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Conversations with designers, founders, and builders behind some of the best work
Lee Black Full Video Podcast.txt
English (US)
00:00:00.040 — 00:00:21.600 · Speaker 1
People often see something and think it's overly complex, when really it's not. It's actually it's really stripped back and simplified, and you can do so much on a simple level with less tools, less layers, but still get a really beautiful outcome. It's not about learning everything. It's about making do with what you have and doing the best with it.
00:00:21.640 — 00:01:51.640 · Speaker 2
Some designers make things pretty and some designers make things work, but Lee black does something a little more rare. He makes things feel like they shouldn't be possible. You've probably seen some of his work without knowing it. Those hyper polished figma pills with goldfish swimming inside, or the Dieter Rams inspired component library that made a lot of us question what was possible with framer or mid-life engineering, a music project born from ChatGPT conversations that helps people with anxiety and focus, has been designing for 25 years.
He worked at framer. He runs a successful design studio called 1042, and he tells me he was the kind of kid that used to take apart his toys just to understand how they worked. But what drew me to this conversation is where he's at right now, because after building this successful agency and after a failed app company that nearly broke him, and after years and years of chasing money that never actually made him happy, he's looking for something else.
Impact and soulfulness. The kind of work that fills your heart, not just your pockets. For the next hour, we're going to talk about what happens when you master your tools so deeply that the rules start to bend, why some of us can't turn off, and why that's not always a problem to solve. This is State of Play, a podcast where I try to figure out what fuels the most interesting designers and builders.
Let's get into it.
00:01:59.230 — 00:02:09.350 · Speaker 2
What was kind of one of the first moments that you think about when when you think about the first. Oh my gosh, I love creating.
00:02:09.390 — 00:04:29.020 · Speaker 1
I was kind of one of those unusual clouds that basically got nice things, but I was really more interested in not playing with it, but actually taking it apart. And I think for me, I kind of had this neat feeling to understand how things work. So I would take it apart. I put it back together, but I might take two things and combine them into one thing.
Um, mostly like electronic devices. Whatever. You know, I was a kid growing up in the 80s. You know, we had we had a lot of boredom, and, uh, you had to just make your own entertainment. Um, so I think that's where it kind of really started. But I also remember being a kid who loved to draw, and I would draw obsessively.
It didn't matter what time it was. And, and I think that's kind of a pattern that's followed me throughout my life. Um, you know, I would just keep drawing and drawing and drawing until I was satisfied with it. I remember when I started painting on canvas when I lived in Glasgow and I did this, um, I did this for, I think, five years.
I ended up burning myself out at the end of it because I became obsessed. Obsessed with it. It was it was my night job. I was working as a designer during the day. Um, I had some people collecting my work, and that was also, uh, it was like my childhood on speed. You know, that's what it felt like, uh, because I would come home from work and I have a painting which I'd been working on from the previous day, and I knew that I wanted to finish it in that night.
You know, some artists they were taking, you know, they take three months to finish a painting. Now, I was doing one painting a night or two paintings, um, every 3 or 4 days. And, uh, so this for me was, you know, it's also linked back and, and I think if you join the dots and you look back, uh, as you get older and see that, you know, as a kid, I was very much like that.
I had to get things done. Um, during the time of painting was the same. And that totally crosses over into the work I do as a designer. So it's, you know, sometimes it's not always about speed. I mean, I think sometimes you can get high quality in a short burst or a short sprint. Um, but then sometimes you just have to mull over ideas for, for some time.
And I think, like, it's trying to find that, um, uh, feeling of, uh,
00:04:30.140 — 00:04:35.220 · Speaker 1
wanting to do, you know. Um, and I'm trying to find the time to do it.
00:04:35.260 — 00:04:41.060 · Speaker 2
The desire to play. It almost tortures me sometimes. And that speed
00:04:42.500 — 00:05:05.300 · Speaker 2
I hate speed when I'm forced to find it in a work place in context. But I notice that when I'm just falling in love with the work, momentum and pace just happened to pick up often. How do you think about the relationship between speed and quality?
00:05:05.380 — 00:05:06.739 · Speaker 1
Yeah, that's a it's
00:05:07.900 — 00:05:48.860 · Speaker 1
I think they're closely tied together. Um, you know, I've worked with a lot of designers who are super fast, but they're often too fast to the sense that they're kind of working in a tunnel vision mode and just doing and doing and doing, uh, where I think sometimes as designers, you know, especially designers who do work super fast, I'm not the fastest of workers, although I produce a lot of work.
And I think sometimes, you know, you have to kind of step back and try to kind of see the bigger picture, especially. And I think that's where, um, this combination of taste and craft comes into play because, you know, you need to have.
00:05:51.140 — 00:07:19.250 · Speaker 1
Sometimes you need to have a time to allow yourself to play, To get the right results and the right level of quality. Although, you know, there are some designers out there who work super fast and, you know, they just produce binding work constantly time after time. Um, but I'm a great believer in, you know, I was talking earlier about the time away from the computer.
I think that's a super important time where you get time to think about what you're working on. It's not just about being a designer. Anyone can be a terrible designer. It's easy to copy. There's so many templates out there we can all build, um, these super beautiful designs. But it's that time away from when you're designing where you start to develop story or meaning, uh, you start to get a bit more of a deeper thought into what it is you're doing.
