When I watched Jim & Andy: The Great Beyond on Netflix, Jim told a story about his father. His Dad could have been a great comedian he says, but instead, he got a safe job as an accountant. He was let go from this ‘safe’ job and their family struggled to make ends meet. So, he said, the lesson is this: You can fail at what you don’t love, so you might as well do what you love. I illustrated this piece as it really rang true with me. To be fair, I’ve never not worked as a designer or realistically ever been close to failing, but there are times when I get that niggling feeling, that imposter syndrome, where I wonder about the future and whether I’ll be doing this for the rest of my life, whether I’ll fall into something ‘safer’. So in times like that, I remind myself of this quote.

Months later after I illustrated this piece, I took Austin Saylor’s intro to animation in After Effects, which was a fantastic resource and really spiked the learning curve for me after struggling with it on my own for a while. I redrew the piece and made it into a moving type animation.