One of the most dangerous feelings in the world is when you encounter a conceptual framework that maps onto your experience and it just seems to “click”
If it was hard work that counted, the donkey would own the farm.
What is the lesson here?
How do you build an awareness in real time of who you are becoming?
As theologian Walter Brueggeman writes on rest and sabbath—it’s a “pause that transforms.” Rest— of people, of land, of resources— is always linked to flourishing, not scarcity. Practiced in times of plenty and proven in times of crisis.
Many want to be chefs but aren’t willing to be line cooks first. It’s not glamorous work, but it builds design muscles, muscles that you’ll need in order to get better and advance to the next step.
All this is to say is that for design, as for other fields, the road to greatness is often paved with obsession—an immoderate, unjustifiable surplus of care. Doing things that no-one asked for with a love that no-one could reasonably expect.