And obviously a couple of that with, with with AI tools today. You know, when you go back to doing something, you can actually go a bit faster, which is which is the, I think, an amazing thing because, you know, a lot of people think or fear AI that's going to take our jobs. And I don't see it that way. I see it as just being another tool.
Um, and yeah, there's a lot of tools out there that can speed things up, but that also doesn't mean that the quality is is the best, I think. Uh, you know, like I said, that time away from the computer, you can build so much around, uh, what it is you're working on or you want to work on and then go back to it later.
00:07:19.290 — 00:07:45.650 · Speaker 2
And it seems like you have done a you really leaned into blending mediums with midlife engineering, the medium that you'll create digitally in websites. Uh, are you produce these experiences with music, um, digitally in design? Were you always blending these mediums? Was it which came first for you?
Was it music or was it design?
00:07:47.210 — 00:09:08.920 · Speaker 1
Uh, I think music came first. Um, I remember when I was 14 years old, I bought a set of turntables for mixing vinyl records, and I started collecting vinyl. And I remember at age 11, um, hearing this song called Superman and being introduced to a band called Kraftwerk, and it was just something I hadn't heard before.
And I just, I was completely blown away because it was, you know, using vocoder and synthesizers, uh, which was something I had not been exposed to until. Yeah. For me, the the music came first. But as time passed, I think music and design is the soul intrinsically connected? You know, you work with layers.
Um, you're trying to evoke feeling, uh, you sometimes you might even try and put a bit of meaning into what it is you're doing. At least for me, when I'm creating music. Often there is a bit of feeling I'm trying to pass through that it could be slightly poetic to to a degree, but but that's actually come more with age.
You know, that's something I didn't really understand 15 years ago. But as I've gotten older and as things happen in life, you start to become more attuned to your heart. So they say, and, you know, you start to kind of you start focusing more on that angle than I think more of that feeling comes through into your work.
00:09:08.960 — 00:09:29.120 · Speaker 2
You're something of a tool bender. You'll you'll take these tools and you'll use them in interesting ways. And that's something I've come to really admire the more I've gotten to know you. What first is kind of your current creative stack? What are you using pretty regularly these days?
00:09:29.440 — 00:09:47.400 · Speaker 1
Um, on a daily basis, I'm working in Figma framer, uh, Midjourney ChatGPT nourishing for its infrastructure and organizing thoughts, ideas, things. Um, also structuring, uh, the work that we're doing with clients. But yeah, I would say the top four are,
00:09:48.440 — 00:11:02.510 · Speaker 1
um, yeah, Figma, framer, Midjourney and ChatGPT. And it's interesting. I just want to talk a little bit about the whole Turing thing. And I think this relates a lot to younger designers, where I think they need to just relax a little bit because, you know, at the end of the day, it's just tools and, you know, you can have 100 tools, but it doesn't make you a better designer.
Honestly, um, I think when you put time into mastering certain tools, then you realize you don't need very much. Um, and I often did questions, uh, on X or private messages or people saying, oh, which tutorial did you watch to to do this? And, um, you know, how many layers does this illustration have? And oftentimes people are quite shocked when I reply to say, look, you know, this, this background here just has one layer with three effects on it.
Um, people often see something and think it's overly complex when really it's not. It's actually it's really stripped back and simplified, and you can do so much on a simple level with less tools, less layers, but you still get a really beautiful outcome.
00:11:03.630 — 00:11:16.470 · Speaker 2
Now, how has that tool stack today kind of evolved, uh, from maybe your most recent daily driving tool stack from 5 or 10 years ago?
00:11:16.590 — 00:11:50.070 · Speaker 1
It's not really changed that much, to be honest. I've always taken the manual approach, uh, to to what I, what I do, you know, if I go back in time, you know, I obviously I use the tool Adobe suite. Um, I, I was very much self-taught on a lot of things along the road. Like, you know, I was always interested again in how things worked.
So I taught myself to write action split in flash so that I can basically build these really rich, uh, interactive websites. And, you know, if I again draw the, uh, connect the dots and the buyers, you know, for me, framer
00:11:51.470 — 00:12:33.750 · Speaker 1
framer predecessor was sketch so that it was illustrator. To that it was freehand. You know, just going back 25 years. And to be honest, I think these tools have just served me in the same purpose along the way. Although, you know, times have changed. So, you know, with framer, you, you know, you can build design systems, you can get into whole variables and tokens side of things, which are super interesting.
You can actually build interactive games. So, you know, there are a lot of things you can actually do, a lot more things you can do. But yeah, the stack hasn't really changed for me. It's not about learning everything. It's about making do with what you have and doing the best with it.
00:12:33.790 — 00:12:43.990 · Speaker 2
Now you said you're using ChatGPT. How is that playing a role in your kind of your experimentation process and your design process today?
00:12:44.030 — 00:14:29.020 · Speaker 1
Um, I'm using it mostly for a almost like an ideas buddy. Um, so, you know, I might have a seedling of an idea, and, uh, I can interact with ChatGPT to, um, just elevated to the next level, get some more input or ideas. Um, when it comes to writing creative copy, um, again, I'm already thinking a lot about offline what the story might be, and then when I get back to my desk, I can I can have this kind of session with ChatGPT to help flesh out, uh, a story for, for mid-level engineering.
So midlife engineering was actually, um, a bit of a birth child that tragically came to me with just in having a conversation. Um, you know, because originally it had a different name and it was going to be more focused around the fact that, you know, in the midnight hour, that's when I like to make music.
