How To Survive as A Self-Taught Designer 🤘

Lots of people didn’t have any privilege to attend design school. Hell, lots of people in my country Indonesia didn’t even have an opportunity to attend formal design school/university.

I never really attended design school because of an economic reason. Most of the time I learn to design by myself. Years later, after working for some client, company or design teams, I discovered some pros and cons of being a self-taught designer. But in this article, I will not discuss that.

This time I want to do some self reflect by sharing about how I build my design career with zero formal education. This is basically what I did:

Surround Yourself With Mentors

One thing that I constantly do every time is I always try to get myself in an environment where there are people who I can learn from. Think about it like having a mentor but also a friend at the same time. This way I can always learn about everything new. Mentors don’t necessarily a better person/designer. Remember that you will learn something from anyone that willing to share something to you.

Stay Stupid, Stay Curious!

To me, this is one of the most beneficial mindset to have as a self-taught designer. By being stupid, you will always want to fill yourself with more knowledge, more wisdom and always curious about how to be a better designer.

Show Your Works!

By being all by yourself with no teachers, or school to evaluate your works, you need to show it to everyone. By constantly show and asking for feedback, you will be able to measure your skill/works. And to me, this is an important aspect to have because as a self-taught designer, you need to know where are yourself right now in order to improve it.

Just Do It!

A famous line by Nike. I find this phrase works like a charm to me. I also find my self having a difficult time to even read a book or learning from a theory. So whenever I want to learn about something, I will just f@%kin do it. Then, I can reflect/evaluate the results, and the challenge after doing it. This way, I can learn a lot faster.

Share What You Know

I learn that by sharing what I know, however small it is, will also increase my knowledge eventually. Because, by doing it, you will push yourself to develop by yourself. And that way, you also learn something from it.

And that is some of my way to survive as a self-taught designer. I hope you can find this writing helpful. If you have any feedback, request, or anything, kindly say Hi to Sit Talk Design Instagram!

Cheers,

Dimas 🤘