Celebrating the little things

Do you remember starting out on your UX or UI journey and picking apart every brand's designs? Looking at how apple chisels their corners, or how Nike's website layout was just “too cool”?

You are thinking to yourself at that moment, “I can do that, it can't be all that difficult”. While yeah, sure, it might not seem like much at the time. But you're so new to the process that you haven't quite gotten a grip on those companies' true brands. The color palette, the spacing, the fonts. All the thought and experience that goes into that and the research they did prior.

So then months later, there you are. Struggling to build something, that now with a microscope understanding, is clearly much more complicated and intricate than you once thought.

And thats okay.

//Woah

I want you to remember back to that first thought of product design and how simplistic it once seemed. How hard can placing a few buttons on a screen truly be?

Now look at the things you have made since then. Look at those first iterations you put together, and compare them to your work now.

pretty mind blowing huh.

You have now spent so much time and effort building a portfolio, building products. Sitting in meetings, tearing apart articles, just trying to find an edge to make you stand out.

But you’ve forgotten the most important part of all.

The process.

Baking your cake and eating it too

So here’s the arbitrarily simple point im trying to make. You time and effort, all those long hours and sleepless nights, trying to get something done on time is worth it. You’ve created a discipline in yourself that has made you leaps and bounds better than when you first started to piece that little idea together.

Doesn't matter if you have ten years or ten months of experience, we are all still learning and improving with this ever-changing system. Now if you're lucky, you might even be in a position to do this on a daily basis, and even get paid for your efforts. If that's the case, consider yourself lucky.

If not, remember that you are not alone. While you might be sitting on your computer alone late at night like I am almost consistently, and that might feel lonely. Just keep the knowledge in the back of your head that you are building towards something better, and that its not for nothing.

Keep going, and celebrate.

-until next time-