Monsters of the Mind: Digital Zine

Monsters of the Mind is an illustrated creative psychology zine built to help artists understand and work with the internal patterns that interfere with the creative process. It has monsters, prompts, and tools for artists working through fear, pressure, and self-doubt.

The project began as a conceptual framework by Cuauhtemoc Velázquez López, who conceived the eight “monsters” as protective inner forces rather than flaws to eliminate. Each monster reflects a familiar creative block pattern; overthinking, perfectionism, shame, freeze, comparison, and more.

From there, the work became a process of translation across mediums.

I worked as the primary copywriter and narrative translator. I started taking Cuau’s psychological concepts and shaping them into language that artists could feel, recognize, and move with.

This meant:

turning theory into digestible metaphors,

giving each monster a distinct emotional voice and breathing room per page

and building a consistent internal structure that balanced play, clarity, and psychological grounding.

The eight monsters were illustrated by Miki Kawaguchi, drawing inspiration from Japanese yokai traditions that gave each monster a physical presence that informed how the writing landed.

The copy and visuals evolved in dialogue, with language often adjusting to better match the posture, mood, and personality of the illustrated creatures.

The result is a zine where:

psychology becomes embodied,

metaphor becomes visual,

and abstract inner patterns feel tangible and approachable.

This project sat at a delicate intersection:

psychological depth without clinical language,

emotional honesty without heaviness,

playfulness without losing credibility.

The writing needed to feel safe, smart, and alive and not like another self-help or a boring academic theory. This zine needed to stand out as a toolkit for artists, by artists.

Each monster followed a shared narrative system:

The whisper (the inner voice)

The pattern (what shows up behaviorally)

What it is (the protective mechanism underneath)

How it protects you (benevolent intent)

Creative cost (what it takes away)

Tools (poetic, scientific, and micro-practices)

As the zine evolved, I worked to:

condense sections without losing meaning,

remove redundancy while preserving emotional nuance,

and ensure the tone stayed warm, witty, and grounded throughout; both in terms of the copy and the design.

The final zine is a collaborative piece of creative psychology. The one that helps artists recognize their inner resistance without pathologizing it.

Instead of asking readers to “fix” themselves, Monsters of the Mind invites them to:

get curious,

build familiarity,

and return to their creative work with more agency and less fear.

Long-form editorial copywriting

Narrative systems & content architecture

Creative psychology translation

Tone of voice development

Conceptual editing & condensation

Zine designing and direction

If you’re curious to know more about the zine, explore the world of Monsters of the Mind here: → View the zine on the Poetic Toolbox website