So I am learning to create the sanctuary of home in my glam-nomad life. I’m one of the luckiest ones, because I’ve found home, exhilarating groundedness, in my work. And for a girl so lightly tethered to the Earth, this is unquantifiably BIG. Not only does my work in design communication anchor and delight me, but it is the very alignment of my passions, my values and my purpose. My Métier. My calling.

So I have that much figured out.

Now comes the challenge of discovering how to create an abundant life and catalyse luminous sustainable change through the work I love.

As with the other spheres of life, I have introduced so meanderingly, arriving here has been the result of years of self-discovery, and trying on the world. A stroke of kismet guided me, a budding engineer toward the challenge, inspiration, what if’s and wonder of the design world. Via flirtations with art and photography, dalliances with literature and language, lusty affairs with science and maths, and an enduring love story with design (he may be the One!) I sought to unlock this beautifully chaotic universe.

I am a designer.

I an industrial designer, shaping the material world, a passionate design philosopher, beauty, ethics and sustainability informing my work, and a graphic designer, committed to elegant communication and dematerialisation. I disappear into the flow of typographic, infographic, illustrative ballet, problem solving to deliver integrated design solutions.

The discipline of design is home, a synthesis of rationality and creativity, linearity and abstraction, the-big-picture and obsessive detail, philosophy and science. I think see design as the means of manifesting ideas. It is a conversation, a gentle, iterative cycle between reflection and action, and in the spaces between, innovation ignites.

And it is ridiculous fun! It delights, astounds and invigorates me. It gives me the ability to form my own language, to communicate, to understand, to unravel, to rebuild, to create. My design is hyper-colour chiaroscuro, aesthetic contrast between light & dark, juxtaposing scandinavian clarity with unabashed girly glam. I can’t stop rolling the word chiaroscuro over my lips.

My CV in a paragraph?

Internships at two national galleries had me convinced I would become and artist or curator (and that I would look cute with an eyebrow ring). Summers working in the resources industry confirmed that petroleum engineering was not for me. Myriad roles through university, including muffin decorator, radio station receptionist, purveyor of lavish giftware, revealed my need for challenge and authenticity. Upon graduating, several intense, rewarding years as graphic designer in the development industry, working across urban design, planning, architecture, interior and landscape design projects from single dwellings to million acre masterplans, allowed me to radically evolve my Superpowers.

And then I launched my business.

Having dreamed of entrepreneurship for years, in May 2009, amidst GFC madness, I launched my business izennah.com and my graphic design studio Princesse Rebelle. I Moonlighted. Devoting every free moment to business planning and projects. By October I was fortunate to be in a position to resign from my full-time job. These two sentences house many tears and stress-ridden nights, and hope, and fear, and optimism, and then fear again. It took a year until the gripping FEAR subsided. Now I would say it’s more of an ever-present niggle.

The FEAR said Yes. It said Yes to projects I was not so passionate about, to clients whose work was less than sustainable, to unfeasible deadlines. On the side, like a guilty, passionate affair, I poured myself and endless time into beautiful projects that aligned with my values, but I could not charge for them. My entrepreneurship and passion were engaged in Cold War.

Yet I love it. Business planning, creating brand solutions that perfectly capture the spirit and personality of my client, executing complex communication strategies from concept through to minute detail. Running my own design studio has been my greatest challenge and pleasure.

Money is tricky thing.

I did not realise until recently how much power and meaning I had ascribed to this innocuous fluid. Living Lightly and creating space in my finances, and learning to live with Luxurious Simplicity has given me the freedom to pursue this entrepreneurial life. Now I am dissolving the limiting beliefs I have surrounding money, in order to create a life of abundance, and ignite sustainable change through the work I LOVE.

What is WORK Lightly?

Live Lightly is all of me.

It is the project I have been working away at secretly for years, too idealistic and gentle to share. As it evolved I published experimental snippets through Renegade Princess.

Launching Live Lightly is the most deliciously thrilling part of my journey so far. It is a space for me to design, discover, communicate, grow and create a slice of my Dream world, in which:

• Luminaries, creative, passionate, intellectual, philosophical dreamers, are supported in self-discovery and have a language to communicate their journey, as opposed to feeling lost, ‘woowoo’ and unheard.
• Luminaries infuse their lives with beauty through Luxurious Simplicity, knowing clarity is a product of space and lightness, and that beauty is a powerful agent of change.
• Luminaries invest in themselves, Illuminating as they learn to Live Lightly, becoming vibrant, healthy, balanced, engaged, passionate, focused and empowered.
• Luminaries direct this clarity, focus and passion toward catalysing sustainable change, in their own lives, then the world.
• Illuminated individuals communicate beautifully and collaborate efficiently.
• Universal connectivity is tacitly understood and we make responsible choices to protect and sustain beauty.
• Design is communication, manifesting Dreams in Action.

I would be delighted to Tweet you!

Have you discovered your passions, your métier? Does your work delight you, challenge you, illuminate you? How do you want to ignite sustainable change through work you LOVE? What does your Dream world look like?

More Minxy Musings...

Living Lightly. Design. Introducing WORKLIGHTLY WHY I Live Lightly. Live Lightly loves Girl Effect.