Tommy Hogan, Here Comes The Anxiety (SINGLE SHOT 2023)

It’s common knowledge that the image that we present of ourselves online is filtered. It’s not even that we do it intentionally we just don’t like to have reminders of our panic attacks, stresses and heartaches. So how am I? Stressed, anxious, and sometimes burnt out; l feel good for the most part but these unhelpful thought patterns are reemerging in my life as I transition back into normal living. Sometimes I’ll just be driving and then suddenly say out loud ‘Tommy you’re a disgusting person’ ’F you’ or ‘I feel awful’. Or I’ll convince myself that the person I saw in the grocery store who looked at me funny definitely hates me. What I consider my best trait, my persistence, hard work and dedication can also have a nasty cousin of being so incredibly harsh and negative when I don’t live up to the incredibly high standards I set for myself. I feel weak when I have rest days, or don’t spend my time in ways that I consider productive. ‘Why aren’t you writing more Tommy?’ ‘Why haven’t you gone climbing today? ‘Nobody wants to hang out with you because you’re too intense, so you still don’t have a girlfriend’. I want to be constantly improving and getting better and working towards things, and if I’m not doing that then I’m doing something wrong.

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