March 11, 2022No Comments

How Taking Care of Yourself Takes Care of Your Team

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After hiring our 3rd designer at Northstar, I’ve been shifting a lot of my growth to learning about being a leader and mentor for my team. It’s a huge challenge for me personally, who has been mainly an IC designer in every role I’ve had in some capacity.

Now that things are starting to shift and my day-to-day is more around decision making and process iterations, people look to me for answers and guidance each day. I don’t know about you, but it’s scary to have that pressure every day you show up to work.

I know it comes with the territory and I asked for this in a way, but some days get harder to work through.“If I just put in a few more hours, our goals will be achieved more quickly.”

“My team is counting on me, this has to be done tonight.”

“Eh, I can skip lunch for this call. I’ll eat after!”

“I can’t sleep in, what if an emergency happens even though it’s 7:00am on a Thursday?”

But after one-too-many weeks of this, I’d be setting myself and my team up for a worse situation.

When I don’t take care of myself mentally or physically, I slowly expend my energy exponentially. I’m not as alert in meetings, I’m distracted by stress, I’m overly irritable, I’m not myself.

I want to be the best version of myself for those around me. That way, I’ll be better able to do what I do best. I listen better, I’m able to focus easier, I’m more open to receiving feedback, and I give better feedback myself.

What You Can Do

You need to put yourself first. Not in a malicious way, but in a way that sets healthy boundaries between work and life. Boundaries that put your health and comfort first, in a way that lets you do your best work. It’s one thing to be self-disciplined and motivated, but another to drive your life into the ground for it.

Remember to spend time with yourself and with your family/friends. Do things that bring you joy and pursue your hobbies. Remember to exercise, eat right, and take care of your body. Go to therapy and work on yourself. Maybe try meditation or yoga before work. Remember to do nothing sometimes too, just exist and listen to the world around you.

Put yourself before anything, the people around you will be happy you did.

June 19, 2020No Comments

Apps That Make MacOS a Better Operating System to Use

Even as an Apple fanboy that loves MacOS and iOS, I know that like any software, it isn’t perfect. Not to mention the lack of customization options and (at times) a cluttered interface.

Over time, I’ve found a few apps that replace default Mac apps that make MacOS a better operating system to use. I happily pay and advertise how useful they are just because of the sheer influence and impact they’ve had on my digital workspace and workflow.

In this article I’ll happily share them with you and (hopefully) dodge the dozens of questions I get every time I post a screenshot of something and happen to include one of those apps. Kidding! But no seriously, I need a place to direct people that ask this over and over ?

Bartender

https://www.macbartender.com - $15

Example of how the Bartender interface works

I’m the type of person that likes to have the least amount of visual clutter and items in my view when I’m working. I tend to get easily distracted by icons and notifications and have geared my digital workspace to avoid that.

Bartender has been one of the best apps for this quirk that I have as it takes those 10–20 icons that show in your top bar and hides them in a secondary bar you can toggle on/off easily. No more having to get distracted by random red notifications and status updates!

Alfred

https://www.alfredapp.com - free or $19 for full

Alfred spotlight search interface

To be honest, I’m still baffled that Apple’s Spotlight feature is as poorly made as it is. It has become quite unpredictable, doesn’t accept keywords to better filter what a user wants, searches unusable files, mixes files with apps in search, etc.

This is where Alfred comes in. Alfred is basically a customizable version of what Spotlight should be. Not only can you customize the look of Alfred, you can also add and create “workflows” to make your own shortcuts that make your life easier. Alfred also uses certain keywords to better understand what you’re looking for and what actions you are trying to take. For example, if you just type a name it will search for apps, but if you type “open” then the file name, Alfred will switch from looking at your apps to looking at files you can open.

uBar

https://brawersoftware.com/products/ubar - $30

uBar dock interface

I get asked about this app the most and I can understand why if I’m being honest. While MacOS default dock gets the job done, it doesn’t try and do much more outside of that (possibly for better battery management). uBar takes your dock up a notch while also making it quite nicer to use, while customizable and nicer to look at.

uBar creates a smaller dock that can hold favorite apps you have, provide better context on notifications, generates window previews on hover, lets you choose which window to open to, lets you see a calendar on hover, and gives shortcut access to your main Finder folders and preferences just to name a few. I personally like that it feels more out of the way than the original dock and still feels in place in adjacency to the top bar. You can even change where it is positioned and the style of dock you’d like.

CloudApp

https://www.getcloudapp.com - free or $8 for Pro

Process of a screen recording in CloudApp

Just like Alfred, CloudApp makes the original MacOS screenshots ten times better. With CloudApp you can use a keyboard shortcut to take a screenshot (or record a gif!) and instantly get a link that you can share with others.

This app has been super helpful for me in my work life for sharing screenshots of design and code items I’m working on for instant feedback and no hassle of uploading. CloudApp is super fast and makes recording gifs when showing animations or click throughs very easy as well.

