Category: In Between

It has been two years since I graduated from art school. After graduating with a BA in Fine Arts in 2023, it was not long before I developed a deeply unhealthy fixation on art. The switch was gradual but felt quick.

There was a certain peculiarity in my love for art. The thoughts, feelings, and ideologies I had towards art felt real, a bit too real, which drove me insane. Funnily enough, my BA thesis was titled “How Art Made Me (In)sane”, and in one way or another, little did I realise that art did make me insane, to the point of hospitalisation in the psych ward.

In my previous writing, I mentioned quite a few times my core belief in seeing art as a deity or some god-like force, and I saw myself as the worker or otherwise the servant of art. In this case, I was adamant on the belief that art is a deity who is watching and judging over me, while I, as the servant of art, am the chosen prophet tasked with serving art through creation. I was fixated, and perhaps even obsessed, with creating the perfect artworks. For me, making “bad art” was seen as sinning and displeasing art, or in this case, the deity.

I did not see being an artist as a career, but rather as a fate or destiny I must fulfil.

Therefore, for two years after my art school graduation, I spent most of my day reading art books, researching artists, developing new concepts for artworks, applying for artist opportunities and even painting. Days on and on would be spent on art, and I had constant, intrusive thoughts about art. Thoughts about art churn my mind, such as about making the next artwork and how to please this deity called art. Strange enough, my whole identity revolved around art and being an artist. I was nothing without art. In my social settings, I would often discuss art. I had this strong conviction that if it were not for art, I would not survive, and I would not be whole. I persisted in this perfectionistic belief that I must create artworks to please art, otherwise the so-called deity.

My love for art became an unhealthy and obsessive devotion. In my eyes, creating artworks was a form of prayer or devotion to art, and I treated my artistic practice as a sort of ritualistic and religious duty. If I made art that I believed was remotely bad, I saw it as a big sin, and I was convinced art, the deity, would punish me and ruin my life if I made bad art. It did not help that I kept getting rejected from my applications for funding, exhibitions, residencies and graduate programmes. Due to my creation of “bad” art and rejections, in turn, I would punish myself by destroying the artwork and, most times, even self-harming. This obsession with pleasing art became so toxic that it led to many of my mental breakdowns, recurring suicide attempts and my wish for euthanasia. For instance, in March this year, I woke to find myself hospitalised in the emergency room and was sent to the psych ward of the hospital due to a suicide attempt.

There were many instances where I wrote for art, spoke to art and sang to art. Everything I did, I did for the sake of pleasing art.

My obsession with art led to my psych ward hospitalisation. I was trying too hard to please art, which led me to view myself as worthless. For two years, I was convinced that if I could not please this deity called art and succeed as an artist, I was unworthy of living and of loving. My love of art deluded me, but little did I know it caused me to be incapable of loving myself or feeling the love from others. For instance, during my depressive episodes, if I failed to make art, or rather make art perfectly in my eyes, it would cause my despair and thoughts of suicide and worthlessness. However, during my (hypo)manic episodes, creating art felt euphoric, and I was convinced that I was the chosen prophet, destined and divinely guided by art to revolutionise the world.

It was not until recently, when I decided to take a break from creating art, that I realised my love for art was far too extreme and unhealthy. I had to admit, it took a while to break free from these core beliefs, such as my delusional way of thinking and the hallucinations that I had surrounding my beliefs on art.

Till now, I am still quite shaken up to paint again. My burnout due to my perfectionistic view of art worsened both my psychosis and mood episodes. Perhaps I will paint later on, but for now, I will light my cigarette and smoke.

Harusnya kau mengerti sungguh besar artimu dalam hidupku, tapi buat sekarang, seniku tercinta, selamat jalan kekasih.

You have to understand how much meaning you gave to my life, but for now, my dear art, goodbye, my darling.

It has been two years since I graduated from art school. After graduating with a BA in Fine Arts in 2023, it was not long before I developed a deeply unhealthy fixation on art. The switch was gradual but felt quick.

