I have spent most of my adult life trying to debunk the myths of my childhood. See, parents tend to tell their kids all sorts of things to make them quiet or when trying to explain something they don’t actually know; several times it is just to protect them from “the awful truth.” We all have one or two of those.
Most recently, as I pondered these things, I took a pen and a notebook and began writing all the things that came to mind as not realistically logical or accurate for the time and circumstances in which they were told to me. I made a long list. Actually, I spent most of the day doing just that. As a result, I realized that the world that I built in my mind as a kid was thoroughly misconstrued; I also realized that I was framed into needing most things around me to make my life appear happier.
I had a long talk with the people from back then, mostly relatives, friends of my parents and, obviously, my parents. I asked them to explain to me those anecdotes again as an adult. The things I found were amazing. They motivated me to make changes in my life that I didn’t know I needed and I also learnt to let go of complications and chaos. Simplicity, in its more fundamental meaning, was not introduced to me as a kid because the people around me were trying to protect me from it. As a functional adult, it is my responsibility to make the necessary adjustments about the things I was taught as a child and with which I no longer agree. See, I now realize that simplicity in the way of thinking and performing is the fastest way to accomplish bigger things.
My wife helped me to be brave enough to bring those changes to my work. I design, that’s my thing. I do all sorts of digital designs and I tend to amuse myself while doing it and for a long time I was not critical enough of my work. After some time trying my best to design the perfect graphic for a client, I decided to go solo and opened my very own site where I had my designs printed on tees… and they were not selling.
After gravitating my life towards minimalism, I tried again and applied my new-found life policies to my designs. I am a firm believer that there is great visual power in a minimal design, whether it’d be for a room, a shirt or even a chair. There is something intrinsically appealing from a minimalistic piece of work.
If a minimal design can change the way an object is perceived, used and consumed, I can’t begin to count the number of times I have seen it impact my life in the way I live it, value it and enjoy it.