Lately I've been thinking about what settling into a career does to a person's psyche. And I think, not that there's scientific proof, that part of the settling process is that most people become massive bores.
It's as though as soon as we determine "this is me" we lose every other bit ourselves. Not quickly, of course, but slowly. Like water over rock.
This is probably why so many people stress the important of pursuing other interests. Having side projects. Advice that's easy to ignore with thoughts like:
"That'll never be me."
"My interests are diverse."
"Look! I'm not thinking about [topic] right now. Right? totally not thinking about [topic] at all. [Topic]."
The even scarier part of this process, in my opinion, is failing to see when it's happening. Believing that things are the same they always were. (Newsflash, buddy, they aren't.)
That's what happened to me lately. At least to a certain extent. I let my interests slip away while focusing solely on advertising.
And you know what happened? My work suffered. My quality of life suffered. Hell, my friendships suffered.
The times I've felt the most alive and energized have been outside of advertising. Hanging out with friends, seeing a new little art house flick, entering a short film competition. And after those things were over I felt a new surge of creativity. A Do! Do! Do! kind of drive that directly impacted my work.