What does the future hold?

I haven’t been writing much, mainly because I’ve been so busy and also because once again, I’ve been lacking in inspiration. I noticed that I rarely feel inspired, especially when looking at other people’s work. Instead of getting ideas and becoming inspired, I get upset and start doubting myself, which leads to me not wanting to write or take pictures. I know that there are always going to be people who are better than me, and I should be happy about that, I should learn from them. But I look at it as I will never be that good, so I should just stop trying. It’s a vicious circle of self doubt, never-ending and painful emotionally and mentally. If that weren’t enough, I beat myself up for not being able to produce work so often. I see other photographers going out and shooting everyday, looking at things and seeing the beauty in it all, and then I look at myself and see that I do the complete opposite. I don’t shoot everyday. I see things and think, well that would be beautiful, if only I had my camera. Maybe I should bring my camera with me more, but I’m so scared that it will get broken. And as for my writing, I really should try doing that everyday. It’s sad though, I really need someone there pushing me to do things. But when I have that person, I get angry with them for pushing me. Maybe there is just something terribly wrong with me. This is an ongoing fight in my mind.

            I think I might have figured out why I haven’t been so inspired lately. When I was living in San Francisco I was constantly taking pictures. They may not have been the best, but I was taking pictures. When I moved back home to Kenosha, the inspiration kind of died out. And even though moving back home was the best choice for me mentally and emotionally, I feel like artistically it was a terrible choice. Unfortunately, I am not ready to move out of this town again, I am not emotionally stable enough to be away from my support system. And that brings me to the question, will I ever been emotionally stable enough to move away from my family and friends, my support system? I’ve become dependent on them and make every decision based on their opinions. So how do you pull away from that, and become more independent? Or is relying on my support system not a bad thing at all? Our society tells us now that you have to be independent and only rely on yourself. So does my relying on my friends and family mean that I am a weak person? Or is society wrong? And how do we discover when we are strong enough to go out on our own? It’s thoughts like these that keep me up at night. So what do we do? Just push them to the back of our mind, or try and figure out the answers? Like I said, it’s a never-ending vicious circle of self doubt in my mind.