Designer Burnout: I Didn't Leave Design, I Left What It Cost Me

I've been in design for more than twenty years, and for most of them I genuinely believed the chaos was just the job. The 4pm "can you quickly change this," the laptop that came on holiday "just in case," the edits I once did on the side of a road while my family waited in the car. It felt normal. Until Covid stopped the world and my body finally exhaled — and I had to ask why it took a global crisis to give me permission to breathe.

This episode is the honest version of why I stepped back from design work. Not because I stopped loving it (I didn't), but because I left the way it was quietly costing me my life — the underpricing, the always-being-available, the freelance guilt that sits on both chairs at once.

If you're a designer or freelancer running on "ek moet net gou," this one's for you. We talk burnout, boundaries, pricing, and why "no" is a whole sentence.

📝 Full show notes, plus everything I couldn't fit in the episode → kunshuis.com 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:27

I didn't leave design because I stopped loving design. I still love it. Just sometimes we don't leave the thing we love to have to leave the way we are doing it. And sometimes that is the beginning of getting our life back. I've been in design for more than twenty years. And for a very long time I thought that was the way the industry worked. The deadlines, the urgency, the last minute changes, clients needing something now, the newspaper needing the ad in 20 minutes, the printer waiting, the campaign launching, the file needing to be smaller, bigger, faster, changed, approved, exported. And the resentment I constantly felt. And somewhere in between all of that, I'm also supposed to have a life. You know, like casually making the dinner, be present with your family, go away for a weekend, watch a movie without checking your phone, exercise without feeling guilty, sleep without dreaming about a missing logo or links in a file. But when you live in design long enough, especially as a freelancer or small studio owner, your whole life slowly starts to bend around deadlines. You don't always notice it at the beginning. At first it feels exciting. You are needed, you are busy, you are building something. Clients trust you. People are asking for your work. And as a young designer or new freelancer, that can feel like proof you are doing well. So you say yes. And then you say yes again. And then you say yes to the thing that comes in at 4 p.m. That must be done by 8 pm. Then you say yes to the client who needs changes at night. Then you say yes during a weekend. Then you take your laptop with you on holiday just in case. And then one day you realize you don't have working hours anymore. You have waiting hours. Waiting for the client to come back, waiting for changes, waiting for approval, waiting for the final text, waiting for the final logo, waiting for the final, final, final, final version of the final file. And while you wait, you cannot fully relax. You cannot fully leave. You cannot fully arrive where you are, because part of you is still in your inbox. Part of you is still in that design, part of you is still available, and that is so exhausting. I remember weekends away where I would take my laptop with, not because I wanted to work, but because I knew something might just come through. And then it would. We would be on our way somewhere, and edits will come through on my phone, and suddenly the work had to be at the newspapers in 20 minutes. So there I was on the side of the road, laptop open, trying to do changes, trying to export the file, save the file, make sure everything is ready for the newspaper. And that's on the side of the road while I was supposed to be away, while I was supposed to be with family or on my way to family. And the thing is, when I say it like this, it sounds ridiculous. But in the moment it felt very normal, because that was how I was taught. That is the scary part. It felt like, well, this is just design, this is just the job, this is just what clients need, this is just how we do it. And there were so many moments like that. Not going to dinner at a certain time because I was waiting for client changes, going back up to my office at 8 PM to make edits, having one ear on my family, one ear on my phone, feeling anxious before opening an email, feeling guilty when I was not working, feeling guilty when I was working. That one is so special, isn't it? Freelance guilt really knows how to sit on both chairs at the same time. When you work, you feel guilty that you are not with your family. When you are with your family, you feel guilty for not working. And somewhere in the middle, you slowly disappear. Not all at once, just little by little. And I know some people will say, but that is what boundaries are for. Yes, of course, I totally agree. But boundaries are not always easy when you build your business on being helpful. When you trained your clients that you will always make a plan. When you believe that if you say no they might leave. When the industry has not educated clients properly about how design works. Because that is also part of it. This is not only a designer problem, it's an industry problem. For years clients haven't taught that design is something quick, something you can just