Ever since Chili became a thing, I've been feeling things out, and it seems like I've found a few more rabbits bouncing around inside my head. One particularly loud voice was one that I've chalked up to my habitually intrusive, anxious, fearful, and worried thoughts.
Flake is the one whose been mostly responsible for those thoughts, is unsurprisingly a hare, and seeks out problems and danger for us to be careful of and stay away from - perhaps a tad too insistently at times. Her fur colours are more muted, wears a shock collar, is "taller" than me but stands shorter cause of how she slouches. She often doesn't bother wearing her glasses.
When we're feeling especially scared, I've taken to calling it "Flaking out," as I depicted in the follow-up comic I made after first pinning down her design.
Expressing this aspect in different ways has actually made it easier at times to give room to the worried, scared, perhaps spiralling thoughts that sometimes crop up. It's let me give them space, rather than letting them fester inside my own head in the interests of keeping us safe. It's been interesting, to say the least. 💝
All my love to all of you, I empathise with Flake a lot 💜
Are the characters on the color in the first frame meant to be legible? Was trying a translator on them and wasn’t sure if meant to be something specific or squiggles?
Characters? Where?
Okay I see you meant “collar” now. x3 Those are flashing lights on Flake’s shock collar.
-gentlest of cuddles-
I feel a deep-seated need to give her a hug and help ease things for her.
Oooh, I like this design! And I’m a recently growing fan of making space for feeling out fear. Been learning a lot in therapy that (surprise) tamping fear down and trying to get rid of it as soon as you feel it isn’t actually that helpful! Exactly as you put it up here, the anxiousness and fear comes from our minds trying to keep us safe, just… not in a way that ends up practical, or goes farther than is helpful. I’ve been trying to meet my feelings with kindness and an open mind, and it’s been awesome! I hope you find lots of success with Flake in your journey with that.
By the way, what does “Catch a Bubble” mean here?
Since giving a face to her voice, I’ve found myself saying things like “Flake needs to..” and “Flake’s worried..” and immediately people who know her, know where I’m coming from.
Whether it’s an unnecessary apology that they know is borne out of fear, or expressing an anxiety that is likely unfounded, or checking in with others cause I’m worried about them – Flake isn’t someone who would lash out in normal circumstances, so folks tend to take what she says from a more charitable angle even if I may misspeak. It’s basically the equivalent of “I need to talk about something, and I’m scared to.” This has naturally encouraged me to be kinder to myself when I find myself in such a place, too.
Asking about “Catch a Bubble” made me giggle a little, cause I’ve had a few people get curious whenever I mention it. If I remember correctly, Garnet picked it up from a preschool teacher who makes short form videos about her job. That’s one of the things she says to her students to get them to stop for a moment and try to calm down – being slow and deliberate as to literally catch a bubble. I’ve always interpreted it as “catch your breath” in a similar way to the underwater levels in the classic Sonic games, though. 😅