There was a certain peculiarity in my love for art. The thoughts, feelings, and ideologies I had towards art felt real, a bit too real, which drove me insane. Funnily enough, my BA thesis was titled “How Art Made Me (In)sane”, and in one way or another, little did I realise that art did make me insane, to the point of hospitalisation in the psych ward.

In my previous writing, I mentioned quite a few times my core belief in seeing art as a deity or some god-like force, and I saw myself as the worker or otherwise the servant of art. In this case, I was adamant on the belief that art is a deity who is watching and judging over me, while I, as the servant of art, am the chosen prophet tasked with serving art through creation. I was fixated, and perhaps even obsessed, with creating the perfect artworks. For me, making “bad art” was seen as sinning and displeasing art, or in this case, the deity.

I did not see being an artist as a career, but rather as a fate or destiny I must fulfil.

Therefore, for two years after my art school graduation, I spent most of my day reading art books, researching artists, developing new concepts for artworks, applying for artist opportunities and even painting. Days on and on would be spent on art, and I had constant, intrusive thoughts about art. Thoughts about art churn my mind, such as about making the next artwork and how to please this deity called art. Interestingly, my entire identity revolved around art and being an artist. I was nothing without art. In my social settings, I would often discuss art. I had this strong conviction that if it were not for art, I would not survive, and I would not be whole. I persisted in this perfectionistic belief that I must create artworks to please art, otherwise the so-called deity.

My love for art became an unhealthy and obsessive devotion. In my eyes, creating artworks was a form of prayer or devotion to art, and I treated my artistic practice as a sort of ritualistic and religious duty. If I made art that I believed was remotely bad, I saw it as a big sin, and I was convinced art, the deity, would punish me and ruin my life if I made bad art. It did not help that I kept getting rejected from my applications for funding, exhibitions, residencies and graduate programmes. Due to my creation of “bad” art and rejections, in turn, I would punish myself by destroying the artwork and, most times, even self-harming. This obsession with pleasing art became so toxic that it led to many of my mental breakdowns, recurring suicide attempts and my wish for euthanasia. For instance, in March this year, I woke to find myself hospitalised in the emergency room and was sent to the psych ward of the hospital due to a suicide attempt.

There were many instances where I wrote for art, spoke to art and sang to art. Everything I did, I did for the sake of pleasing art.

My obsession with art led to my psych ward hospitalisation. I was trying too hard to please art, which led me to view myself as worthless. For two years, I was convinced that if I could not please this deity called art and succeed as an artist, I was unworthy of living and of loving. My love of art deluded me, but little did I know it caused me to be incapable of loving myself or feeling the love from others. For instance, during my depressive episodes, if I failed to make art, or rather make art perfectly in my eyes, it would cause my despair and thoughts of suicide and worthlessness. However, during my (hypo)manic episodes, creating art felt euphoric, and I was convinced that I was the chosen prophet, destined and divinely guided by art to revolutionise the world.

It was not until recently, when I decided to take a break from creating art, that I realised my love for art was far too extreme and unhealthy. I had to admit, it took a while to break free from these core beliefs, such as my delusional way of thinking and the hallucinations that I had surrounding my beliefs on art.

Until now, I am still quite shaken about painting again. My burnout due to my perfectionistic view of art worsened both my psychosis and mood episodes. Perhaps I will paint later on, but for now, I will light my cigarette and smoke.

Harusnya kau mengerti sungguh besar artimu dalam hidupku, tapi buat sekarang, seniku tercinta, selamat jalan kekasih.

You have to understand how much meaning you gave to my life, but for now, my dear art, goodbye, my darling.

I believe that the definition of happiness is relative and differs from person to person. Everybody has their definition and meaning of what happiness is to them. As someone with bipolar disorder, for the longest time, I have equated happiness with the manic episodes I experience.