Uh, that was how the original concept kind of started. And then it started to dawn on me. But actually, you know, when I was chatting with ChatGPT, I started learning about all these scientific, uh, things around how ambient music is actually lowers cortisol in the body and how ambient music is actually good for de-stressing.
Uh, and then that kind of started to kind of become this. Um, first it was a parody, and then and then it became this, this kind of, um, humorous kind of story around, you know, me being in midlife, going through a midlife crisis and building a tool that helps me but can also help others. And this all came from ChatGPT and me just having back to back conversations and building out the story and and most of the copy as well, which was, uh, which was really nice.
And I think that's
00:14:30.260 — 00:14:40.620 · Speaker 1
some of the best feedback I got was just based on the story from top to bottom. And, uh, you know, and ChatGPT was a huge contributor in that process.
00:14:40.620 — 00:15:06.890 · Speaker 2
So a lot of musicians will just start to riff and play an instrument until something will come about. You've mentioned oftentimes by the time you sit down in front of a computer, you have a pretty good scaffold of an idea and you're ready to start creating. So what are the sort of instruments that you use or methods that help get your ideas flowing?
00:15:07.050 — 00:15:52.050 · Speaker 1
Yeah, that definitely go back to ChatGPT. Uh, so if I have an idea, I can go directly there first, but sometimes I also just jump straight into Figma and just start sketching, or I go directly into framer without having a piece of design reference to work from I mentioned earlier, I'm quite a visual thinker, so I already kind of know what I'm going for.
I know that I'm going for a sounds or a serif typeface. Um, you know, I know all these things already, and I just actually can start building, um, straight away. I mean, it's a bit different, you know, I'm saying that on a more personal project level, but working for clients, It can sometimes be a little bit different because, you know, people or other people are involved and you have to involve them in the process.
00:15:52.210 — 00:16:10.290 · Speaker 2
The work you share has such a finish to it, a polish. I think it's quite impressive. And I just want to ask you, what does Polish mean to you? How do you think of this thing I've created is done?
00:16:12.130 — 00:16:15.530 · Speaker 1
Yeah, that's a really good question. Um.
00:16:17.690 — 00:16:32.489 · Speaker 1
And it's interesting because I didn't used to share my work often. It's only been over a year since I've been sharing. I have 25 years worth of of work, uh, to to share with the world. And, uh, you know, I always go back to, um, when I read
00:16:33.570 — 00:16:40.130 · Speaker 1
the book, uh, called The Creative Act from Rick Rubin. Um, he spoke about, uh,
00:16:41.690 — 00:16:44.250 · Speaker 1
your work is just a diary entry.
00:16:45.650 — 00:17:28.250 · Speaker 1
and only when you feel like it's ready to share with the world. Then you can put it out there and no one can judge it because it's yours. It does have to have a certain polish, from my perspective, a certain quality. I'm not sure if sometimes I'm just releasing stuff and that just comes through to other people.
You know, I'm still my own biggest critic. You know, sometimes I put stuff out there and I'm immediately thinking, yeah, I just want to delete that post. And I have done that in the past because I just don't feel it. And maybe other people would think it's amazing, but to me it's, um, yeah, I have quite a high standard, uh, when it comes to taste something which is kind of innately
00:17:29.410 — 00:17:43.090 · Speaker 1
inside me, where my perfectionist kicks in. Uh, it's not always a good thing, I would say, you know. Perfectionism can help in many levels, but it can also hold you back on, on at other times. Yeah.
00:17:43.130 — 00:18:17.080 · Speaker 2
Is there? Well, I like that piece about the diary entry. And one of the things that I saw that you first published, or rather, that I saw first, of the things that you were publishing outside of the Dieter Rams components. Were these comprehensive, these, uh, super dynamic Figma pills? They were almost kind of dimensional.
What were you. What were you chasing there? What were you sharing? What was that diary entry about?
00:18:17.680 — 00:19:48.950 · Speaker 1
Um, that's really interesting how that came around. Uh, I'd actually recently I'd watched back to back, uh, all of the matrix movies with, uh, with my older daughter. She was she was 14 at the time, and, uh, she wanted a bit of, um, I basically was giving it a little bit of education on, on, you know, just some of the best movies of our time.
And, uh, she absolutely loved it, And I remember, you know, the scene of the blue pill, red pill. And I thought, okay, I want to build and build like a pill button in this style. And I did that. And that was kind of the, the ceiling of, of where it came from because it had this really high finish, uh, high polish, lots of layers, a lot of styling in there.
And it kind of went a little bit. It wasn't viral, but, you know, people seemed to love it. And, um, it kind of just started. You know, it's like anything I call it the seedling of an idea. Sometimes you just put it out there, it goes crazy. And what it does is, I think sometimes it also inspires you to just be more creative or follow, follow that little path somehow.
And that's what happened. And, um, so I started drawing various types of pills. And it so happened there was a kind of trend going around with this chrome pills at the same time. And I thought, okay, this is a really nice trend. I thought, I'll give it a try. Uh, see what's happening. I think I originally copied, uh, one from, um, uh, which is named font.
00:19:50.470 — 00:20:36.510 · Speaker 1
And, um, yeah, that just kind of led into this idea of, hey, if I take away all the color, I'm left with this beautiful glass scape. And that just opened up, it was like, open up Pandora's box, because, you know, the first thing I thought of was, I want to put a fucking goldfish in there. We have to have a goldfish.
