/ic/ - Artwork/Critique

I feel like I'm going to be mediocre forever. I've done thousands of drawings over the past five years and my shit is still boring, 2-dimensional, unambitious, wildly inconsistent, and completely bereft of both skill and meaning. Seeing artists who actually know what they're doing has long stopped being inspiring, I can't imagine ever becoming a competent artist no matter how much I work. I can't imagine becoming someone who has interesting or relevant things to say with their work. I can't even imagine art being fun. I just get depressed and envious instead. I push away people who want to be friends because they're infinitely better artists than me and I can't understand why they'd ever give a shit about me.

I want to quit but drawing is the only thing I know how to do, if I throw it away I'd just be another autistic shut-in who does nothing productive with his life. I'd have to get some shitty retail job and live with my brain turned off until I eventually die. Either way I'll wind up unhappy, there's nothing I can do.

I'm sick of being bad at drawing but whenever I convince myself to try harder to improve and make good art, it feels like I fell for a stupid prank. I keep tricking myself into spending time, effort and frustration just to end up reminded that I'm a piece of trash who doesn't belong next to real artists that know what they're doing. I've met so many of them, and the admiration I used to have is mostly just resentment now.

It's pathetic that I bother trying at all knowing that I'll never get anywhere, but I'd feel pathetic for giving up too so I'll just feel like trash either way. Joke's on me for caring I guess

I've spent so long drawing just for the sake of practice that I don't remember how to use my art to convey what's in my imagination. Nothing I come up with seems interesting anymore, it's all stupid or boring or more work than its worth

My art is decent at best and without any interesting ideas it feels like I have nothing to offer. There are tons of people who can effortlessly draw circles around me so why bother trying to chase technical skill?

>bi-weekly art crisis time, get really frustrated about inconsistent style and tedious methods
>create lots of hit-or-miss drawings in a frantic series of experiments to find something that works better
>know that when i do find something that 'clicks'- a nice brush setting or a stylistic approach that finally made things easy- It'll result in a really nice piece that'll be immensely satisfying to make
>then I'll break out my tablet the next day and have no idea what i was doing right
>go back to experimenting and feeling bad about not knowing what works or what im doing

how do i break the cycle? i want to be free