Month: December 2025

I didn’t become a designer because I loved art. I became one because I liked control. Aligning things perfectly. Choosing exact shades. Deciding where something begins and ends. Design felt like a place where effort translated cleanly into results.

It didn’t stay that way for long.

The more I worked, the more I realized how little control I actually had. People interpret designs in ways I never expect. Stakeholders see something entirely different from what I intended. Users ignore the parts I obsessed over and struggle with things I thought were obvious. Design slowly chipped away at my need to be right.

I remember one project where I spent days perfecting a layout. Every spacing intentional, every interaction smooth. The feedback came back simple: “Feels cold.” No technical explanation. No actionable point. Just a feeling. I was frustrated—but they weren’t wrong. I had optimized the life out of it.

That moment changed how I design. I stopped designing to impress other designers. I stopped treating feedback like a threat. I started listening for what wasn’t being said. Design, I learned, isn’t about clarity alone—it’s about warmth. About making people feel invited, not instructed.

There are still days I miss the certainty. When I wish there were formulas instead of opinions. But uncertainty has made me better. It forces me to test assumptions, not defend them. To care less about being clever and more about being useful.

Design also taught me something personal: letting go doesn’t mean lowering standards. It means trusting the process enough to let others shape the outcome. The best work I’ve done wasn’t fully mine—it was shared, challenged, softened by other perspectives.

Now, when I open a blank canvas, I don’t rush to fill it. I let it stay empty a little longer. Because design isn’t just about adding elements. Sometimes it’s about knowing what doesn’t need to be there—including parts of your ego.

And that lesson? It’s useful far beyond the screen.

Being a designer means living in a world where everything is both a problem and a possibility. I can’t look at a badly spaced menu without wanting to fix it. I can’t walk past a billboard without imagining three better layouts. And I definitely can’t open Instagram without mentally redesigning half the ads I see. It’s a blessing and a curse—but mostly, it’s the quiet thrill of knowing I see the world a little differently.

My day usually starts with sketches—not perfect ones, just messy shapes and arrows that only make sense to me. Before the emails, before the client calls, before the Slack notifications explode, I need that little window to create without rules. Some days it leads to something great; other days it ends up in my digital graveyard of “ideas that might work someday.” Designers all have one of those.

Work officially begins when the feedback starts rolling in. “Make it pop more,” “Try a cleaner vibe,” “Something isn’t clicking but I don’t know what,” “Can we make the logo bigger?” I’ve learned that half of design is translation—turning vague comments into concrete solutions. And weirdly, I enjoy that challenge. There’s something satisfying about pulling clarity out of chaos.

But the real magic happens in the in-between moments. The random color palette I discover while editing a photo. The layout idea that appears while watching a movie. The typography inspiration that comes from the label on my lunch. Creativity isn’t contained to software—it slips into everything.

Of course, the job isn’t all aesthetics and inspiration. There are revisions that stretch until midnight, deadlines that get tighter every hour, and projects that drain you until you swear you’ll never open Figma again. But then you see your work live—a website layout, an app screen, a poster in the real world—and suddenly the exhaustion feels worth it.

Being a designer means constantly learning, constantly noticing, constantly caring about details most people never see. And honestly, that’s what makes it beautiful.

Design isn’t just my profession.
It’s the way I understand the world.