Hello, 2025.
“Where have you been?!”
“You just rebrand and then go quiet? What’s with that?”
You’re probably wondering none of these things or maybe you’ve just noticed some silence on my socials. There’s a good reason for that! I went back to school! I decided to finish my bachelors in psychology at University of North Dakota online.
And here’s the thing: I’m doing it for YOU, my client. And I’m doing it for me. I’ve wanted to finish my bachelor’s degree for awhile and I didn’t want a bachelors degree just for the sake of a degree. I wanted a degree that would serve the work I do now, and prepare me for a career change should I ever need one. That is why I chose a psychology degree.
What I do as a branding studio deals a lot with reaching target audiences. Reaching target audiences is all about influencing human behavior. Psychology is all about understanding human cognition (thinking), behavior, emotion and relations to other people in all the ways we do. Psychology is a perfect pairing for my graphic design degree, and it will help me to serve my clients with a more in depth framework for understanding their audience. I’m becoming even more qualified to be doing the work I do for you.
School is a lot of work and I struggled to figure out how to mesh it with my business. Running a business and being a full time student is like working two full time jobs and a part time job. It’s tough, and I learned some hard lessons about prioritizing, time management, discipline and how I learn. Believe it or not, those skills look completely different in an academic setting than they do in a small business setting.
I learned some important lessons about being in school and running a business. The first lesson was that if I have the chance to work ahead, I absolutely should and must. Initially, I was of the mind that I wanted to save some of the fun for later. What I learned was that when you save the “fun” for later, it ceases to be fun. I found that when I saved the fun for later, other things built up and I got behind and was studying from the time I woke up to the time I went to bed. It was overwhelming.
The other key lesson I learned is that peripheral support goals matter. I got sick twice this semester and it took a hit. One of those times was right before I photographed NIFA Region VI, and the other was right before finals. Those were the least opportune times of the semester to go down for the count. This taught me that keeping yourself healthy both mentally and physically are necessary to your ability to manage your time efficiently. If you’re out sick and can’t study, you’re just cramming more into less time when your schedule is already full. Instead of pushing through when you’re sick, as some would suggest, my approach this spring will to be take care of myself so I am less likely to get sick to begin with.
I’m thrilled to be able to serve you even better in the future. Go Hawks!
