Build a clear vision for 2023 and allow yourself to take time

Hello, everyone, welcome to a new Year and a new podcast episode. Welcome to the Green new Web podcast. I'm your host, Sandy Dähnert. In this podcast we discuss ecologically as well as socially sustainable UX and UI design.

And with this new year comes a lot new challenges, opportunities, solutions. So in this podcast episode, I want to talk with you about how to build a clear vision for 2023 and how to find your own space in the bubble of sustainable design.

It's important to find your own path because we don't all need to be the same design experts. We can have our own little niches and you don't have to mimic someone else's path. Find your own. That's what this podcast episode is about. And yeah, let's just dive right into that.

I know I've said it a couple of times before and I will keep saying it that there is a space and a path for every one of us, and I love seeing that there is so many more designers out there that join this path of sustainability. And what's really important is that we find our own way of doing things, our own passions, and pursuing that. For very long time I thought I have to be in a certain way as a sustainable web designer. But no, I don't have to be that, and neither do you. I started my career as a UX designer, so as a user researcher and information architect, that's the deep core of what I love and I'm very passionate about. At some point I added UI design into it to cater more for social and ecological businesses and NGOs and all of that. So I became a UX and UI designer, but what I never was a developer or anything in terms of coding. When I started in 2018 with sustainable design, especially green design, I thought I have to do that as well, or at least go halfway into it, maybe not all the way through it, but halfway into it. And I started getting into all of the nitty gritty with CCS and JavaScript and hosting and whatsoever. And of course, the basics are really, really important to understand certain things. But I'm not a back end developer and I never will be. I'm also not a front end developer and I will never be. And that is okay. I actually started allowing myself to feel free to go back into my UX and UI design niche with sustainability. It was when I saw other designers as well as developers coming up caring for sustainability, and I felt like, okay, awesome. There are experts out there who will take on and tackle this specific topic. That's brilliant, that's awesome. So I don't have to go into all of the details. I can do what's my passion and I can do that well. So just have a look into, for example, the general UX and UI design sphere. There is people who do research. There are people who do information architecture, UI design, just communications. And even in those specifics, they have their favorite methods of user research, for example, different styles to do certain things, different ways of doing design. And you can allow yourself to have that also in ecologically and socially sustainable design. Why should we do all of it if we maybe have one specific passion in, for example, how to make e commerce much more sustainable? Maybe it's in social design and accessibility. Maybe it's specifically for ethical UI design. Maybe it's specific methods in user research and sustainable research. You can find your niece and you can find it even in those frameworks of, for example, the sustainable development goals that have been created by the UN as well as doing the doughnut tech. I will link both of them in the description where you have various environmental as well as social topics that you might want to be specific about and you want to cater especially for the oceans and the wellbeing of oceans, or especially for gender equality. And there is plenty of other topics in both of those frameworks. Just have a look around. Maybe there is one that speaks directly to you and there is allowed to be web front and developers, web big and developers, people who care for hosting and hosting providers, web designers, and maybe are more journalistic. There is your specialist research specialists, UI enthusiasts, marketing lovers, graphic designers, illustrators. Every one of us has their own space in this sustainability niche. There is also lots of trainings coming out. I've talked to a couple of people who are planning to have trainings and courses and all kinds of learning material out in 2023. I'm actually one of them. So get ready. There will be something coming at some point this year as well and we all have different angles to look at sustainability. We all have different ways of doing it and we all have the space to do all of it. Not only one person can cater for all but every one of us can do his or her thing in order to make our design spectrum much more sustainable in every kind of way. So the question is, how do you build a clear vision for 2023 now? And the first question is, what is your vision? What do you think this year, 2023 can bring for you? What are the topics that you are most passionate about? You can start with one topic. You don't have to do it all at once. You can start with one topic. Maybe one thing that you want to implement into your own design projects, into your design processes. Allow yourself to tackle this topic step by step. You don't have to do it all in January 2023. You have time and you can allow yourself