Finding My Creativity in Creative Advertising

“Finding myself without actually doing something ‘life-changing’”

Aaron Johnson
Sep 5, 2018 · 3 min read

My creative journey started around late 2015 after I had finished a semester in Los Angeles, CA, attending a school, The Master’s University, for a bachelor’s in computer science. In spring of 2015, I ended up taking an engineering course for computer science that wasn’t as code-based like previous CS courses. For some reason this was a nice pause from my previous hectic schedule with music filling the rest of the time with its endless practices, rehearsals and recordings. I wasn’t bogged down with something I was getting softly irritated with: computer science.

This is where social media and Web 3.0 interrupted my life for the better. Instead of coding all the time I forced myself to be more “creative” and create myself a website, as cliché as that sounds. In my mind, it was something new and sparked my interest. Fast-forward a few months, I began to question how dearly I loved computer science or coding in general. My thoughts weren’t against the idea of coding or computer science, but my life and creative eagerness were growing toward other forms of content I could dabble in. Because I knew coding wouldn’t leave my heart, it wasn’t my life support anymore. I was growing into Web 3.0, to be quite honest.

In those few months I began to understand why I had so many doubting thoughts on computer science. Instead of coding the rest of my life, I made the choice to have computer science as a foundation, of sorts. I began to use my knowledge of the computer to incorporate a more technical side of creative content, new trends and interactive ideas. Whatever I sought out to make, it had computer science as the foundation and helped tremendously. I have no regrets having been established with so many foundational CS courses because those shaped my mind into an analytical and object-oriented mindset. Although computer science wouldn’t be my life forever, it changed my life for the better.

I dabbled in a plethora of creative outlets like Wordpress CMS, social media, and UI/UX design. The computer science side of me understood the technical aspects of what I tried to implement and yet understood a whole new look at creativity that was fresh and exciting for me to discover over time.


A Creative Mindset

At that time, I chose to take a year off in order to discover what I had on my mind: a creative mindset the needed its boundaries widened, searched, and challenged . I hadn’t the slightest notion what this “creative mindset” might entail in my life but was persistent to find out. A year later, through summer jobs and chats with friends in the advertising field, I ended up attending Texas State University for a bachelor’s in advertising with a concentration in digital media and a minor in computer science — computer science being that foundational aspect of my life that shaped my mindset toward technology.

I chose the advertising field for its freedom of creation: something that is hard to define yet easy to implement through creativity. It’s organic. It works. To some, it’s creating something out of the ordinary to change the world we live in. For others, it’s filling a blank canvas with imagination. I’m no master of the arts but advertising has opened my eyes up to something beautiful and rewarding.

Follow me on this journey to find creativity in creative advertising…until then, cheers.

Aaron Johnson

Written by

Hello, I’m Aaron. I‘m currently a senior at Texas State University studying Advertising & Digital Media. I’m a Copywriter and UI/UX Designer. Cheers.

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