You know, it just makes so much sense. And the thing is, people don't know that with Figma, if you can play around with blend modes and you can pull in video, uh, and you can just fake so much things to get a really beautiful outcome. And, um, I just basically exploited that for the whole process. And not only that, you know, you can create components which are animated, uh, the loop, whatever.
And so that's, that's kind of where it came from.
00:20:36.910 — 00:21:09.870 · Speaker 2
I think that's fantastic. And and what's great is, you know, you've you've cited Dieter Rams as one of your influences in a lot of this. And I have to ask you with these, you know, these pills that on one hand, they're so minimal in how they're framed and presented and they have so much going on inside. Um, it seems like you have a very good sense of knowing what to leave out.
I guess I would ask you, how do you design with that sort of restraint? How do you decide what to leave out of a design?
00:21:09.910 — 00:22:11.420 · Speaker 1
I think when I started out as a designer, uh, you know, I looked back in my first five years working, there's a lot of stuff I'm not proud of. And then I look at it and it's just, you know, when you first start out, you just want to put everything in there because you just think, you know, the more we put in, the better it will be.
And and as I've gotten older, um, I've just realized, um, that it's actually better to just take away. And sometimes I revisit old projects, um, like I posted today on some mental health courses. These are the posters from 2012. Um, with my style today. And if you look at both of them, you know, it's a much more minimal version today.
And I often like this process of taking away because I just realize now, I guess it's some sort of intuition that, you know, some things are just noise. Um, and I also have a huge appreciation for white space. You know, not a lot of designers know the. But one third of the design is made up of empty space. Are.
00:22:15.100 — 00:22:38.700 · Speaker 2
Taking away in kind of the restraints. There's a lot of, I think, shared properties across different mediums of creativity. And as somebody who produces music as well, do you think that good design feels the same across mediums? Are there connections between a good user interface and a good song?
00:22:39.820 — 00:23:27.100 · Speaker 1
Yeah, I believe there is a connection, but I think that's also partly a lot to do with this. There are people who like hardcore metal. Uh, for me it's just a space I'm not going to go to because it's just default fill on. I'm looking for a more kind of minimal, um, sound, but if I compare it to from a production perspective, I think some of the work that I've enjoyed the most making has been 4 or 5 layers, uh, in a music track, you know, and I've seen myself have songs with 30 to 40 layers and I'm just mulling over for weeks, and it just goes on and on and on, and I can't finish it.
And I don't know why, but I think it just again, it goes back to that idea of simplicity. Uh, when you strip it back, it's easier to find an end point.
00:23:27.140 — 00:23:43.580 · Speaker 2
And, and I, you know, I'll ask you this because going back to drams, which was obviously very inspired by DRAMs, is do you treat his rules as sort of gospel or more of, I guess, jazz?
00:23:43.860 — 00:26:02.970 · Speaker 1
I'd say more and more jazz. It was, you know, the whole idea that it follows the principles 100% is not really accurate. I think I've wrote about it a few times. Again, it's closely linked to my childhood. You know, like when my father had these high five separates, uh, made by pioneer, you know, you had these beautiful, um, real heavy steel knobs that you would just, you know, you squint, spin them with inertia.
And it was just something really nice about that. So, so drums just kind of a little bit like, you know, retaking some of the, the brown products, looking at their knobs, uh, looking at how things function and move or how you, when you interact with things and just trying to replicate that in any kind of new era for the web sort of say, um, I think it doesn't always work when you just try to do a 1 to 1 product copy.
And there's a lot of fun things that just kind of grew out of it. You know, like, you know, the little ball with the search button, you tap on it and rolls out, uh, the search button. And then once you hit send it, it just rolls back in, you know? So there'll be a lot of fun things that just grew out of it. And but no, I wouldn't say it kind of follows the principles 1 to 1.
Um, I think what's more interesting is deterrence ethos in product design was was more about sustainability. And, you know, when you design and build a product, what kind of impact does it have and will it stand or just stand the test of time, you know? Does it become timeless? Um, and that's where the sustainability sustainability part comes in.
Because if you have a product which lives in the market for 50 years and it's still being used, you can just say there's so much value in something like that from a design perspective. And so, you know, when I'm perhaps working with clients, uh, I try to bring a bit more of that, um, thinking into the work that I'm doing so that, you know, whatever I design or put out there for them, it's not just an overnight, uh, success and an advice it has to have, um, some sort of true meaning, uh, which has longevity.
00:26:03.010 — 00:26:16.170 · Speaker 2
You have this taste and you have these principles, and you, you appreciate a certain bar of quality. How do you protect that when you scale even a small studio?
00:26:16.170 — 00:27:22.160 · Speaker 1
It's a difficult thing, I would say, because, you know, most of the people we come in contact with are not founders. They don't want to be founders. They just want to be employees or be freelancers. And, um, they tend to just have a different drive, I would say. Uh, so that's it's a super frustrating Thing.
I can give you an example when, you know, we had a few junior designers working with us, and although we set a lot of initiatives so we would do things like have a, um, uh, have like a coaching or fun session every two weeks, uh, where everyone will have a chance to build something and present it and give some critique and feedback and whatnot.
