What I learned in grad school is…
As my first semester of grad school comes to a close, I am pretty awestruck at how much I’ve learned in just 15 weeks. Literally every day was filled with valuable information and new experiences. But despite all this useful knowledge, I think the most beneficial thing I’ve learned is to accept failure and treat it as part of the design process.
Henry Ford said, “Failure is simply the opportunity to begin again, this time more intelligently,” and he couldn’t be more right. I’ve fucked up a lot of things semester. But it’s been most advantageous when I’ve used those fuck ups as a learning experience and tried again or reiterated what I was working on. Those failures really are the most valuable learning tool I could have hoped for.
Working on my final projects these past few weeks has been a true test of my patience. There were days where literally everything went wrong and I was ready to give up completely, but it really helped when I reminded myself that things would work out as long as I kept trying and used the knowledge I gained from screwing up to find the right solution.
With only about 7 or so months left to our program, I know there’s a lot more failure coming my way. It feels good now to be able to look at that in a positive light, and I feel more prepared to face these challenges. Bring on 2018!
