the crowdfunding. Should have done it long ago, but my head's all over the place.

That's not to say there's been no progress. I'm building v3 for Crowd Supply, and it feels nearly done. The enclosure is great at this point, and I added a USB-C adapter to the PCB for power. Tested it, and it works. But the USB-C adapter is far too hard to solder (I shorted one and fried it once), so I improved it into a version that adds the old 2-pin screw terminal back. That's for the community users who order the PCB and solder it themselves. While I was at it, I reworked the module positions across the board and shrank the overall size. Wanted to cut the production cost even a little. Honestly the enclosure 3D model still has more I can see to improve. The snap-fit on the back is weak right now and needs reinforcing, and the encoder positions would be better if I measured the proportions exactly and readjusted them. Not "better," I have to. It's work I'll have to do eventually if I don't now, and this kind of thing is best done as early as possible. And the community model needs its enclosure-joining parts improved too.

So there's really a lot to do. I have this compulsion that I have to build it as fast as possible. Honestly I think this is fast enough. I've led the project diligently enough, and even on days I didn't want to go out I stopped thinking and just moved. But lately that doesn't work. I can't even really recall what's happened recently, what I've been thinking about. Why is that? Is it because it's monsoon season and all the rain has kept me from running? Or because I haven't had time to scribble on paper by hand lately? Just worn out, probably. I quit games, quit webtoons, and it's already been about half a year of living by working, studying, exercising every day. And yet I watch YouTube, and lately I'm studying piano and sound again. Isn't that rest? I don't really know what resting is. Could I even just do nothing and get through a day?

I'm studying piano and sound again these days! Hard, but fun. For piano, I borrowed a self-teaching book from the library and practice along with it about 30 minutes a day. For sound, I'm going through Andy Farnell's Designing Sound, which I bought early this year, and following along in Ableton Suite's Max for Live. Ah, but this book, I paid like 100,000 won for it on the Google store, and a free PDF comes right up… well, call it tuition. If I'd known there was a PDF, I wouldn't have had to do all that grind during the semester, capturing it page by page to translate, feeding it to Gemini, copying the translation and organizing it… hm.

Anyway, it's really fun and hard. I recently moved into the Seoul Design Startup Center with Patternflow, so now I have a shared office. It's really pleasant and spacious, which is nice. Originally it's about a 30-minute walk from my place, so I figured I'd hardly go and home would stay my studio like before. But the route works out, stopping by school for lunch at the cafeteria on the way, eating there again on the way back in the evening, so I've been going. I'd meant to barely show up, and now I'll probably have perfect attendance. The spot is really good, too. And since it's not home, I end up more focused. So it's perfect for studying sound. It's been a while since studying made my head ache. Ah, or maybe not that. Anyway, it's a bit awkward to slack off there, so I work harder. I just wish there were a rest area. Somewhere I could lie down and close my eyes for a bit.

It's a good space, full of impressive people developing and selling their own products. But I worry about whether I can blend in well. I feel so out of place there. I don't really have what you'd call work to do, so I just go and study. Study sound until I'm tired, read a book, get sick of that, study again… essentially I'm using it as a study café, not an office. I want to get closer to the others but I can't quite manage it. Why? It's not like I'm particularly shy? Normally I'm fine going up to people first. If anything I'm forward about it. When I think about the times I can't, is it when it's like the Seoul Design Startup Center now, where I have to see people over a long time and there are a lot of them? Might be that. If it's someone I'll see once and never again, I can just act and talk however my mood goes, but with relationships in a setting like this, I think I feel I have to show consistency. I know I'm very moody, that there'll be plenty of days I can't manage that, so I think it's hard for me to be forward.

Then again, maybe that's not the problem. Something that happened recently, ah, it was yesterday. First, there's someone I got close to about two months ago in the club room at school on a weekend. They're a senior in my department too, and given how vividly the scene comes back to me, I guess the conversation was fun. We only exchanged Instagram and didn't really talk after. One day I saw a treadmill photo on their Instagram story and thought it might be the gym I go to. And yesterday I saw them at the gym. But thinking it over, it's strange. All I did back then was sit and talk for about two hours, and they were wearing glasses, and that was two months ago, so why could I be sure the moment I saw their silhouette? Ah! Come to think of it, I'd seen the reels they posted now and then. Now I remember.

Anyway, even knowing it was them, I couldn't go up and say hi first. I was scared they'd already forgotten me, that I'd just look like some weird person. I was really conscious of how others see me. So I couldn't bring myself to speak, and the thing I did to make a point of connection was to photograph my gym InBody scan and put it on my Instagram story. Sure enough, a reply came. Chatted a bit with my new neighborhood friend that way, and we agreed to say hi when we see each other at the gym from now on. Really, I could have just talked to them. Honestly, doing an InBody scan and posting the story to get a reply is a bit creepy. If I got scanned regularly, maybe, but it was my first in two years. Why did I have to go around like this?

It's self-distrust and fear of rejection. And the fear, again, of being seen rejected by others. It's the same at the Seoul Design Startup Center, and the root of these things seems to be my school days as a kid. It's not that I had no friends, but I was always lonely. I almost never approached anyone first, and I felt I didn't belong to any group. At the same time I felt inferior to the friend I was closest to and leaned on most, and I was anxious they'd get closer to someone else and abandon me. This resembles my relationship with my older brother from even earlier. Hm, this has somehow gotten too deep, so I'll cut it here.

How did I even get to this. There was something else I meant to say. Ah! This. The thing that still drives me to live hard is anxiety. Woke up to find someone had shared a black-colored version of Patternflow on their Instagram story. Cool. I wanted to put it on the website so I asked, but no reply yet. They definitely read it, though. Even something like this makes me anxious. I hate this uncertainty and waiting, and it drifts toward the "it won't work out" side. That leads to the thought that plenty of other people are the same, and I wonder if I should make a few Patternflows and scatter them like a testbed. For that the other parts are enough, but I'd need to buy more LED matrices. Went to buy them and the price has gone up again. I should reach out soon and find a place to supply them for Patternflow. It's mostly like this. This is how I get things moving.

Short-term, there's a clear upside. I can push the project forward without rest, and because I'm always doubting, I keep changing something. But long-term it's no good. It might be even more fatal for me, someone who finds holding onto emotions hard. When doubt and anxiety, guilt and resentment keep piling up, I can fall hard. In that case there's a high chance I'll run off looking for some other shining thing, like I've always done. I don't want to end Patternflow that way. I want to carry it at least two years or so and bring it to a close, so I have to find another way. What is there?

Fun? Learning and growth? For one, it's clear I regard Patternflow as an art project for my personal growth. And "growth" here means the part I feel most vulnerable about. What I think art is seems important, too. Can I introduce myself to others as an artist? Still hard. Why is that? The identity of "artist" doesn't really require expertise. If you think you are one, then you just become an artist. What are art and the artist to me, that I want it and yet find it hard to do? Or is it just a tool for direction, and I'm keeping myself in this state on purpose?

Are these kind of useless worries and thoughts? It suddenly hits me, what am I doing, maybe I should just study sound. Do other people live in this tangled a way too? Or can they live simple and fun? I don't know. Writing it out, it's turned into total nonsense. But I'll probably post it anyway, and the reason is to signal to others that I have the will to keep Patternflow going.