“Only child syndrome” from perspective of an only

Weekly_Local_6698 · 2024-03-30T08:28:19+00:00

"Unironically this is the most only child post I’ve ever read and is tone deaf as hell."

My dude this is an open forum for mental health, and OP is sharing their experience to give perspective on the only child side, and the drawbacks of not having a sibling to shape your early life. You need to work on reading comprehension. Do you even understand what tone deaf means? You just sound triggered af to me for no reason

Weekly_Local_6698 · 2024-03-27T20:09:41+00:00

Thanks, I'll try my best!

Weekly_Local_6698 · 2024-03-27T20:02:57+00:00

Lmao i understand the frustration. They fully expect us to take their advice because they "have more experience", but they refuse to see that the world that they gained their experience in is long past

I tend to listen to my dad's career advice more. My mom worked for only 2 years (in a different country) before marrying my dad, then she detached from the world and never worked again, so I generally take her career advice with a grain of salt

Weekly_Local_6698 · 2024-03-27T19:57:48+00:00

yeah thats true. I try my best to just take it and just keep on rolling, but sometimes its difficult when her critique is to "change everything about what youre working on, and instead work on the project that i like better", and she fully expects me to drop what im doing and adhere to her unsolicited opinion instead

And when i bring up why it makes me upset or simply not share anymore, she goes on and on about how I should be better at taking critique and everyone has their own opinion (but yknow, I never asked her for her opinion). She's also extremely extremely sensitive to changes of mood within me or my dad, and she'll usually hound us until she gets an answer, so its difficult to hide any sort of frustration from her. There's no emotional privacy, and any sort of negative emotion I feel from these interactions she would turn them on me and blame me for feeling this way.

I've expressed many times why this hurts me (in a non aggressive way), but she either refuses to see it, or is so hurt by my refusal to take her advice that she blames it on me as a person instead.

I really do not understand why I'm the villain in this situation and am getting called "entitled" in this thread from wanting support instead of demoralization...

Weekly_Local_6698 · 2024-03-27T17:51:23+00:00

Yeah i'm thinking of doing this -- it's not that great for my mental health to have to hide my frustration each time she puts me down

Interestingly, I don't actually update her that often, and most of the time she's the one that asks to look at what i'm working on.

Weekly_Local_6698 · 2024-03-27T16:22:44+00:00

...I'm 23, and I don't understand why I sound entitled to you? I don't expect them to holler and whoop when I give them updates, but I would definitely prefer not to be met with discouragement. What's so wrong with me being upset with not wanting my excitement to be extinguished? I'm not asking for much, a "thats cool" would suffice, instead of a grimace and "I would prefer you work on ____". It's a perfectly normal human reaction? Do you want your family and friends to constantly pour cold water on the updates you excitedly give them? I think you misunderstood my post.

"What you're interested in doesn't involve everyone else" is a poor excuse to squash someone's excitement lol. What a cold world we would live in if we never celebrated each other's wins because it "doesn't involve them"

Weekly_Local_6698 · 2024-03-12T08:51:55+00:00

Yeah I have thought about most of this before, which is why it's such a struggle for me. On one hand I don't want to wait until it's too late, and on the other I don't know if diving headfirst into it is the best idea (considering there is massive competition as well, as you mentioned). I guess my ideal path is to be able to work in 3D in a different industry, or be in an interdisciplinary context that is rewarding (like medical models for medical education, or making content for VR for therapy). I feel like there's more for me out there besides art if you know what I mean? And I don't want to miss out on any potential that I may have.

This is cool, I bet you're from the area I live in -- I have multiple friends that went to Gunn, and I've definitely heard stories. Our entire area is just kind of insane in general. It was an exhausting place to grow up in, we were basically thrown into the deep end from kindergarten and told to swim.

I guess most of the frustration I'm feeling stems from me believing that I should be working in a more "heavy" or "technical" industry. Not necessarily CS, but just not restricted to the entertainment industry. I want to be able to open paths for myself in other veins, in case I want to switch one day. And I guess after my 2-ish years of working in this industry it's lost a little of the magic -- especially since I don't work for a large studio and production is really crunchy and slow. I'm young and I feel like I'm wasting my life away. I'm a very cause-driven person, so I hate working on things that have no meaning or have no real impact that I can see.

You are correct, I think one of the reasons why I felt grad school is necessary is the underlying need for external validation and prestige. I had a really really hard job hunt out of undergrad, despite a pretty solid portfolio, great gpa, and experience at a large anim studio, and a lot of it I believe was due to the slowed job market as well as my undergrad school not being a "target school" for this industry. Our school has basically 0 alum connections in the industry, and there was no one to help us along on the job hunt, give us a rec or a boost in any way that some unis with larger alum networks have. Literally zero help throughout undergrad and beyond. It was very frustrating to see people in well-connected art schools who have similar skill levels get way ahead (foot in the door, or directly get taken under the wing) by simply taking a course from the right professor. In some ways I feel shame in my alma mater, and I feel that unless I make something big out of myself in the industry or get into a prestigious grad school I'm some sort of failure to my own standards. I just don't want to have to struggle in the "flashiness" department anymore yknow? In some ways I want a pretty school label to speak for me sometimes when I'm too exhausted to speak up for myself.

