It may just have been away too long and had a harsh winter. All of this. The pandemic, the buffoons elected here and there, this crazy habit of denying facts and making up alternative truths. As it turns out, the stronger the winter, the more beautiful the plants will grow in the spring. I am glad this may come to an end. It's time to rise and shine again. Let's try to do everything we can to bring a bit of light to this healing world.
I also went through a bit of internal turmoil, feeling the conflicts and the cognitive dissonances. As a designer, I vow to bring beauty to the world. And how long since I did anything creative? Quite an imposter syndrome has stuck with me. I am a designer with no academic training in design. I came to design from the mechanical engineering. And I take pride in this. But I suck at drawing, so I kind of stopped designing stuff for a while, even though I started teaching design.
And somehow, all the pieces came together quite recently.
So, I come from a technical background (engineering + MBA). I am a designer by trade. Believing designers should master the material with which they are working, I taught myself how to code and, later, joined as a developer a startup with a very high level of expectation requiring all the technologies it uses. And I learned and grew a lot by their side. But I knew that, no matter how hard I worked, I would never become a real developer and have the same talent as my colleagues. And, this also doesn't help me bring beauty to the world.
A couple of weeks ago, I had a conversation with a friend and fellow designer about a position that might have been interesting to consider. He told me that one of my assets for this position was that I am a non-visual designer. I handle concepts and work to shrink the complexity of user experiences at large, and this was invaluable for the position. Some too many visual-only designers try to solve every problem with a new user interface.
Non-visual designer. Coining the expression that way lit a spark. This is it. This is who I am.
I read philosophy, mostly philosophy of technology. I used to make a living writing speeches. I am never happier than when I read books and write stories. I am a designer, and I am meant to work with words, concepts, and materials. Suddenly, everything made sense.
If I never applied for this job, I owe him one for helping me figure out how to continue my journey. He brought beauty into my world.
So now, it's time for me to rise, shine, and continue.