Your personal Tumblr journey starts here
Idk who needs to hear that, but using a shit ton of references for art is valid. Tracing, as long as you credit the person if it's very identical and if you post it, is valid. You learn by doing. So if you trace something enough, you'll eventually be able to draw the previously traced piece from memory, and you can adapt it to whatever you want. Be it a different style, a different pose, a different palette.. Same with references.. That's what they're for, people. Tracing isn't illegal, neither is using references, no matter how cheap that feels.
That's just how we learn. So, would you rather be stuck and eventually give up because you can't get it right? Or will you seek help by the very tools given to artists so they can learn these things?
It's literally in the Sesame Street opening.. Not sure if it's in the English version, but a german verse in there was always "Sometimes you have to ask to understand these things!". So ask. Ask google, ask people around you who draw, ask Google for references, ask. Just ask, guys