Taking Stock: A Year of Survival, Reinvention, and Refusing to Disappear
Editor’s Note:
This piece reflects how I felt at the time it was written. The relationship described here has since ended amicably. I’m leaving it intact as an honest record of that moment.
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On Christmas morning, I sat at the table with family and casually asked if anyone makes New Year’s resolutions. They laughed. Not a cruel laugh—more of a knowing laugh. A “we’ve tried that before” laugh. A “let’s be honest, we never keep them anyway” laugh.
And honestly? I get it.
I’ve made resolutions in other years. I’ve broken them, too. I’ve drawn up rigid plans, grand visions, heroic narratives about “the new me,” and just like nearly everyone else on December 31st, I’ve watched them dissolve when real life showed up with its complications, interruptions, heartaches, and practical demands.
So no, I don’t necessarily make formal resolutions anymore. But what I do make space for is reflection. I pay attention to what this past year did to me, took from me, and also—quietly, unexpectedly—gave to me.
Because this past year has not been simple.
It hasn’t been linear.
It hasn’t been clean or calm.
It has been raw.
It has been painful.
It has also been strangely beautiful.
This has been a year of holding things together with trembling hands, of not disappearing even when part of me wanted to, of staying in my life instead of stepping out of it. It has been a year of choosing presence, even when presence hurt.
And as I move toward the year ahead, I want to honor that.
Art as Lifeline, Not Hobby
If you’ve followed Aspie Art Journey for any amount of time, you already know: art has not been some side project for me. It is not something I do when I’m in the mood. It is how I remain alive. It’s how I orient myself. It’s how I stay in my own body when the world becomes too loud, too chaotic, too uncertain.
This year forced me to adapt creatively. Not in the romanticized “artist boldly reinventing himself” way. In the real “this is my reality, so I must shape something meaningful from it” way.
Working large hasn’t been possible in the ways it once was. Materials, space, time, logistics — all of it shifted. So instead of fighting that reality, I shifted with it. I leaned into smaller works. I began building out what became the Minis — those tiny portals of attention, breath, and detail that invite you into intimacy rather than spectacle.
Those Minis aren’t small ideas in small packages.
They are concentrated presence.
And that’s become something of a theme for me this year:
Not bigger.
Not louder.
Not grander.
But truer.
MicroGenesis Academy and Somatic Creativity
Alongside creating art, another thread has been forming:
I’ve continued developing MicroGenesis Academy, which is not just about learning to draw — it’s about learning to be with yourself.
The longer I teach, write, create, and live inside this neurodivergent brain and nervous system, the clearer it becomes: creativity is a somatic practice. It is not just something that happens in the mind. It happens in the shoulders, the breath, the nervous system, the heart rate. It happens in how we sit. How we hold the pencil. How we soften the jaw. How we allow ourselves to return to ourselves, even briefly.
And the world desperately needs that right now.
We are overstimulated.
We are overwhelmed.
We are fatigued in ways our ancestors never experienced.
We need places where time slows down enough for our humanity to catch up to us again.
Part of my connection to this comes from my own experience on the autism spectrum — the overstimulation, the emotional flooding, the exhaustion that comes from constant processing. But another part comes from family influence. Members of my family work deeply in somatic healing practices, inviting people back into awareness of their bodies, their breath, and their emotional intelligence. Their work, in its own way, runs parallel to mine. Different medium, same core truth:
You cannot think your way back to feeling human.
You have to return to the body.
Art is one of the most accessible paths back.
MicroGenesis isn’t just structured content.
It’s permission.
It’s a doorway.
It’s a nervous system exhale.
And yes — it is still actively growing, evolving, and taking shape into something I believe will be powerful, useful, and deeply human.
A New Shape: Lines on the Spectrum as an Ecosystem
One of the most meaningful creative developments has been realizing that Lines on the Spectrum is no longer just “a single illustrated memoir” as I originally imagined it.
It’s becoming bigger than that.