Often you've or I found at least it didn't matter how much time you put in, you know that 20 year difference of experience is not going to happen overnight. And that can be really frustrating because you're always looking. Your bar is already set super, super high. Um, but at the same time you've got to practice, um,
00:27:23.400 — 00:28:18.800 · Speaker 1
practice being fair and giving constructive feedback, not cartoony. Then, because, you know, we were all junior at one point. And, you know, I, I remember taking anyone looking over my shoulder when I was working as a junior, I didn't like it. Um, whereas now I don't really give a shit. That's. I'm cool with that kind of thing.
So. Yeah, it's it's it's a tough one to answer and I think it's different for everyone. But what I do find, and it could be interesting for you, is that, uh, one of the models we work with now is just working with senior freelancers, because these are the people who can just, you know, they hit the ground running and, you know, they can take on a project.
They can, you know, they can hold they can hold meetings, uh, they can they can tell stories, um, and they can do it confidently. And that's, you know, you pay more for them. But if that's the standard and the quality you want, that's the way you have to go.
00:28:19.440 — 00:29:08.230 · Speaker 2
I'm finding very similarly. And, you know, I come from a background in-house where I championed and advocated for juniors who, uh, when that happened, it was a game of finding folks who I believed had good taste and their reps maybe just weren't there yet to execute it the way they wanted, and trying to take some bets.
I find myself trying to operate that way, but I noticed that there is a certain level of, I think I'll call it unreasonable obsession required sometimes, and that's a hard thing to ask of people to be obsessed with an idea to chase a bar of quality. Do you experience that? Do you think that that's true in your experience?
00:29:08.510 — 00:29:27.350 · Speaker 1
Yeah, I think I think that's that's true. Um, I always practice an open, honest policy with people I work with. And, um, I remember once just asking people what they really wanted out of the whole experience of working for 1042. And the first answer was, I just want to get paid at the end of the month,
00:29:28.670 — 00:29:42.270 · Speaker 1
you know, and that that's that's okay. You know, people who are employees, That's that's just what they want, and that's what they need. But it broke my heart a little bit. You know, my heart kind of just sunk into my chest because I remember the first ten years being a designer, I
00:29:43.470 — 00:30:33.780 · Speaker 1
struggled to my wife and I, you know, we've been together since I was 18, so we've been together the whole journey. And I remember, um, for the first ten years, we couldn't afford to eat out in the restaurant once a month. You know, I was I'm the pure designer for the first ten years. Um, but I was just so hungry.
I just had a completely different drive on. It just felt that, you know, when I finished my day job, because I wasn't 100% satisfied, I was bringing home, and I was building flash websites, uh, either for clients or for myself, because I was just on this continuous, uh, need to get better and keep learning and progress.
Um, and I often find, I think a lot of designers, the younger designers, don't have that drive today. Or if they do, then I think they are the ones who go on to become founders and go and to do extra extraordinary things.
00:30:34.740 — 00:30:44.980 · Speaker 2
I noticed that in this obsession that I have, I have had plenty of sparring. Sparring with.
00:30:48.180 — 00:31:30.740 · Speaker 2
Anxiety or mental health? I mean, I've had I've had some pretty big mental health moments in my career, um, that were the product of a number of circumstances, one of which was my obsession for an outcome that I was chasing until the wheels fell off, and then the wheels would fall off and I would have to recalibrate and, uh, kind of recenter myself.
And I've learned how to I've learned how to chase my aspirations in a much healthier way. I've. I still find myself getting anxious. I still find myself uncertain, being afraid. Um, but it's a bit more manageable for me. How have you
00:31:32.020 — 00:31:42.940 · Speaker 2
worked with the kind of duality of obsessing over quality and big ideas in pushing yourself to kind of the absolute limit?
00:31:43.180 — 00:32:11.579 · Speaker 1
I think mental health plays a big part in the designer's life. I think we're all affected by them to some degree. And, um, yeah, it's for me. I've had a lot of challenges, uh, in the past. Um, even sometimes today, I still struggle a little bit with certain things. And it's more to do with these, actually. It's the times when I get more hit by
00:32:12.860 — 00:33:53.810 · Speaker 1
suffering is when I actually deliver something that's really good, uh, for a client. You know, it's like I do it. And then the days afterwards, I'm just feeling miserable. I might have a little bit of, um. Yeah. Feeling not worthy. Uh, or it's not good enough. Um, But the big thing is, I think, is there's a lot of tools, you know, we can use.
Uh, there's seven things I do. You know, I've. I've been in and out of therapy. Um, because of me being a workaholic. You know, I put my hand up, I am I am a workaholic. I'm obsessed with my craft. Um, it's all I think about. I even, you know, it crosses over into my personal life. A lot of the time. And, you know, I've got a great family who support me.
Uh. They understand. Uh, it works out really well. Um, but you learn a lot of tools, uh, over, over time. Like breathing, you know, just taking time out to breathe. Uh, I have this other thing. It's called a Shakti mat. It's like a mat of nails that you just lay on, and, uh, it's extremely painful. It's like six minutes of pain, uh, until the endorphins kick in, and then you just get this kind of feeling of, um, pure relaxation, and, you know, it makes you feel like you want to go to your bed and fall asleep.
Um, and, you know, obviously having therapy, that's always a great support, but it's, uh, the inner voice never switches off. You know, that inner urge to do something or work on the next best thing, or, you know, just someone drops into your inbox and says, hey, I'm working on the next best startup. Uh, can you get involved?
