
In terms of weather, today’s been great. As I write this, I’m gazing up into the sky. I think way back to when I first started doing UX/UI* (User Experience, User Interface). Like every beginner designer–artist, I confused the design industry exclusively for the strictly artistic one.

Now some of you may argue that it takes artistic creativity to design well. You are completely right! But there lay 2 kinds of creativity that we’ve mistakenly merged into one: the I-need-to-be-creative-in-order-to-derive-solutions-to-problems-creative, and the I-want-to-create-in-order-to-express-myself-creative.
Design falls under the first, artistry falls under the second.
Both are equally wonderful things, but today’s about you, design.
So if I were to go back in time to teach my younger self a thing or two, here’s what I would say:
It’s okay to follow the rules.
Wait, what? Is there a world wherein you’re rewarded for, well, being basic?
Yep, that’s right. On first instinct, our artist selves yearn for creative intervention. It’s better to do things our way– to innovate, instead of to copy pre-established designs or design patterns.

I mean– why make a typical web page text-filled and messy, when you can transform it into something minimalistic and sleek?
If we try making this important piece of text appear only when one hovers over an image– it’s informative, it’s creative, and it saves space…except it’s also practically invisible to the tons of people who never hover over it. ☹️
So to all designers starting out on this exciting journey and hoping to learn from my *painful* mistakes, the best tip I can give is:
Don’t make your work harder than it really needs to be, only for aesthetic purposes. If you just make your design very easy to figure out, more than half your work is done.
Everything here is almost always easier said than done. But as they say, you have to “learn the rules so you know how to break them.” Experimentation is always great, just never, ever forget to think of the user while doing it. ☺
So whoever you are reading this right now, thanks for stopping by and good luck!

*Note: UX and UI are completely different, but for the sake the point of this article, I put them together.