More flexible than that.
More alive than that.
It is evolving into an umbrella ecosystem — a series of shorter volumes, each one focused, emotional, grounded in reality, and artistically honest. Instead of forcing one giant book to hold everything, multiple volumes can each hold a truth, a tone, a season, a chapter of becoming.
The first of those volumes is now deeply underway.
And it is raw.
Unapologetic.
Beautiful.
Vulnerable.
Unflinching.
It is turning pain, resilience, humor, grief, anger, and tenderness into something you can physically hold. Something you can read and feel in your chest. Something that tells the truth without drowning in it.
This isn’t about perfection.
It’s about aliveness.
And yes — there will be more volumes beyond this first one. Lines on the Spectrum has become less of a single “project” and more of a life practice in book form.
Love, Connection, and Choosing to Stay Tender
And woven through all of this is something profoundly human: love.
Not the idealized cinematic version.
Not the fantasy projection.
But real love.
Messy love.
Grounding love.
Being with Mariela has mattered.
Not because she “rescued” me. She didn’t.
Not because she made everything suddenly easy. Life is still complex.
But because when I am with her, something in me can finally exhale. I can laugh again. I can remember what tenderness feels like. I can feel my body softening rather than bracing. I can lean into warmth instead of fighting a cold world alone.
We haven’t had a perfect fairy-tale schedule. Real life has real logistics. There are challenges. There are questions. There is reality. But there is also joy. There is connection. There is presence. And there is a grounded steadiness that keeps reminding me:
I am still capable of love.
I am still capable of being loved.
My life is still worth inhabiting.
That matters.
A lot.
What Comes Next
So where does all of this go in the year ahead?
More art.
More honesty.
More projects brought into existence instead of staying trapped inside my head.
I want to publish.
I want to put books into the world.
I want these volumes to live in people’s hands, on their shelves, in their lives.
I want to continue developing MicroGenesis into something both artistically empowering and emotionally supportive.
I want to keep creating Minis, exploring new formats, experimenting with materials, and saying yes to creative life instead of shrinking away from it.
And most of all, I want to stay.
To stay present.
To stay human.
To stay visible.
To stay alive in my own story.
Because I have spent too many years disappearing.
Too many moments shrinking.
Too many hours apologizing for existing.
This past year hurt. It stretched me. It stripped things away I wish I could have kept. It demanded resilience I didn’t know I still had.
But I am still here.
And I am not fading out.
The work continues.
Life continues.
The art continues.
And I continue.
See you in the new year — I’ll be creating.
Because what’s coming isn’t polite.
What’s coming is me choosing to exist without shrinking first.
It’s me standing in the wreckage of everything I lost and refusing to apologize for still wanting beauty.
It’s breath that shakes sometimes, but still insists on filling my lungs.
It’s a body that has been terrified, humiliated, abandoned, loved, and still says: I want my life.
It’s not about pretending I’m “over it.”
It’s about carrying the bruises honestly instead of hiding them.
It’s about saying: yes, this hurt, and no, it did not erase me.
I am not here to disappear quietly.
I am not here to whisper gratitude for scraps.
I am not here to contort myself so nobody else has to confront their discomfort.
I am here to take up the space my life deserves.
To feel — even when it’s inconvenient.
To love — even when it’s risky.
To show up — even when it’s easier to numb out.
I am raw and alive and breathing anyway.
I am scarred and still reaching forward.
I am exhausted and still refusing to turn into a ghost.
I’m still here.
With a pulse.
With teeth.
With hope I didn’t manage to kill, even when I tried.
And I’m not done.
Jeff Brackett
Artist • Writer • Educator
Exploring the intersections of art, autism, and human connection through the ongoing creative project Lines on the Spectrum — an illustrated memoir in progress.
https://www.jeffreymbrackett.com
Aspie Art Journey — reflections on art, perception, and creative process.
Dating App Diaries — essays on vulnerability, connection, and rediscovery
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