And, you know,
00:33:55.290 — 00:34:08.810 · Speaker 1
sometimes you you want to run away from it and sometimes you should as well. You know, it's also good to say no. And that's actually a good point, was, um, I started learning to say no more as I as years went on.
00:34:08.810 — 00:34:16.209 · Speaker 2
I've had to learn to say no. Um, and, and because there are so many opportunities and, and the more
00:34:17.370 — 00:35:26.760 · Speaker 2
opportunities you say yes to. And if you're able to meet some level of success with those opportunities, the more opportunities come about afterwards, and everything can be very distracting and everything can feel like fleeting if you don't say yes to it. Um, it's very overwhelming. And I recall after selling my company back in 2015, having that that feeling of emptiness.
Did I make the right decision? Was that it? And now it's over when you're on the ride? At least for me, that was the most interesting part of it. That was where I derived all of the joy. I like the journey of creating more than. I like marveling at the outcome. And there's a lot of people on the internet or in my circle who would tell me, you just need to rest.
You just need to relax. I don't have a brain that can do that. I rest and relaxation and turning off is not a good coping mechanism for me. Um, instead, what I found was
00:35:28.040 — 00:36:27.520 · Speaker 2
turning to things that were play context switching as rest became a sanctuary that I really started to appreciate. Maybe not having to work a 9 to 5 project and instead working on something on the weekends that just was itching at my brain that I could finally scratch. And yes, it would take a lot out of me.
It would require drinking some coffee in the morning, and it would maybe require that I'm hanging out in the evening, when maybe I should be sleeping. And maybe sleep is part of the problem, right? But the the, the act of going through those motions and bringing something to life really sat with my soul in a way that made me feel ready for Monday morning when I had to do the things that were, you know, for money and for taking care of the family and things like that.
Do you find yourself in those situations where you choose between commerce activities and just outright play.
00:36:28.600 — 00:36:29.480 · Speaker 1
Absolutely.
00:36:30.520 — 00:36:46.840 · Speaker 1
Absolutely. I think it's one of the things that keeps me level. To be honest. Uh, and it goes back, uh, 25 years. I've always had side projects since I started out as a designer. Um, because
00:36:48.080 — 00:36:48.999 · Speaker 1
often
00:36:50.240 — 00:36:51.880 · Speaker 1
I think context switching.
00:36:54.280 — 00:37:42.910 · Speaker 1
Works for the way my mind operates. It's not for everyone, but for me. I can't sit for eight hours and just do the same thing for eight hours. Okay. Sometimes I have to do it. It it really burns me out. I would say, you know, because, um, it's just it's just a lot of pressure. Uh, it can be really tedious and boring.
Um, so context switching is, is that way where, um, that's why, you know, that's why we have we have drums. We have the magic eight ball. You know, we have all these illustration works that I do. I'm not getting paid for doing them. You know, these are my context switching projects, uh, that just seem to warm my heart.
They sing to me to some degree, and it's.
00:37:43.990 — 00:37:47.270 · Speaker 1
Yeah, it's that difference between, um,
00:37:48.430 — 00:38:03.230 · Speaker 1
getting paid and not getting paid. You know, when you start to attach money to things, I think it drives more pressure inside. Um, and money's a big thing. We all love it, you know, we all need it to survive. But at the same time, we need to have our time to play
00:38:04.750 — 00:38:05.070 · Speaker 1
well.
00:38:05.110 — 00:38:13.870 · Speaker 2
And so to that point, I mean, you have grown your studio to what many would say is quite successful operation.
00:38:14.950 — 00:38:22.750 · Speaker 2
How do you do that without selling out? How do you do that? How do you what do you say no to? What's a hard yes?
00:38:25.150 — 00:38:50.510 · Speaker 1
Uh, it's a good question. Uh, and to be honest, we didn't say no to a lot of things in the first in the first four years. Uh, and, you know, I'm not going to sit here and say that growing the studio as a designer founder is for everyone. You know, you have to wear many hats. You have to take the stress, a lot of stress that comes with it.
Um,
00:38:51.790 — 00:39:20.510 · Speaker 1
you get into a lot of fights with other people and you have to pick your fights and, you know, be careful in certain circumstances. It's it's it's a tough journey. And it's not for it's not for everyone. For me, I think it's it's maybe running the end of its course, if I'm honest, because it's not giving me that thing that I really desire or need, and I'm becoming more in tune with that.
Um,
00:39:21.670 — 00:39:25.350 · Speaker 1
so I am in the moment looking for some sort of change.
00:39:25.910 — 00:39:31.990 · Speaker 2
What is it that you think you desire that you really need in this chapter of your life?
00:39:32.190 — 00:40:33.820 · Speaker 1
When we first started the studio, the whole idea was to actually eventually build our own products and we ended up ended up just becoming a consulting agency, uh, you know, serving others. And, um, it's always been my passion to be more community driven, do more for the community. Uh, you know, have fun Fridays, like, you know, just get local businesses to come around on a Friday.
And we we do a little workshop on, I don't know, the basics of UX design, for example. Um, and that never, ever really materialized. And we kind of got stuck in this cycle of just being a consulting studio, um, just churning out work after work after work. And, you know, sometimes we're working with contracts with us for six months or a year or so.
