Open waters

"If you could teach me anything, what would it be?"

That was the last question Kahlil asked during my interview to join Ivella as their part-time designer. Racking my brain for things I could reasonably teach in 5 minutes, I finally landed on swimming. For 2 years of high school, I swam nearly 4,000 yards a day, 6 times a week. With each additional lap, the way your arm rotates through the water, the way your hand slices into the water, and how often you breathe are all things that even to this day feel...well, natural. But how would I even begin to explain all of this?

It was like trying to give someone verbal instructions on how to rebuild a Lego set — you know you followed the instructions because it looks exactly the way it's supposed to, but how exactly did you get there? In a similar fashion, I had a good idea of what freestyle or backstroke were supposed to look and feel like, but explaining the individual steps and movements to get there was a challenge.

And while I might not have admitted it, design felt the same way to me at the time. I had only been designing for a little over a year before joining Ivella, and many of the decisions I was making were grounded in what I could only call "intuition" — what looked right, what felt right? As you might imagine, though (especially if you know Kahlil, Jubber, and Vishal), that rationale doesn't really hold water after rounds and rounds of discussion.

What I realized during my 2 years there was that it was often in these conversations, where I was pushed to name what I could not yet explain, that I began to understand who I was as a designer and sometimes even as a person. This, in my mind, was what one might call "good" friction. It was the pressure of distilling my thoughts into words and the uncertainty of not knowing if I was on the right track that often pushed me further than I was initially comfortable with. I often look back on these years fondly, as they were among my most formative periods.

Months after Ivella sunset, I joined Instagram, one of the most established design organizations in the world, to work on Subscriptions. I previously interned here, and to come back felt almost comfortable — familiar faces, steady roadmaps, established processes, and much more. I say almost because there were parts that weren't.

The friction now consisted of the inevitabilities of a large organization — last-minute strategy pivots, levels and levels of reviews, alignment with different teams working on overlapping projects. Over time, I started to feel my sense of ownership slipping away. It all started to feel like one big game of Minesweeper, treading carefully to avoid one wrong move that unlocks a series of other ones. This, I'd come to realize, was a much different kind of friction.

It wasn't long after that Kahlil texted. He told me about what would soon become Natural, sent me the 15-page memo, and I read it once, then twice. What was more striking to me, though, was the intensity and thought behind it, so much so that I flew to SF to be one of Natural's first work trials. What was originally planned to be just one week with Kahlil, Eric, and Walt became two in our corner of the Human Capital office. What pushed me into the second week was simply the gift of starting this early — the product becomes an extension of you, your vision, your beliefs, and even some of your quirks.

The timing wasn't right. I wanted to stay in New York, and ultimately I had to give the hardest no I had given. But I followed along closely, first reading Gabby's post, then Devan's, Kendall's, and so on, each one with its own flair of "You're really missing out". Or maybe I was projecting. Either way, I knew it was a matter of time before I'd be back.

Now, as I sit along the East River on my 25th birthday, watching the sunset peek through the gaps in the Manhattan skyline, I find myself reflecting on some of the most pivotal moments of my life and asking myself...well, what's next? How do I want to start the second quarter of my life? I find myself searching for the next round of "good" friction, and I think there's more than a good chance it's at Natural.

This piece alone is an example of this. What I originally saw as just a thoughtful marketing play has deepened my own appreciation for what I'm about to take on, the people I'll be working with, and the many lessons I'll learn along the way. Not a bad start to Q2.

And who knows? If you think you might be one of those people, check out /careers.