How can I be blamed for this way of thinking? When I am in a depressive episode, tidal waves of melancholy wash over my whole being, drowning and suffocating me.

My depressive episodes are painfully scorching. In general, I am a motivated person, but I know I am in a depressive episode when I no longer feel motivated in things I am interested in, such as art, reading, studying and writing. I would spend hours and days rotting in my bed, with low energy, mood and motivation. The beauty that life once held sucks away as my depression grows. My depressive episodes are plagued with physical symptoms as well, such as chest pain, difficulty breathing and at times, I even turn mute and would lose the ability to speak and sometimes move. Days, weeks and months will pass with this lingering and painful feeling of depression until a switch clicks in my brain and I am set off flying into a manic episode.

I would confidently say that mania is an illusion. For most people with bipolar disorder, it is an illusion of what happiness is like. I believe that this is due to that, for people experiencing manic episodes, we have this incredibly immense burst of energy, we get the illusion that we are able to do anything we want, and we feel unstoppable.

It feels that way, but it isn’t.

I would say mania is the opposite of depression. During times of depression, when doing normal daily tasks becomes difficult, my energy, mood and motivation are down the drain. The opposite goes for manic episodes, where I am bursting with energy and my senses are heightened; everything is possible during this time. Due to my heightened energy, I become extremely impulsive and unstoppable. For instance, thousands of Euros will be spent in a day, I will start multiple new projects, run away from home, get new tattoos, modify my appearance, turn my house upside down, I will spend days awake without sleep, forget the duty I hold to take medications every day and many more.

How can I not think this is happiness when I can do everything I want?

To say the least, a chaotic and eventful summer vacation is the perfect blow.

Perhaps, a part of me needed to escape the Netherlands, specifically to escape the mundane and structured lifestyle I have here, to get a dose of Indonesia’s dynamic and tumultuous environment. I started to realise my need for a perfect balance between structure and chaos, because, as contradictory as it sounds, I thrive in chaos. As much as I find joy and excitement in the thrill, danger and chaos, I am also aware that structure is needed in my life to balance out the imbalance of chemicals in my brain.

While I experience — in what I call — true joy in moments of thrill, such as when I am going through danger, self-destruction, near-death experiences or even when I am having extreme emotions, I also have to come to a consensus that I can no longer chase after the thrill to feel joy. I am starting to realise that, while I love the thrill and chaos, I have to sit in the uncomfortable truth that the still and mundane life can also be comfortable. Similar to how I taught myself to feel comfort in times of pain, I need to unlearn that pattern of thinking and teach myself to be comfortable in the mundane.

Perhaps what I am saying is that there is no need for me to wreak havoc, be reckless and restless while spending days and nights without sleep — in other words, to be in a manic episode — to be happy.

What is happiness? Perhaps, I will never find the answer to that. Maybe happiness is a scam devised by capitalists to maintain a certain standard that we must meet to be considered happy. Whatever happiness might mean to one or the other, I just want an ice cream at the moment to escape this summer heat.

Everything in my life has led me to this path as an artist. For me, being an artist is not merely a matter of a hobby or a career — it is a chosen destiny I must walk through and a fate I must follow.

I was asked by a fellow mentor of mine, Sands Murray-Wassink, to write about art, how much it means to me and what being an artist entails. There are many ways I can go about this, even in a thousand different directions and meanings. At times, I struggle to put into words how to explain the meaning art brings into my life. There is no doubt that art is my first love, and I fell in love with art before I fell in love with a person or even myself.

Before I continue, what is art?

By definition, art is the expression or application of human creativity in visual form. While by definition art is the expression, for me, art is more than just an expression. Rather more, art is a sort of in-between entity, a medium and a tool that humans can use to express their emotions, passions, desires, interests, opinions, political views and anything possible that needs to be expressed. It is inherent in human nature to express, and humans have a constant need to express. If we have a constant need to express and if art is an expression of human creativity, then would it not be possible that our expressions — such as in the way we speak, the way we dress, the way we interact with one another — are a form of art in themselves?