You're just, you know, you're you're there. You're you're stuck in that position. And yeah, it's it's great. And it gave us, you know, a opportunity to grow. Uh, but
00:40:34.860 — 00:40:44.020 · Speaker 1
I just feel like it's moving further and further away from where I want to go, personally, if that makes sense. Yeah.
00:40:44.380 — 00:42:14.420 · Speaker 2
It does. I've essentially left my corporate career of 15 years, and I did a startup founding, uh, stint in that as well. And I find myself creating and wanting to tell the stories about people like you. There are so many angles of things that don't get discussed. We have talked about burnout as an industry to death.
We have talked about, um, you know, how to work is healthy, folks. Uh, but I don't think we really talk enough about the ones here who are plagued by this incessant desire to be creative, to bring things to life. And and it's almost a bad word for us to say, hey, I'm still trying to figure that out on a Saturday.
Well, you shouldn't figure that out on a Saturday. That's when you're supposed to rest. And I feel like there's a breed of us who that's not helpful to us because we aren't having our needs met mentally there. And I think it's a it's a tough place to be. There's courage in you saying, hey, I'm thinking about moving on from this agency because it doesn't sit with my soul anymore.
And there's something more that I need to speak to. How do you how do you continue to make sure that you stay true to that, that desire for for soul, for soulfulness?
00:42:14.420 — 00:42:18.340 · Speaker 1
I think the soulful projects that you talk about are
00:42:19.810 — 00:42:28.730 · Speaker 1
It's like a natural progression for me. That's that's the direction I'm heading towards. So to say, uh, you know, that's
00:42:29.890 — 00:42:31.730 · Speaker 1
that's the thing that kind of really,
00:42:33.210 — 00:42:45.969 · Speaker 1
um, pulls on my heartstrings, so to say, because it gets closer to this feeling of, am I negative stage of my life where I can use design
00:42:47.170 — 00:45:02.680 · Speaker 1
in a positive way to benefit other people? Yes. Of course, you know, I can keep chasing money, but money is never really made me happy. You know, I came from a single parent family, you know, very, very adverse upbringing. Really poor. Um, money is not something that really gives me a lot of joy in life. Uh, if I'm brutally honest.
So it's about this kind of feeling of, you know, my time on the planet. Less than a lot of these 25 year old designers. Coming up, they want to work for money, and that's fine. You know that. That's that's what you do in that age. You need to start to get your foundation for your life and build it up. Um, I'm past that stage, and I'm just looking for, you know, one.
Can I just have fun every day in the work that I'm doing, work on really fun things and just build really fun, awesome projects? Uh, and the other part of that is, you know, kind of make an impact with the projects I'm working on, you know, and taking midlife engineering, for example. Okay. You know, it's not something that's really mainstream.
It's a little bit left field. So they say as an idea, um, or as a, as a, as a, as a mental health healing tool. But with some of the feedback I've heard from a lot of people who are neurodiverse or they have mild depression, um, or they just need to have focus. You know, when I get that message to say, wow, this This really helps me.
You know, that's that's where I feel like I've just won the jackpot, you know? And that's so, you know, it's easy for me to keep that passion and keep these side projects alive because of that. Uh, it's just that that drive of knowing that's where I'm heading towards, um, and moving more away from this idea of always just servicing others, uh, because they have their KPIs and, you know, they have their profits that they need to make.
And, you know, if it doesn't align in a sense of, you know, does this this project I'm working on negatively impacts people. At the end of the day, then I'm not interested. Really.
00:45:03.080 — 00:45:20.560 · Speaker 2
You mentioned impact in that being a really big priority at this chapter in your life. Do you regret chasing money earlier in your career, and how do you define whether or not something you're working on feels impactful to you.
00:45:20.920 — 00:45:22.919 · Speaker 1
I try not to have a lot of regrets
00:45:24.040 — 00:45:32.000 · Speaker 1
of the past. Uh, you know, I'm here today. I'm alive. I have a healthy family. Uh, these are the things that are super important. Um,
00:45:33.680 — 00:45:44.160 · Speaker 1
but I did. I will say I had the wrong mindset for a period of time where I thought that money was going to be this, uh,
00:45:45.800 — 00:48:15.990 · Speaker 1
this past The Wonderful Life, because I never had it growing up. And I thought, okay, if I get it. And I remember, I remember the moment it was 2014, uh, it was just after Flappy Bird. This overnight success, uh, had happened, and I just thought, fuck, I can do that. You know, EV. Yeah, I'm going to become a millionaire.
And that's all my problems are going to go away. Once I make this million, I'm going to make it. Oh. And, um, so I set up an app company in 2014, and, I took myself to write Objective-C on the front end. I was working only on iOS apps. I built a portfolio of 23 products over a five year period. Um, but the thing was, you know, I had invested, so I bootstrapped the whole project with around 45,000 of my own money.
And, uh, I started making money after two and a half years, and I made my investment back. But this million was moving further and further and further away. And the more that was happening, the more I was slipping into feelings of being a failure and that I would never make it. In the end, it broke me. It broke me badly.
Uh, you know. And so after 2017, I made the decision to start winding it all down. And I managed to find two buyers for two of the big products that I had, which were fairly successful. So I made some cash in the process. In the end, I sold off all the IP in 2019, but I ended up very broken in therapy. Um, you know, I was drinking too much alcohol during the whole process because the more I was stealing, the more I would just drink to to try and make me feel better.
