My Content Throughout my Life
Throughout my life, I’ve always enjoyed creating things. As a kid, when there was a toy I wanted but couldn’t afford, I would take materials from around the house and make my own version of the toy. Similarly, I would go into phases where I got extremely invested in a singular piece of medium and during those times, I’d make weapons or other props I thought were cool from said medium. For me, not only did making these things help me get items (or at least close to them) I couldn’t get normally, but there was also something relaxing about sitting down and making some big, in-depth creation. Even if it was difficult, there was a sense of calmness just sitting there making something.
Now today, I still enjoy creating things, though in a different manner. I originally thought about being an engineer, mainly due to my aptitude with physical creation’s, but the math part scared me. As an alternative, I choose to go into design, as I thought it would still give me the chance to be creative, but more technological for the modern me, as well as having way less math. This has turned much of my projects digital, which I feel is both a blessing and a curse. It’s nice to be able to just create something whenever and all my digital files are readily available, but losing the physical aspect of creation was a difficult adjustment at first.
In regard to how I organize this content, that’s something I often struggle with. I’m always a messy person and my desktop isn’t much different. I’ve improved over the years, getting more and more items organized in folders, though I still struggle to find things at times. I’m also a bit of a content hoarder. I can delete things like papers and what not pretty easily, but even some of my earliest design work, while awful, I can’t quite throw away. Part of me always says “well who knows when you may need it” which can be true. Some content is timeless and would be a waste to throw away, though I do wonder how much of me keeping this old work is simply just nostalgia, as there’s not much use it can give now.
The content I create has often been synonymous with me throughout my life, even as it’s changed over the years. As a kid, this was great. I did things I thought were fun, did them solely for myself, and gave me something to do that could help me relax. Nowadays, it seems like the opposite, with much of the work I make stressing me out due to the complexity. This isn’t to say the content I make now isn’t fun, far from it. I still get a nice relaxing feeling when I’ve got a good project going and a nice soundtrack in the back. Rather, I feel it helps show both the contrast and the similarities between the content I make now vs what I used to do.
As a kid, there was the childlike wonderment and fun of creating something. To see these random scraps get turned into a finished project was always a great feeling and playing with them was fulfilling. On the other hand though, the long term fulfillment isn’t as high. While it felt good in the moment, I would often move right to the next one rather quickly, with whatever was made before getting lost in the void. Now, as an adult, the wonderment of creation isn’t there as much. There’s far more times where I’m doing things just to do things, with little interest in it. Other times though, I do feel the creative spark, similar to I did as a kid. The sense of joy is also there, but for different reasons.
Before, most of my creation’s were simply for fun, but now, my content has more of a shelf life. It’s often of much higher quality and far easier to access than before. The fulfillment of seeing a well-made, finished product which is praised by contemporaries feels far greater than a cool paper toy.
