Rin Kuroo

First post of 2026. And I want to yap.

So… I got a full-time job. It’s not my dream job like animation, but I can do it. Even if it feels a bit forced sometimes. Who knows what the future holds, right?

Honestly… I want to go back to drawing. I miss 2023-2024 so fucking much.

Let me tell you something. Looking back from where I am now, 2024 might’ve been the best year for me. You know why? Because I was finally free from that stupid college. I literally chose not to finish my degree just so I could have time to draw. Yeah, it sounds insane. But honestly? It was totally worth it. (In my field nobody really cares about degrees anyway, they care about skill.)

It was probably one of the happiest times of my life. Sure, there was stress and sadness, but when I look back, the happiness outweighed it.

I drew those two old men nonstop, and somehow people actually liked them. What the fuck. My skills kept improving during that time. I slowly started revealing the characters and stories from my world, little by little. And it felt amazing.

Every day I’d wake up thinking: “I want to draw today. I want to bring them to life.” It was so fun I can’t die yet… who the hell is going to draw them if I’m gone?

That feeling of freedom… I had been holding it in for so long. Even though things at home were stressful. I had my favorite plushies. My pet loved me (that little guy’s old now and prefers being alone).

I had friends, and yeah, of course, I also lacked maturity. I was jealous of the people around me. I kept overthinking about who I was and how to be “good enough.” At some point I started comparing the number of likes on my posts and others', I don’t even remember when that started.

When I felt unwanted, lonely, or jealous… I pushed people away. Facebook, Twitter, everywhere. I kept isolating myself.

Then 2025 happened. I started thinking maybe I just shouldn’t be friends with anyone at all, because I thought I'm not a good person to be around anyone. So I chose to be alone.

The stress got worse. Game fandoms got quieter. Familiar people slowly disappeared. I was stressed about not having a job. I felt like such a fucking loser. Didn’t finish college. Couldn’t get hired anywhere. I didn’t even know if the animation industry was collapsing… or if I just wasn’t good enough. Why wasn’t I good enough? I’ve been practicing my whole life. I'm not bad! My skill is good for a junior! So why the hell couldn’t I get a job? It's been 1 year and a half damnit! Is my skill really that bad for living?

I got so exhausted that I couldn’t even draw anymore. All I could do was part-time jobs that paid almost nothing. And honestly, I don’t even know why I couldn’t just get up and keep improving my skills.

Other people at my age were having their lives. Meanwhile I felt like mine was already over.

Without my art skills, I’d just be another useless nobody.

My diary was mostly filled with stress about my dad, about not being able to find work, and sometimes jealousy toward other people.It went on like that until the end of the year. Eventually I quit social media completely.

But you know something? At the end of last November, I finally started getting up again. I tried to change myself, both in improving my skills and being more serious about religion.Of course I still get discouraged sometimes. But look at this… I hadn’t even gotten far into my plans for this year yet, and suddenly I got a job.

Life is so unpredictable. It happened so suddenly that I’m still confused.

Free housing. Free food/snacks. No water or electricity bills. Only saving. Isn't that an amazing place to work?

Even though it’s objectively good… I still want to work in animation. I’m angry that I’m stuck here. I'm angry that I can't do what I had planned for this year anymore. Really angry. But right now I don’t really have a choice.

And… yeah. I’m a young adult now. Compared to the last few years, I feel like I’ve grown up a little. I think I’ve got some fire back in me.

I want to draw again.

I want to feel that kind of happiness I had in 2023-2024 again.

Even if it’s just a little bit…I want to try starting over.