And, uh, yeah, I just ended up really broken in the end. And what happened was I put money is my top priority and my family lower down the list. You know, my own health lower down the list. And I got really sick in the process. Uh, and it was great because I took time off. I went into therapy, and I managed to flip this around.
It was like a I can't even say it's a regret because it was one of life's greatest lessons. I would say that, you know, I have money. I'm still not happy. It's it's not it's never been the driver for me. And that's where I get closer and closer towards following, uh, this idea of. yeah, having impact.
00:48:16.070 — 00:49:13.980 · Speaker 2
Now, people might be listening to us and say, well, these guys just have this wonderful luxury of having money. And, you know, yeah, I get that. They came from this place and they were able to bounce back from, you know, some of that hardship. And now they get to just work on things that speak to their soul.
Well, I'm over here fighting the job market and I'm not at their skill level. And I don't know how I'll ever compete with all of the obstacles in front of me and this and that. And I can understand how there might be someone who listens to this conversation and feels maybe even a bit more cynical after having heard some of our, um, challenges that we are facing or our communicating, what would you say to somebody who's newer, who's experiencing the market today, who is has who hasn't had the opportunity to solve some of that financial, um, need?
The way we have.
00:49:15.220 — 00:49:18.260 · Speaker 1
Are quite simple. I would just say follow your heart
00:49:20.220 — 00:49:25.140 · Speaker 1
and you know, be passionate for what you're doing. Money will follow.
00:49:26.180 — 00:49:40.900 · Speaker 1
It's really it's that it's that simple. But I would also say other things like, you know, keep your priorities in check. You know, health, family, friends, relationships. Keep them at the top of your list.
00:49:41.100 — 00:51:04.220 · Speaker 2
One framing that has helped me, that I that I've said to folks, is think of your moments of creativity or your moments of exerting that creativity in in terms of seasons, that there are sometimes seasons where you exert that creativity, um, to, to sow a garden. And there are moments where you exert that creativity and you get to reap the, the benefits, and then you can now go and become a little bit more liberal with how you prioritize the constraints in your life, you can play a bit more, but then there are seasons where maybe you were just a little too complacent, and now you have to get back to some of the other priorities that need your attention.
And so, um, uh, for me, it's a perspective that has really helped was to not be so shortsighted and to think that everything needs to happen right now in this window. If you are in a place where, um, financially things are tough, that should certainly be the priority. And you may have to go through a season of planning that garden and doing exerting your creativity for things that don't necessarily speak directly to the things you'd love to be doing.
But if you think of it in terms of seasons, the next season is right around the corner. And I think that if you can recharge that way, at least I know for me it has been helpful to think of it that way.
00:51:04.460 — 00:51:08.900 · Speaker 1
Yeah. And also this feeling of not wanting everything too soon.
00:51:10.540 — 00:51:21.090 · Speaker 1
You know, I see it a lot with, you know, and I think social media pushes this and a lot of young designers. You know, uh, Aaron, your 50 day, uh, NMR. Um,
00:51:22.250 — 00:51:24.169 · Speaker 1
it's it's
00:51:25.210 — 00:51:57.130 · Speaker 1
I don't think it's a real healthy thing. You know, enjoy the process. You know, you have a long life ahead of you. Like I said earlier, my first ten years as a designer, you know, I had a mortgage on a on a house, so that that was an investment. But, you know, we could only afford to eat out once a month in a restaurant.
You know, we had a quite a quiet, simple life. And actually, sometimes I preferred life back then because we didn't have much. You know, we have everything now. And I think sometimes it's just, you know, uh, too much choice and too much distractions.
00:51:57.770 — 00:52:04.890 · Speaker 2
If nothing mattered. Money. Clients. Time. What do you think you'd be working on right this minute?
00:52:04.930 — 00:52:06.490 · Speaker 1
I think I'd be working
00:52:08.250 — 00:52:25.090 · Speaker 1
both On a design project, but also being on the street in the community. Trying to understand people with mental health problems and to find, uh, some sort of creative solution that can just make a small difference in their life.
00:52:26.130 — 00:52:37.570 · Speaker 1
That's what I'll probably really be doing. Yeah, yeah, it's giving both, I think. Giving both personal time and then my my skill set time.
00:52:38.090 — 00:54:06.640 · Speaker 2
Lee said something early on that I haven't been able to shake. And when he gets messages from people telling him that midlife engineering helped them focus or de-stress, that he feels like he won the jackpot. It's not his agency wins or the viral posts. It's the quiet DMs telling him that his work made a difference.
And I think that's what nobody tells you about craft and success. You can get really good at making beautiful things for other people's KPI's. You can create an agency, you can grow, and somewhere along the way, you realize the thing that got you into design, the obsession, the play, the 2 a.m. experiments, it all got buried underneath the work.
Lee is at a crossroads that many of us will eventually hit. And maybe you're there now. His agency serves its purpose, and now he's asking, how can I use the next chapter to help people at scale, and not in some vague mission statement kind of way? Real impact, mental health, community work that really matters and his approach to tools should be required.
Reading to anybody freaking out about AI or design tool hype. He's been doing this for 25 years, and his stack hasn't really changed that much because the tools aren't the point. It's the taste, the obsession. Because anyone can learn framer. But not everyone can put a goldfish in a glass pill and make you feel something.
Anyway, that's the episode. I'll see you next time.