Dear reader,
YOU ARE COURAGEOUS!
If you are reading this book, it means that you want to be the designer of your own life; that you are interested in thinking about your life proactively; that you have things to explore and changes you want to make creatively.
This book is for anyone who, like me, thinks that your life is your most important project. It does not require that you have any design or creative experience, just the desire to explore your life from a new point of view and to learn to think like a designer. Welcome to designing the life you love.
ABOUT DESIGN THE LIFE YOU LOVE
Design the Life You Love started as an experiment. I had just finished putting my creative process on paper, as a tool to share with my team at Birsel + Seck, the design studio I lead with my husband, Bibi Seck, in New York, and our clients. But first I needed a test project. What better testing ground than my own life, something I have come to consider my biggest project? I first shared it with my friends, who’ve helped me to fine-tune the steps and given me the confidence to go do it. Then I did my first workshop. And things started to grow from there. Which brings us to this book you’re holding in your hands!
WHAT IS THIS BOOK?
This is a workbook to use interactively, take notes on, paste pictures into, draw on its pages, color in if you feel in the mood . . . then refer back to each time you have a problem you want to solve or just want to refresh yourself on the process of designing your life. This is an evolving process, one that you get better at the more you do it, and that you can adapt to the changes in your life with its ups and downs. But I shouldn’t really call it a workbook. This is actually a PLAYBOOK. A book in which to think playfully!
HOW TO USE THIS BOOK
20 Minutes
Do 20 minutes or so and then take a break. Come back later or the next day.
Always Right
There are no wrong answers here, only your answers.
Draw and Write
You don’t have to draw like Picasso, but just draw.
Playful
Play when you’re designing in this book. Like a child. Don’t forget that this rabbit will be your reminder!
WHY DESIGN?
Design is about identifying and working within given constraints to arrive at new and better solutions. Life, just like a design problem, is full of constraints: time, money, age, location, circumstances, etc. You cannot have everything. If you want more, you have to be creative about how to make what you need and what you want coexist. This requires design thinking.
Copyright © 2015 by Ayse Birsel. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.