to find your own niche, your own passion topic. And if you found that already, you can allow yourself to stick to that. Who said we all have to be perfect in every kind of way and all kinds of angles and topics around sustainability as well as zoo design, web design, development and everything. Who said that? You don't have to do it all. Of course you can. But you don't have to do it all. We always need generalists as well as experts in specific detailed topics. We need them all. We need strategists as well. Who will you be? And if you decide now on a clear vision for this year, it can change over time as well. It can change next year. It can change over the next months that you feel like. No. I want to add another topic that I'm very passionate about. But it's okay to take it step by step. I see so many people struggling with wanting to have it all. And I was one of them and I'm still sometimes one of them. So this is definitely a reminder for myself as well. It's okay to get familiar with certain aspects of sustainable design. One step at a time. So the question is, what is your vision, your very own vision for 2023? Your very own path, your very own passion topics. Allow yourself to find your niche. To find the topics that you want to tackle in this year. And if you've already found those topics, then allow yourself to stick to them. It's okay to not do it all at once. You can, obviously if you have time and resilience and everything, but you don't have to. Sometimes we get taken away by our fascination for certain topics and we want to have it all and we want to have it fast. Especially in today's society, it feels like everyone's running and we can allow ourselves to stop, to breathe, to take a step back, or to just stand there. We don't have to go back, but we can just stand there and enjoy, breathe, get familiar with a certain topic, with a certain way of designing or a certain way of mindset. It is okay to not rush through everything. How should 2023 feel for you? What can you take away from your last year that might have been more of a hustle, maybe might have been more of a rush and really fast paced? Can you take away something that you want to change for 2023 that makes your own energy, your own business, more sustainable, more long lasting? You can take this beginning of the year to set your foundation for this year for your vision. For what you want to achieve in this year. And of course, those those goals can be high and far out of reach. It's brilliant to have those goals. And at the same time, we can take our time to get to them. And to be okay with maybe this goal won't happen in the next two months. In today's society, taking your time feels like being stuck. But it's not like that. It allows ourselves to build this foundation for an actually sustainable future. Often we don't have the patience to just stick around with one topic and really getting an expert in this topic. Maybe you want to be more of a generalist. That's absolutely okay. That's fine. That's cool. But just know what you want to do. Know what you want to achieve in this year. So the question that I often ask myself is whether it is just about the output, the outcome, the goal itself to reach that, or is it also about the path that we're going towards this goal, towards this outcome? What do we actually learn? The mindsets We learn, the techniques we learn. The path that shapes us as a human being. Isn't that a goal in itself? Reminding ourselves every now and then that the path is really important to enjoy. So how can you bring more magic, more joy into this year? How can you set your foundation and bring more joy into the whole process over the next months to see your vision coming to life that you have for this year and allow yourself to breathe into that vision. Find your niche, your passion project, your passion topic, or if you've found it already, to enjoy it. We don't always have to go further. We can, of course, always, but we can also enjoy the fruits of our labor. Just to sum it up, you can find your own path, not anyone else's. Don't try to mimic anyone else. Really try to go for your own path. You don't have to be someone else. You can have your very own vision of what ecologically or socially sustainable design looks like. And what is your space in this bubble? Whether it's a generalist or an expert in a very specific topic field technique, method, anything. Go for it. Set yourself up for exactly that. Write down your vision for 2023 that you have and allow yourself to be exactly that. I can't wait to see so many more sustainable designers out there. I really can't wait and I hope we get connected at some point. You can find me on Instagram at Green Web. You can find me on LinkedIn at Green the Web. You can find all kinds of free resources on my website. Just check them out there and yeah, just share the love with friends, colleagues, family. With writing this podcast, this would really mean a lot to me because then more people see that this podcast exists. This helps tremendously. And yeah, just let me know what you thought of today's episode. In next week I will actually have a bonus episode coming for you. It's again a little meditation for you to hone much more into building a clear vision for 2023 and allowing yourself to take the time and to really center in yourself and into your own vision. Stay tuned for that and see you next week.