The Weight of Returning

Coming back to the studio after a long block is like stepping into a room that still remembers you. The air feels familiar, but you have to relearn how to breathe in it.

For months, I hovered at the threshold — thinking about making, talking about making, organizing the shelves and papers that surround making — everything but touching the work. And then one day, the hesitation broke. It wasn’t a moment of inspiration or clarity; it was simply a quiet surrender. I sat down, and I started drawing again.

The lines came out shaky, uncertain, almost fragile. But in that rawness was truth — something human that I had been missing while overthinking what art should be. These first marks, awkward as they were, carried the pulse of life returning. They weren’t about perfection; they were about permission.

Teaching often reminds me that this is the same place students live every day — in that trembling space between fear and discovery. It’s humbling, really, to realize that I am not so different from them. The same courage it takes to begin, to mess up, to begin again — that’s what keeps art alive.

Returning to the studio isn’t about reclaiming who I was before the block. It’s about discovering who I’ve become because of it.