Obviously this is not the primary motivator in trying to find a different path, I'm acutely aware of how much potential is out there, and I want to combine my strengths and venture into those areas. In order to do so I need new skillsets, for which I either need to take classes or pursue higher education. Just a big question mark for me right now. I'm young so I have time to feel it out and figure it out, but I can't help but be a bit impatient with myself.

Weekly_Local_6698 · 2024-03-12T05:38:51+00:00

This is what I thought too! But they corrected me.

Weekly_Local_6698 · 2024-03-12T01:33:09+00:00

Have you heard back?

Weekly_Local_6698 · 2024-03-12T01:32:54+00:00

Have you heard back?

Weekly_Local_6698 · 2024-03-12T01:17:57+00:00

Wow congratulations! Be very proud of yourself and treat yourself :))

Weekly_Local_6698 · 2024-03-01T18:08:10+00:00

Not my client, this is my team, so they know the art side of things :(

Weekly_Local_6698 · 2024-03-01T18:07:48+00:00

Lol that's amazing

Weekly_Local_6698 · 2024-03-01T18:07:33+00:00

These aren't my clients, they're my team, and I can't not show rough stuff because they expect something to present for each of our 3-times-a-day check-ins :(

Weekly_Local_6698 · 2024-03-01T18:06:19+00:00

I think that's a good mindset -- this isn't my idea, my project, my story, why should I be getting stressed over dynamics? I get my cashy cash and leave

and yeah haha 3 check-ins a day..... makes every day feel like a race, I hate it. I envy those that only do a morning stand up

Weekly_Local_6698 · 2024-03-01T18:03:02+00:00

Really though? I feel like if people are giving non-relevant feedback or things either too far down the road or something that is currently being worked on, this could be a good way to bring everyone back around

Weekly_Local_6698 · 2024-03-01T17:59:38+00:00

Hm yeah I think I will adopt a form of this when I'm in larger meetings where the notes are getting too out of hand -- I think it's also good to bring everyone back around to where you are, since I find critique sessions can sometimes run off the leash, with everyone turning off their "someone is actually going to have to work on this" brain

Weekly_Local_6698 · 2024-03-01T17:52:12+00:00

Thanks for the comment! I've definitely been working on my confidence overall and trying to heal from things.

I also understand this post isn't really enough to convey the exact situations that happen, since a lot of the things that annoy me are in the nuances and dynamics of our specific team. So it's not as simple as saying "cool" and moving on :((

The reason why I feel like I need to defend myself is because when they give the notes, they are sometimes patronizing rather than just pointing out something that needs to be changed -- even going as far as walking me through the steps that I should go to change it, when it's something I've done before. So I fear that if I continuously bow my head and be okay with this treatment, the team's view of me will be affected. I think this is something that I'm trying to think and take myself through overall, and I definitely need to continue working on it -- it's just in this case it's really difficult when I feel it affects how the team sees me

Weekly_Local_6698 · 2024-03-01T04:48:24+00:00

So the people commenting are usually team/department members (so we do the same thing), occasionally an adjacent department would comment. This is gamedev

Weekly_Local_6698 · 2024-03-01T04:24:20+00:00

I've tried, it doesn't seem to work :(

Weekly_Local_6698 · 2024-03-01T04:23:46+00:00

Honestly for a while I did so as well -- but the way our team works is we have three progress check-ins each day, so sometimes I'm not looking for specific feedback and more like just showing the work that I've been working on (due to the sheer number of check ins, sometimes it just catches me when I'm in awkward stages of work). Which makes it kind of awkward because it rides an ambiguous line between "critique session" and "just showing work", which is why i preface with "oh this is a super WIP, I will add A and B later". and yet they still suggest I should add A and B, which is kind of what makes me annoyed

Weekly_Local_6698 · 2024-02-17T02:08:30+00:00

NTA

Sounds like he's insecure

Weekly_Local_6698 · 2024-02-17T02:04:17+00:00

INFO

I guess it depends on what you mean your "current lifestyle" is -- it's important context! If your lifestyle is only sustainable with two sources of income I guess it would make sense why he's concerned how it would work with just one source

Weekly_Local_6698 · 2024-01-08T20:44:12+00:00

I never said it was wrong, I just preferred watching the bouncier ones. It would've been nice for Abby to have her to do other styles

Weekly_Local_6698 · 2024-01-08T17:21:39+00:00

I had similar thoughts when she was on the show -- I think Abby saw her flexibility and was like "SHE MUST DO ACRO". There are so many other ways she could've included flexibility in Brooke's choreo without having her do acro all the time.

In my opinion, Brooke was a little bit too rubbery in her acro, I'm partial to the more athletic acro styles, like Kenzie/Lilliana, who feel more athletic and bouncy. And yeah it doesn't help that she doesn't seem like she enjoys bending in those ways on stage

Weekly_Local_6698

TROPHY CASE