I don't know if this even counts as a confession, really. It’s more like… an observation, maybe. Or a feeling. I was at one of those industry mixers tonight, you know, the ones where everyone tries to look like they’re having a GREAT time but you can tell they’re just trying to remember names. I had this lukewarm gin and tonic – I think it was gin, hard to tell after a while – and I was just nodding, nodding, trying to keep eye contact with someone who was telling me about their new VR project. My eyes just kept glazing over, I think. I was just so tired. So tired after a week of staring at a screen, tweaking logos, trying to make someone’s terrible idea look… less terrible. And all I could think was, is this it? Is this what I poured my whole life into? I mean, I love design. I really do. Or I did. For so long, it was everything. My whole identity. I skipped meals for this. I argued with my dad about how it was a REAL job, not just drawing pictures. I sacrificed… a lot. And for what? So I can stand in a noisy room, making small talk about kerning while my feet ache and I just want to go home and maybe watch some terrible reality TV? Is that what a successful career looks like? Because if it is, I think maybe I got it all wrong. I always thought it would feel more… meaningful. More exciting, even. Not this endless treadmill of trying to be polite when you just want to lie down. And the worst part is, I can't even tell anyone this. Not really. Everyone thinks I’m so creative, so lucky to do what I love. And I am, I guess. But what if I don’t love it anymore? What if I just… got good at it, and now I’m stuck? I don't know. Does that make me ungrateful? Does everyone feel like this when they get to my age? Like you look back and think, man, I really thought there’d be more to it than this. I thought I’d leave some kind of mark, something bigger. But mostly I just make PowerPoints look pretty and then go home feeling hollow. It's a pretty lonely way to live, I guess.