Even so, sustainable creation requires care. Romanticizing suffering can corrode both art and artist; the aim is not to seek pain, but to steward the pain that arrives. Build recovery into the process—sleep, community, therapy when needed—so the engine runs without burning out. In this ethical frame, longing becomes a teacher rather than a tyrant, and the work becomes a conversation with the ache: you bring the discipline, it brings the voltage, and together you make something worthy of the fire. [...]