VEEER

https://veeer.io - free

Overview of the VEEER user manual

While there are quite a few window managers out there for Mac, I personally use VEEER because of how lightweight it is. It does what I need it to without using up RAM and slowing down what I’m working on. It also has a few small unique shortcuts like the way it alternates full screen and minimized windows.


Hope you found this valuable and I hope you try out the apps I mentioned. Got other apps that make MacOS better? Let me know which others I need to try out!

June 22, 2018No Comments

The Struggle of Having Too Many Interests

Ihave been struggling quite a bit lately coming to terms with the various interests and pursuits I have in life. Feels like a strange statement to say if I’m being honest—how can being passionate about different topics have a negative connotation?

Well, there are a few that I personally struggle with and have a hard time overcoming, but I think the main ones being incompletion, lack of focus, and the feeling of accomplishment.

Let me tell you my scenario and maybe you can relate.


An overview of topics I am passionate about in no particular order: design, development, music, music production, fashion, sneakers, startups, health and fitness, entrepreneurship, gaming, minimalism, interior design, collecting, and writing. Not a crazy amount of topics to be interested in all things considered, but with my personality and mentality it leads to some “less than ideal” situations for me.

I love making things. I feel like crap if I’m not working on something (a side project, a new album, etc.) and in turn weigh “journey” over completion subconsciously. This leads to unfinished projects, songs, books, articles, video games, etc. I get a rush over starting something new and learning about new things at a constant pace.

If something starts to feel mundane, I need to move onto something else or I get extremely unmotivated. Being unmotivated = no work being done = me feeling like crap and getting in my head about things and where I am in life. Dramatic, right? I agree, but it isn’t something I can control unfortunately. I’ve recently found this compounding as I’ve shifted more of my personal work outside of full-time design work towards non design and development topics.

For example, being focused on releasing mini-albums (or EPs), playing story focused games with time investment peaking, and recently getting into fashion and streetwear and the research and collecting that comes with it. While I don’t regret putting time or money into these (on the contrary, I highly enjoy them), my time spreads more and more thin for making time to pursue my original goals in my career of design and development.

I want to work for myself at some point in the future. I love where I work now and don’t plan on doing this anytime soon, but some day. I want to have my own web apps that I work on myself and just have that as my full-time job. While I consider myself a great designer and front-end developer, I don’t quite have the full skillset to pursue this or even put this into motion. While I’m more than willing to learn, it’s hard to find a balance with all the other things I’m working on and doing.

At some point there is a priority decision that needs to be made, whether consciously or not, and wherever my interests are focused at the time tends to be the winner. So instead of learning some new technologies of code or picking up and reading that business book, I’m putting that time into working on my new album or researching a company or project I came across.

One could argue that I need to “set my priorities straight”, and while I thought this was the case too, it’s a bit more complicated than that after much reflection. It’s not that working on my new album or playing a video game aren’t priorities to me, because they are. I care about making music and experiencing an interactive movie because these are creative outlets for me outside of design and development too.

These other topics I care about are important to me and it’s not just a toggle to switch of what I want to do that day. Throughout the week I touch on almost all of my passions to a degree, and I don’t want to have to sacrifice one or two of them for others. I have instead been pursuing each on a typically shallow level while deep diving on 1–2 at a time.

What I’m trying to say is that no matter what I do, I always feel guilty about another topic that I’m not working on. Even when I am working on one and being productive, in the back of my head I’m asking myself “when are you going to finish that code course?” or “how come you haven’t finished that book yet?” or “you only have one song left for that EP, why are you doing this instead?” as an endless loop.

While I’ve come to terms with struggle to an extent, every now and then it becomes overwhelming mentally. As someone who keeps to themselves and does well with handling problems on my own, it’s a tough thing to talk about with others because there really isn’t a straightforward answer. It’s more of a fluctuating choice management of focusing on 1–2 topics for a finite amount of time and then when my mind shifts, I let it and ignore other topics for a bit.

I’m getting better at feeling less guilty putting other interests on the back burner for a bit and learning how to handle it more and more each day, but it was something I wanted to write about this week as it’s very relevant to me today recently as couple things in life start to compound one another for a bit.


Did this make sense? And is it something you or someone you know can relate to? I’d love to know your thoughts and/or your approach to this if you have any input you would like to share as it’s always welcome.

May 25, 2018No Comments

How to Be Well Prepared for Morning Standups

Since joining MetaLab a few months ago, I’ve had to transition back into daily stand-ups after not having them since I worked at Satchel last year. While stand-ups are incredibly useful in a work setting, it definitely takes some preparation and getting used to or can lead to miscommunication or even be action-less at the end.

