I have been in the printing industry for nearly 40 years. I am an artisan, a craftsman. I take pride in my job as a graphic designer/Art director. I put my energy and heart into my work. It is a labor of love. It takes takes time to relate a masterpiece. Of course everything I create is not a masterpiece. But everything is worthy of my best effort.
At one time, years ago, we had time to develop advertising campaigns, logos, company and corporate identities. Today, with the help of computers, we are able to pare the creation time down greatly.
Even so, we artist are expected to make this art in seconds, rather than hours. This is modeled in the things we see around us everyday. The art, the logos, the flyers, are all quite often mundane, boring, and rip-offs of previous art. Everyone who owns a computer and Microsoft software (including the little clip art with a few tweaks,) can be a graphic artist. And they an have what they want in five minutes. Everyone wants it now. And wants it just good enough to get by. That’s why you see mundane. That’s why there are typos in publications. We don’t take the time to correct or take pride in our work.
It is this way in most aspects of our lives and society. We want it all and we want it now. We are willing to give up quality for instant gratification. But with instant gratification comes instant displeasure. In my industry, we don’t have time to proof a flyer the first time, but somehow we seem to have time to rerun 25,000 flyers, trim, and fold, and package the job. Why don’t we take the upfront time to make it correct the first time?
As I said, this idea pervades all aspects of our lives. We are a bit overweight, so we diet. Then we get angry because we can’t the 20 pounds from our bodies in 4 days that took a two years to put on. We want to run a fast 5K, 10K, or marathon on one month of training and wonder why we don’t succeed. Because we haven’t put the time in to long term training. We have only time to read a headline and think we are informed without reading an entire article to gather facts or lies about a subject. We don’t do real research into subjects and form solid opinions. Instead we take a political leader’s opinion as fact and go with it no matter how wrong that opinion could be.
We do these things because we don’t want to take time to think for ourselves. We don’t take time to do what is necessary to get the best or most out of what we are doing.
Harken back to grandma’s best Sunday dinner. She took the entire day to create some fabulous food that tasted fantastic and sated you. She did this with time and care. She used a crock pot, the slow cooker. She added the ingredients slowly, over time to properly season the meal.
Today, we end to grab a package, tear the liner off, throw it in the microwave, devour without tasting, (perhaps because there is no tastiness of flavor), and go about our merry way, unfulfilled ready for the next meal or snack. (Maybe this is why we added those twenty pounds I mentioned earlier.)
Rome wasn’t built in a day. So I urge you to take your time. Slow cook your life. Slow down your expectations. Stop and smell the roses. Say hi to the person next to you in line and strike up a friendly conversation. Take the time to fill your life with flavor. Live a crock pot life.