What is this about? Self-love? Self-hate? Finding peace with oneself?

Pretty much all of the above.

A woman with much to give, downtrodden by disordered eating, overthinking and self-sabotage starts photographing herself daily, no matter what state she is in, in order to see who she really is. Mostly nude, to strip away any pretensions. Occasionally smiling and attractive, more often balled up and uncomfortable. The photography sessions help.

But even better, drawing the photos bring peace through contemplation. I wasn't too confident when I started drawing, the early ones were very naïve. But I gave up trying to be original and worked directly from my photos, and found peace in the details. Quietude and the realization that we are all equally perfect and imperfect.

In this drawing, I was having a pretty rough day. The process reminded me that we all have bad days. And suddenly I was no longer alone with my negative perceptions, I was in solidarity with every woman everywhere having a bad day.

A simple change of perspective. Freedom.

Drawing myself, my face, but in particular drawing my body, brings me peace.

Why is that? Because I've suffered from an off-the-charts striving for perfection as well as an inability to clearly recognize my own strengths and weaknesses. Drawing my face, unsmiling, unmade-up, and drawing myself (or another person) nude connects me to what is vulnerable, to what is fragile and tender, to what is raw and real. It brings me back into contact with the frailness of humanity but also to a very pure animal-like strength. It moves me closer to myself in an unaccessorized, unromanticised way.

It helps me to see myself as I am. Both strong and weak, resilient and vulnerable. Not all one or the other, but a mix of many shades in between. It brings depth to my shallow desire to appear impeccably put together all the time.

In the past I have been ambiguous about sharing this work and these drawings, but not any more. I share the work in case it can inspire just one other person to pick up a pencil and give it a try, and perhaps find some peace there too. I share these drawings freely now because they don’t really belong to me, they just kind of come through me as I hold pencil to paper. As I draw, a sense of detachment grows in the translation from photograph to drawing. As I work on the image, there comes a point when it’s no longer me, my body, my scars, my curves. It’s just a drawing, of a woman, at that age, at that weight, with that attitude or composure or lack thereof. This erasure of identity brings a universality to the image that allows me to step back and have compassion for the person I see, even if it started out as me and everything that was wrong with me.

No artistic talent or experience are required for this process, just a willingness to face yourself and see something different than the you you are used to judging so harshly.