The time is now
July 15th, 2008
I’ve gotten a few emails, and spoke with a couple of people about this, and I think it applies to everything, not just design. What I am eluding to is when you are too afraid to try things, for fear you will have wasted your shot at doing your best.
A ship in a harbor is safe, but what good is a ship in a harbor?
My dad said that to me once, and it has stuck with me. It makes perfect sense, doesn’t it?
How many times have you had an idea for a new project, site design, career change, logo, business plan, etc, and have put it off because you want to “plan” it out better? Now, this is all well and good for certain things, particularly the job one, as that can impact your life greatly, but none of this should really stand in your way! If you have an idea for a new site, start sketching. Want to write that post, but fear you don’t have enough subscribers to get the response you want? I feel that way often, but I don’t think that it should stand in the way of you saying what you have to say, or doing what you have to do.
I literally have thought to myself “wow that would make a great post, but is now the right time to do it?” So what if I don’t have 80k+ subscribers, and so what if I don’t get 120k+ unique visitors a day, or that my Alexa ranking isn’t as high as I want it to be. Just let it out. I keep a piece of paper in my car with me, and just quickly write down ideas, that I want to think about more when I get to work, or home. I find that getting it down right away helps me to pursue it further. The next step is to get onto your site and make a draft of the post. It doesn’t even have to have any content, just come up a with working title. From time to time, revisit your drafts and see if you can pump one out.
How are you going to grow as a designer, developer, person if you keep having the attitude that you aren’t quite at that level yet to do it your best? How will you ever get there if you don’t push yourself? Like when I posted about using strict DOCTYPES, some people responded saying they feel they are not a knowledgeable enough, so they just use Transitional. Why?! Just use a Strict one, and validate your pages, and if they do not validate, look up why and fix them. Actively pursuing things can and will help us all become better at what we do.
What do you think? Is there a right time to do things, or am I just on a rant?
- Posted at 9:29 am in inspiration
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ifoh designs | The time is now | GET INSPIRED
Don’t put off those ideas any longer, get inspired and get moving on them today!
I think you’re right. I’ve learned as well - perfection is illusory and the most efficient way to make things better is to test them in the real word of experience.
It’s easy to fear what others will say, who see something in it’s early stages. But better, I (now) think, to congratulate yourself for having the courage to try. Many don’t.
And when the time comes that your something - whatever it is - is made so much better for all that early exposure, many more people than those ones you feared early on will go, “wow. That’s aweseme. How’d he do that?”
So, yeah, I agree