I don't know where to begin as I've apparently spent my whole life working at being a Rationalist and didn't know it until I heard about this site and the Rationalist Movement. As a Starving Artist/Amateur Intellectual/Hermit, I'm not in a position to go to graduate school right now, and the people around me these days don't share my same interests. Like any human being I need to engage with people thinking about the same things I do. So here I am. 

I've kept boxes of sketchbooks and journals for a couple decades that are full of ideas and concepts I've developed from my own personal experience, reading and studies, but my work doesn't do well on traditional 'art' forums. It's usually very dry, scientific, conceptual work looking for a form, but as a trained artist I've run into technical issues - requiring skills, experience and/or data and resources I don't have - so my work stays theoretical and stacks up in boxes in my living room. I've attempted to write research papers, grant proposals, blogs, twitter posts, essays and books but can't quite finish them because I've lacked a support network. My work is my passion, but I've been unable to share it because I hadn't found a place where so many of my interests could be satisfied. When I look at the list of topics of discussion on this site, I feel agitated I didn't find this community sooner. 

So as a newbie looking to develop, share, develop, and share my own work, contributing while benefiting from the work of the others on this board, I'm a little overwhelmed by the scope of this place. Since I'm pretty comfortable in my sexual and gender identity as a man, I wouldn't mind a little hand holding in the beginning.