There is no art without love, and there is no love without art.

Meanwhile, humans are busy judging one another, starting wars against each other and being hateful to others, art loves and embraces. Art never hates or judges; rather, it is the humans who judge the art. Perhaps I have some sort of spiritual relationship with art, as I see art more like a deity that watches over me and protects me. The deity, art, manifests in my mind as I spend most of my waking hours thinking and breathing in art. While I, as the artist, the worker, create the artwork, which is the product. My days are mostly filled with me battling against the chemical imbalance in my brain, such as my intense mood swings of mania or depression or being dragged away by my delusions and hallucinations. When I am creating and expressing in art, my brain becomes still and quiet, and there is serendipity. Art helped me in ways many cannot, and creating art has helped me to slow down my brain and process my pain, my reality and my state of being.

Art taught me virtue, art taught me patience, art taught me acceptance.

For the past few months, I have been struggling with my identity as an artist such as if being an artist is for certain a career I want to pursue for the rest of my life — if this artist life is really for me. For instance, I have been accepted into a second bachelor’s programme in a whole other study, but I know deep within my heart, my soul can never survive without art, without me fulfilling my destiny as an artist. Despite the difficulties artists face, such as myself, there must be perseverance and some sort of resilience needed to survive within the art world. The art world can be seen as a harsh place, but as I said, it is not art that judges — it is the humans who do so. Without art, I will not be whole, and despite any career paths I take, I will always go back to being an artist because art is not just a career, it is my life.

I think that says a lot more than it entails.

Reminder: keep creating what needs to be expressed. As Sands Murray-Wassink once said, “Show up for your art even when nobody does.”

Life has been different since I attempted to take my life three months ago.

My attempt to take my life led me to finding myself waking up in the ICU and being moved to the psych ward. I do not remember events prior to my suicide attempt, yet little did I know that there was an entity of demons creeping at the back of my brain, struggling to come out and be noticed.

It came as quite a shock to me when I realised I suffer from psychotic symptoms more than I thought I did; somehow, it all makes sense. The delusions, hallucinations and disorganised thinking I have suffered from most of my life have been repressed and normalised by me.

I have always thought it is normal to be in a constant state of suspicion and paranoia towards people. For instance, I have always been suspicious of my husband and convinced that he is a sex worker at the Red Light District, and despite his many attempts to convince me otherwise, my mind would not budge. Convinced that we are living in a simulation controlled by an organisation of aliens, I am constantly suspicious and paranoid of other people, that everyone in my life is in truth an actor being paid by the government to watch every one of my moves, that my people can read my thoughts. They are being broadcast out in the world. I also have hallucinations of God and angels talking to me and telling me that I am the chosen prophecy and it is my calling to sacrifice myself. Other times, it would be aliens coming down to Earth to colonise the world, and I am the chosen one to save the world. Most times, it would be bugs crawling on my skin, communicating the violent things that these aliens want me to do.

During my mood episodes of mania or depression, these hallucinations and delusions would get extremely violent to the point that I would surrender to them and harm myself, sometimes even leading to suicide attempts. Perhaps that is why I did not remember my last suicide attempt, because I was in a psychotic episode when it happened.

Ever since my last suicide attempt, I promised to myself and everyone around me that I would stop self-harming and self-destructing. Yet, it is extremely challenging to do so because my mind is battling against me by bombarding me with these violent delusions and hallucinations, with voices telling me I should die and giving me violent instructions to end my life.

The more I resist and try not to harm myself, the more violent these delusions and hallucinations become. It would impact me greatly to the point that I am not functioning as well in daily life. Doing daily tasks has become difficult, and I am starting to get paranoid about leaving the house and keeping up with self-care has been a challenge. My mood and emotions have become flat, and I rarely show expressions of excitement because things that I once loved doing, such as painting, no longer bring me the same excitement.

