I consider myself a broadminded person. Although I work as a designer, I don’t limit my daily reads and scrolls to Dribbble or Behance feeds. I rarely visit widely known websites or talk about famous designers. I make it a daily habit to read about politics, society and the state of the world, spirituality, beauty, fashion, music, sustainability, interviews, etc. I think the biggest quality a designer can have is the ability and flexibility to jump out of the “perfect aesthetics” box (even though I live for good aesthetics).
This doesn’t mean I don’t have my own taste and interests — I do have people I look up to and sites that I follow. This means that my mind and creativity actually benefit from disconnecting the design bubble when I travel to different places.
I’m a movie person, and a few years ago I wasn’t very much into series, but I gave them a chance and eventually started to enjoy the magic of seeing episode after episode. I also don’t appreciate Portuguese television in general, but if I see what’s going on, then at least I’m able to comment on it and form an opinion on how much it could be improved while being able to maintain a conversation on the topic. Otherwise, my parents would’ve raised a completely alienated human being.