Lack of motivation on patreon

Thanks a lot for your thoughtful input too, Noirat, it is much appreciated :) Now after a couple hours has passed I think my glucose levels may have been a bit low when I wrote this, which explains the a bit ranty structure of the text, haha. But I still do stand by some of the things I said, I need to sort of restructure and rethink what this patreon is for. Maybe it is all about just scheduling those three days for myself each month that will be reserved for doing all the sketches, as for awhile I just thought about patreon as like extra income, but I think I need to rethink that aspect, as a year ago I had 2 patrons and now I have 13, 6 of who I make sketches for! I also understand that people have to unsubscribe at some point, it is only natural! However, I think there could be some rethinking on patreons end on how to display the unsubscriptions, as right now it displays a big ol' notification with big ol' numbers of how much money you lost and how many people left, I think that is a bit unnecessary and cruel to show those statistics that way. Granted, for some people it may be useful to know that and have that data immediately visible each time you log in. But for now I will continue on doing this thing and figure things out as I go along :) Edit: And I totally agree about not putting art behind a paywall, after all, what is art if there is nobody to witness it?

A generic guy. Don't mind the name. Stop reading!

Sorry to hear the sketches are stressing you out. I can't say if you should or should not continue the sketches, as one of the guys using it I am biased there, but you should do what is good for you mentally. If you want to get some stress off, but still do it, maybe make the sketches not as detailed and have artistic freedom with them, opposing to planning out every picture carefully. If it's too much or patreon just cuts too deep into the money, you should stop and think of something else. Also the idea Helzim had, of a higher tier over 5$ giving some people maybe voting rights on the theme or topic of another piece of art or incentivice Commissions sounds good. Just a paywall for art would be a bad idea there. I really hope your self esteem rises again soon as well. There is no need for you to be sad about your artwork at all and patrons come and go. It makes no sense to doubt your quality, because some people leave, maybe because of money problems or maybe because they only intended to give some money for some months. When patreon doesn't pay out for you, personally, I think you are not known enough yet. I have, apart from one of your journals I think, not seen you advertising your patreon anywhere. This may sound stupid, but it might help a bit. In any case, whatever you decide, I hope you are fine and everything will work out good for you =)

Thanks for the insight, Helzim :) I should add that I am quite fortunate and lucky to be in a place where people think my work is good enough to pay money for, but I indeed do feel that I may have to change things around here a bit at some point. But if there will be any changes, I will be very up front about it, so no changes yet at least :)

Wifewolf_Goes_Awoo

I think if the sketches are proving stressful it might be a good idea to cut that reward tier off and leave it as a tip jar, especially if Patreon is taking a cut of that leaving you with less money than you'd get for a normal commission. A halfway point you may consider is a higher tier above the $5 that grants some incentivize for commissions but still leaves you ahead, as there's no point in issuing a Patreon tier/reward that makes you lose money/time, maybe getting access to forms early. Regardless, I hope you're able to work everything out in a way that's good for you.