change. Just move, just make bigger, just sing quickly, just add this, just change the colour. Just do one more option, just quickly. That word quickly. It started following me everywhere. I have to quickly finish this, quickly reply, quickly make dinner, quickly bathe the children, quickly exercise, quickly rest. Imagine that, quickly rest. Africans would say Akmutnetho. Every second word would be mutnetho. That is when you know your nervous system is fried. When even rest feels like another task you are failing at. I did not know how tired I was until COVID came, and I know that sounds strange, because COVID was such a hard, scary, terrible time for so many people. It was the worst and the best time of my life. The worst because everything felt uncertain. The worst because I lost my dad. There was fear everywhere, but the best because for the first time in years I had a reason to stop. I had a reason to say no, I had a reason not to rush. Because suddenly nothing was that important. The whole world had stopped, and I felt relief, instant relief. And then I had to sit with that. Because what does it say about my normal life when a global crisis gives your body permission to breathe? That question stayed with me. Why did I feel so relieved? Why did I need the whole world to stop before I felt allowed to stop? That was a very uncomfortable mirror. But it was also the beginning of something. Because I realized I did not want to go back to the way things were. I did not want to live with that constant feeling of I have to quickly. I did not want to schedule my whole life around client deadlines. I didn't want my children to remember me as always just finishing something. I did not want weekends away with a laptop on my lap. I did not want to keep teaching clients without meaning to, that my life could always move around their emergency. And please hear me, I am not blaming every client. I have had wonderful clients, kind clients, respectful clients, clients who value me deeply. But even with good clients, if there is no structure, no boundaries, no process, no clear pricing, no proper education, everything can become urgent. And if you are the kind of designer who cares, you carry that. You carry the project, you carry the deadline, you carry the brand, the client's panic, the printer's pressure, the late feedback, the missing information, you carry everything until your body says enough. And mine did. I just couldn't sit in front of a computer anymore. I couldn't open up Illustrator or InDesign, a client email, a brief. It felt so heavy. And that is why I started speaking about it. On my podcast, on my emails, on my website, inside my products, inside the things I'm building now, and because I don't want other designers to feel the way I felt. But I still see it everywhere. I see designers grasping at every bit of advice just to keep their heads above water. I see designers looking for extra work because the work they have is not paying enough. I see designers wanting to leave the industry not because they are bad designers, but because they are tired of the way the industry makes them feel. I see talented, beautiful, clever creatives living in a constant state of rush. And the sad thing is when I look at the industry, so much has changed. But also, not enough has changed. The platforms have changed, the programs have changed. Went from FreeAnd and Quark Express to Adobe, Canva to AI. The tools are faster, the files are faster, the clients expect faster, the communication is faster. But the way clients work with designers, the way designers are expected to absorb urgency, the way creative work is still undervalued because people don't see the thinking behind it, that has not changed enough. And that is why I care so much about what happens beyond the design. Because the design itself is not the problem. The problem is often everything around it. The pricing, the process, the boundaries, the timeline, the way you brief, the way you present, the way you explain, the way you say no, the way you teach people how to work with you, the way you protect your time, the way you protect your mind, the way you protect your actual life. Because you can be a brilliant designer with no boundaries and still break. You can be talented and still undercharge. You can be creative and still completely disorganized. You can have beautiful work and a business that is quietly hurting you. And I deeply do not want that for you. I don't want you to think anxiety is a normal price of being creative. Don't want you to think you must always be available to be successful. I don't want you to build a business that only works if you abandon yourself. I don't want you to sit at dinner waiting for changes. I don't want you to take your laptop everywhere because your business has no breathing space. Don't want your children, your marriage, your body, your friendship, your face, your joy, your creativity, all to get whatever is left after the client gets the best of you. And this is not about becoming hard, it's not becoming rude, it's not about suddenly sending cold emails with big boss energy and pretending you are not scared. No, this is about small things done right consistently. That is where the change starts. A proper quote, a clear timeline, a deposit before beginning your work, a feedback process, office