When too much is too much

Praise,

That title makes absolutely no sense. What the fuck did I write? When too much is too much?

Laughing hilariously—in my head—while bouncing my leg involuntarily. It's been bouncing for 10 minutes now. Just stopped it, consciously. Lol.

Let's be serious, lol.

That title actually makes no sense.

I am good at a lot of things. Let's take . . . errrr . . . strategy as one. Okay, no! Let's use design instead—brand design. That's still too broad—brand identity design is more like it.

When I'd walk into FourthCanvas in 2017, I had done maybe a dozen logos prior—maybe. Horrible logos, I must say. I walked in, and a few hours in, I saw a mark I had always admired from afar.

First time I saw it was in my dad's car, and I told him, "I'd love to meet the designer, it's so fresh".

"Uh-huh", my dad replied unconsciously. I barely talked, so I'm pretty sure he found it dutiful to acknowledge me.

17-year-old me, now in the HQ, staring right at the logo on a laptop screen, moving around, controlled by Tunji [or Victor] and I was like "woooooow".

#logoeveryday, and actual logo projects, FourthCanvas had done quite a whole lot for a budding design agency, and I had absolutely no idea how they did what they did, despite being in the same profession as them.

I was pretty worried—yes, impostor syndrome.

I still haven't gotten a better title yet. Lol

"Present everything", Ferricool said.

This was 2018. Tunji makes no mistakes when it comes to qualifying the work of his gees, and my curious mind stays curious.

"What does Ferricool do?", I'd ask myself. I'd stalk his Behance and gawk at his work. I even sent him the infamous "mentor me" DM. I wish I had me then.

E nor too show like that.

Same year, I'd come in to Lagos—Workstation to be precise.

"I disagree. You can't just formulate meaning before the logo", Seyi countered Evans at the Dribbble meetup hosted by Coker. I so miss it, even if it's just for the vibes.

Again, Tunji tells me about Seyi—in his words. "easily, the best visual designer in the country".

Ohhh yes! I spent the next few weeks wallowing in how Seyi comes up with fire stuff every goddamn time. It just didn't make sense.

I could go on and on and on—Check DC, Uche Ugo, Abinibi, Fosudo, Yox the Professor, etc. There's the entire Pentagram, Landor, David Airey, Sagi Haviv, Sagmeister & Walsh before they split, and so on.

You see, Praise, I was obsessed with how they achieved the work they do.

So, I started learning and I learnt everything I could consume. It didn't make sense, I promise you. Just like the title.

Whatever I learnt didn't need to "make sense" at the time. I could pick a hair off it, yes, but I just won't get the whole idea.

IT WAS MADDENING!

Pretty sure you can relate, Praise.

Well, it doesn't have to make sense. This is another case of trust the process. Certain knowledge can only be understood by a level of experience.

If you don't know something, it's probably not time for you to know it. When you "coconut your head" through it, you set yourself up for grief—another synonym for the infamous impostor syndrome.

Just like this entry, the beginning might not make sense—until you read till the end.

The title still makes no sense at this point in time, but the message stands.

Ciao.

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