Artwork : Havidol
Artist : Justine Cooper
2007


Profile :
Who : Workholic student
Where : The library
With : Books and a laptop
When : Early morning
Doing : Working
Laughing type : Snicker

In the middle of a hectic semester, I sometimes have these sudden moments of awareness. Yes, indeed, I am a workholic and I would feel guilty spending only one day doing something else than studying. I never have enough and it has become a vicious circle. Studying hypermedia art requires interdisciplinary competences and there is a new publication on the matter or related to it everyday. It’s a perfect research subject for the maintenance of my workoholism.

In a sudden state of awareness, I googled my emotions just to feel the normality of my situation. I typed : anxiety, “never have enough”. I browsed the web forums, blogs and other websites on the matter.  Of course, it’s always scary. On these websites, it says how this anxious mind state can degenerate. According to them, I might need medication for that one day. Finally, the googling makes me totally hypochondriac and, of course, increases my level of anxiety.

I finally hit this website called Havidol. I could read the most relevant slogan to describe my mind state : “when more is not enough”. I realize that I actually have this very complicated “Disphoric social attention consumption deficit anxiety disorder”. There is a woman smiling on the screen, next to my diagnostic. She is smiling because they actually found a medication for this very specific problem. It’s written that it should be taken indefinitely, right next to the strange side effects (hair growth?) that would actually put me in a poorer mood then the actual. One can take this medication as a suppository and he will then be able to shop more adequately. As the absurdities accumulate, I watch a very funny testimonial video to finally understand I’ve been trapped. I didn’t really feel trapped by this website, but by the others that I’ve seen right before.

 

Home Narratives Curatorial Statement