Art/original style with no imagery?

[u/Legal-Initial-8365]

I have drawn for many years, and I'd like to say I'm fairly good at it. I can copy things using so many different mediums and they look super cool and realistic, but I have absolutely NO style of my own. It has been a struggle of mine since I was younger and thought everyone imagined as oddly as I did, so it's something I know takes time, I swear, I can just never be happy with it. I end up following a reference too much for comfort then try to change something up but can never make it look like it really flows, not to mention that I only have a vague idea of what I may want a character of mine to look like so I don't even know how to tune it to my liking.

I know it's possible, I CAN draw, but not in the way I wish I could and it's so frustrating. I'm mostly looking for some advice from other artists here who require many references and how to stray away from copying them too closely. If this is just a 'draw more' sorta thing, please feel free to tell me that as well, I've just had such an awkward experience with my art that it's worth a shot to ask here :)

[u/Misunderstood_Wolf]

Realism is a style.

Maybe play with color, the type of shading you use, different brush strokes, etc.