Here are some tips I’ve implemented for myself that you may find useful for your own standup preparation:

Write down tasks you complete throughout the day

At first I thought I could remember off the top of my head everything that I did the day before but I was completely wrong. Some days I would forget a few tasks that were completed and would jeopardize deadlines or personal task lists.

Instead, I now keep a notebook next to me throughout the day at my desk and I write down each tasks I finish that day no matter how big or how small the task is. Then the next day I have an accurate list ready to go and talk through with my team.

Write down specific blockers you had during the day

Sometimes I’ll have some software issues during the day (cough InVision cough) that can put an hour or so dent into my workday. Or sometimes I’ll be waiting for another task to be completed by another team member before I can proceed. Addressing these blockers in stand-ups is crucial to be transparent with your team and your team may have advice on how to better approach these blockers next time you face them.

Leave stand-ups with clear action items

Ever leave a stand-up and need to think for a second about what actually needs to get done? No, just me? All joking aside, this is an obvious but important one. Make sure you have a clear picture of the goals for your tasks that day and what needs to get done for that day. It helps!

Ask for prioritization of tasks for that day

A genuine mistake I used to make was not asking for prioritization of tasks. Some tasks needed to be done before others for client presentations or calls so it was important to put those first.

Not asking for priority level on tasks can lead to interference with the schedule and tasks of others which you definitely don’t want to be the cause of. Prioritizing your tasks for the day also allows for some leeway if not every task gets done because you got the most important ones out of the way at least.

May 11, 20181 Comment

Making Your Phone a Tool, Not a Distraction

While I was first transitioning back into working from home a few months ago, a bad habit I realized I had was checking my phone constantly during breaks. I use a Pomodoro technique where I work for 20 minutes and then take a 2–3 minute break and every break I had I would reach for my phone.

It is a break after all though, so what’s the harm in checking my phone? Well for me personally it didn’t feel like a break. It distracted me; left me thinking about posts I saw on Instagram or how many notifications are waiting for me on Twitter. A break should be a reset from work, not an additional element on the mind. A few weeks ago I got fed up with checking my phone for no reason and decided to do something about it.

A phone should be a tool, that’s what made it such an innovation when smartphones with touchscreens came into our lives. How could I reset the way I use my phone and gear it more towards a tool? Here’s how I approached it:

  1. Only have necessary apps on the main home screen of my phone that I use daily.
  2. Turn of all notifications except phone calls, texts, and Slack messages (only during work hours).
  3. Delete social media apps that have a desktop alternative so I only use them on a computer (Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, etc.).
  4. Hide apps in folders that didn’t have alternatives but I still needed at times (Instagram [mainly to post], Uber Eats, Strava, etc.). This provides friction in comparison of just one tap on the home screen
  5. Make my phone feel plain (black backgrounds, only a few apps in plain sight, no red notification icons).

After all this, this is what my home screen ends up looking like. I use each of these apps every single day and none of them have immediate distractions to them. Even a black background (I made a thin color gradient around it to make it a little nicer) to have what I need from and center and no questions as to what I need and where it is.

This setup is more of a tool for me in which I am able to easier accomplish things in both work and personal life as well as passive tracking and even photography. I keep random apps you need to have and apps I mentioned above in another folder on the second screen to keep them from being in plain sight. I also keep miscellaneous apps like banking apps, Lyft, calendar, and email tucked away since I do need them but not front and center like these that I use every day.

I recommend doing the same with your phone if you relate to the feelings I had towards my phone. While social media, games, etc. have nothing inherently wrong with them, I think there is a time and place for these and probably not the best to have them sitting at arms reach 24/7.


Shortly after I went and did this with my phone I found this great post on making a “dumber phone” if you’d like more: https://nomasters.io/posts/dumber-phone

October 27, 2017No Comments

How to Work on Personal Projects after a Long Full-Time Job

I started a new job about two months ago. A job that requires me to be in work mode for 12 hours a day (I wake up at 5:30am, start work at 7:00am, and get home at 5:30pm). Needless to say — the days are long and tiring even though the work is usually fulfilling. Something I have struggled with since starting this new job is making time to work on side projects. My previous job was from 9:30am–5:00pm and I worked from home with no commute. I wasn’t used to working on the same thing in the same spot for as long as I need to now.

When I get home, I usually don’t want to do anything. Even watching over my own health and making sure I work out is a frustrating struggle. Let alone working on more design and development work after spending my whole day working on it.

Lately though, I’ve been using a 15 minute rule. Basically, I make sure I work on one of my projects for at least 15 minutes a night. Some nights I only do the 15 minutes and move on to watching Netflix or playing video games. Some nights I get into the work and am excited enough that I don’t even realize 15 minutes have gone by and end up working for an hour or two.

Either way, I feel more productive because I have at least put in some work for my personal projects for that day. 15 minutes may not seem like much, but the point is to help keep you feeling productive and motivated on what you are working on.

I’ll get back to you on making sure I work out every day ?

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