Where do we go from here?

Are you ready for the same intro every UX professional starts out their “comeback” article with? Let’s see, we’ve got: burnout, creative death, existential dread paired with AI anxiety, a public failure built on years of work, a casual inspirational quote to bring us back to life, and a good ole fashioned “I’m back, but things are gonna be different.”

I recently found myself on the wrong side of burnout. I was (am? I’m definitely not back to my best self) not just burnt out at work, but also creatively. And as someone who uses their creativity as a way to relax, this was not a cute situation. This isn’t new. Everyone I know working in UX is burnt out right now. We’re all fighting to prove we are relevant as AI creeps into our space while also continuing to do our jobs, AND learn every new AI tool, just in case. 

Back to the real problem, I was burnt out creatively. Which meant I couldn’t unwind. I couldn’t see the beauty in the world. I couldn’t pull inspiration from anything. 

My mind was just a gray slate, and I was using a pencil to try and sketch things out. 

I didn’t even realize I was struggling, but I was dropping the ball at work, in what I’m calling a critical moment in my career. I was dropping the ball with my friends. I was failing in my obligations. I was trying so hard to not drop the ball as a parent, but I definitely let it slip a few times.

If you are not aware, I suffered a pretty massive creative failure this year, which may have been the spark that led to my creativity going up in smoke.

I've spent years studying how language includes and excludes people, and the thing most people get wrong is treating one as good and the other as bad. Exclusive language can save lives in a hospital. Inclusive language can become a hollow checklist. The real work is knowing which lever to pull, and why. I’ve spent the last two years as a Sensemaker in Residence with the Sensemakers Club, where I fine-tuned this obsession and tried to find the best way to share it.

I decided that a course was the way to go, so I got to work building one from the ground up, assembled almost entirely in whatever scraps of free time I could pull together over two years. To add insult to injury, just when I thought I was almost finished, I realized the whole structure needed a redesign. As someone whose whole thing is making information clearer, discovering that my own course was overbuilt felt like a very cruel kind of irony. So I simplified it, rebuilt it, and raced to finish it before the course start date. I did marketing (as someone who doesn't use social media, this actually felt like torture) to get the word out. And in the end, I failed.

One person signed up for Words Shape Belonging, and I was heartbroken. I had two years of buildup and anticipation all come to a shocking and dramatic halt. And suddenly my calendar was just a void. Unfortunately for me, I still have this knowledge and I still want to share it, but the thought of going back to square one was debilitating.  

I didn’t want to put this down, but I didn’t know how to hold on to it anymore.

Since hearing it on the first day of my sophomore year of college, I have held Samuel Beckett’s quote “try again, fail again, fail better” pretty close to my heart. I look back fondly on my life as an impressive series of failures that I’ve somehow turned around, and I’m adding this one to the pile. 

So, where do we go from here? I don’t yet know exactly, but I have some ideas and I’d love for you to come along for the ride. I won’t have a set schedule, and that’s on purpose. This only works if it doesn’t kill me. It’s probably going to be a bumpy ride. There’s going to be some hiccups, but maybe that’s just part of the experience. If you’re curious about language or you’re interested in the things I have to say, keep your eyes here.