I would say I am stable in terms of mood, but in terms of my psychotic symptoms, they have become far too violent that I cannot even keep up in social settings anymore. These psychotic symptoms are so unbearably violent that I would be paralysed for hours, unable to speak or move. I am an extrovert, yet, strangely, I am withdrawing socially, isolating myself. At times, I would not even comprehend what others are saying, my thoughts are disorganised, and I am too preoccupied with these violent delusions and hallucinations that I am unable to follow what others are saying.

My sense of reality and self are too disorganised, for I am losing myself to my psychosis.

I have always dreaded my birthday and the prospect of turning one year older.

For my whole life, I have always seen birthdays as a sign that I have lived another painful year. Yet, it is strange how, when I turned 25 in May, I felt a sense of relief that I was alive for the first time. Perhaps there is a link between turning 25 and having your frontal lobe fully developed that made me somewhat stable.

I spent my entire life chasing after death.

Stuck in a toxic cycle, I was obsessed with pain, death and self-destructing, specifically inflicting more unnecessary pain on myself. As a child, I was not able to handle the amount of pain I went through and being the kid I was, I did not know any better how to cope with what was happening to me. As a result, I learned to cope by learning to enjoy the pain that was inflicted on me. My mentality was that if I was going through this immense amount of pain, I might as well enjoy it.

My first suicide attempt was when I was just ten years old.

With the negative experiences I’ve had throughout my life, I learned to internalise the pain that I went through and blamed myself for the pain that people inflicted on me. Someone would hurt me, I would, in turn, blame myself for it, which caused more pain and self-hate. If someone caused me pain, I would hurt and punish myself ten times more. As a way, it was my way of being able to handle the pain — I learned that it was easier to cope and understand what was happening to me if I blamed myself for it.

Having spent my whole life being obsessed with feeling more pain, chasing after inevitable death and drowning in self-hate, I am starting to rationalise with myself that perhaps the fact that I have survived all this pain and all my suicide attempts is because I am meant to live and flourish. Even when the day comes that I face death, I will not be filled with self-hate and immense pain. Rather, I want to die with gratitude that I have lived a life that, despite being painful, is meaningful and beautiful in many ways.

For the longest time, I only viewed myself with hatred, specifically that I am a failure and a disappointment. I saw my suicide attempts and self-destructive behaviour as a good thing because I thought I was doing everyone a favour if I was not on this Earth.

Now, I cannot even fathom trying to harm myself because I am stronger than that. Despite everything I went through, I have always been resilient and would push myself back up to be stronger than before.

I am more than my self-hate and self-destructive ways, and there is more to me and my qualities. Little did my younger self know, but I am not a parasite in everyone’s lives because I bring so much joy and meaning to a lot of people’s lives. I wish I had known sooner that I am a bundle of joy and that the only thing stopping me from achieving my full potential is my self-hate. I make people laugh, and as cheesy as it sounds, I am funny in the most unfunniest ways. My drive to make a difference is admirable, and my favourite quality about myself is that I am talented; let it be art, writing, violin, guitar, sports and even cooking, I am good at everything I attempt to do.

Despite being my own biggest enemy for the longest time, I do not regret anything, I do not regret that I used to hate myself, for a life of regret is a life of pain, pity and hatred. I view my old self-destructive ways as a learning curve. Having bipolar disorder, I know now that the key to staying stable I must have a good routine and good sleep, so far it has been helping.

I spent my entire life chasing after death and inflicting an immense amount of emotional and physical pain on myself — yet, I am still here, standing strong. All of this is a sign that I am meant to live long, not die young.

Perhaps in the future I might fall back into my old self-destructive ways, but it does not matter now. For the first time, I am enjoying being alive and seeing myself in a positive light.

I love self-love and being stable, I want to cherish this moment.

Therapy is finally working, huh? Maybe, I do have hope after all…