hours, limit on revisions, a proper brief, a little breathing space before a deadline, a price that includes the thinking not just the file. A sentence like I can do this, but not buy tonight. A sentence like this will need a new quote. A sentence like I am not available this weekend. A sentence like no. Because saying no is a whole sentence. And I know sometimes it does not feel like one, especially if you are used to explaining yourself. We want to soften it, we want to add three paragraphs, we want to make sure they still like us. We want to say I'm so sorry, I really wish I could. It's just that my child has this thing and my life is this and I promise I'm not a bad person. No, my friend. No can be clean, no can be kind, no can be professional, it can protect the work, protect the relationship, it can protect you. And the more I look back, the more I realize that design was never the enemy. The lack of my structure was, the lack of boundaries was, the under the always being available, the fear of disappointing them, the clients, the belief that being a good designer means making everyone else's problem your emergency was. That was my biggest problem. That is what cost me. Not design. I still absolutely love design. I still see design everywhere. I relish design. I still think like a designer. I still believe design is one of the most powerful ways we make sense of the world. But I'm not fully back doing design work. At the moment, I refer about 99% of the design work that comes my way to other designers. And that was not an easy thing to admit. Because for so long, being a designer was my identity. It was a thing I built, it's a thing I am known for. It's a thing that I'm very good at. But there comes a point where you have to ask, is this still the work I'm called to do in this season of my life? Or is my experience meant to become something that helps someone else? And for me the answer became clear. I want to help designers not to get to the point I got to. I want to help you build the business side earlier. I want to help you to understand pricing before resentment sets in. I want to help you create systems before your desk and your inbox becomes too heavy. I want to help you set boundaries before your body has to shout at you. I want to help you see that being a designer is not only about the work you send to the client, it's also about the life you are building around the work. That is why Beyond Design exists. That is why I keep talking about the things people don't always talk about in design school. Nervous systems, motherhood, money, guilt, confidence, client relationships, quotes, emails. The way you feel when a WhatsApp comes in after hours, the way you feel when someone asks for just a quick change, the way your whole body reacts before your mind even has time to reason. This is the real business of design. Not just the pretty portfolio, not just the logo, not just the brand reveal. The real business is learning how to create without constantly losing yourself. And maybe you are listening to this while you are still very much in the middle of it. Maybe you still need the client. You cannot just say no to everything. You have bills to pay, children to feed, school fees, rent, groceries, a business that is not yet stable, and I fully understand all of that. I'm not sitting here saying just set boundaries as if it will always just be that simple, but it can start small. You don't have to change your whole business this week. You can start with one thing. One boundary, one clear quote, one better question before you begin, one proper payment term, one email that says I'll send this during office hours tomorrow. One moment where you don't apologize for having a life. That is how we begin. Small things done right consistently. That line has become more and more important to me because I don't believe most designers need another massive reinvention. I think many designers need support, language and permission to run their business like it matters, because it does. Your business matter, but so do you. Your creativity matters, but so does your body. Your clients matter, but so does your family. The work matters, but so does the woman doing the work or the man doing the work. And maybe that is a part I forgot for so long. I knew the work mattered, I knew the client mattered and the deadline mattered, but I forgot that I mattered too. And if you're on that place now where everything feels urgent and nothing feels spacious, I want you to hear this. You are not weak, you are not ungrateful, you are not bad at business because you feel overwhelmed. You are probably working inside a system that was never designed to protect you. So now we build better ones. Not perfect ones, better ones, with clearer boundaries, better prices, kinder timelines, stronger processes, more honest conversations, less panic, more trust. And yes, still beautiful, beautiful designs. So now I didn't leave design, I left the way it was costing me my life. And now I want to help you build a creative life that does not cost you yours. I hope you enjoyed this episode. I'm building beautiful things for you in the background to make your life easier, to take all of this panic away from you so that you can focus on what you love, which is design and being creative. Please sign up for my email list on my website, kinsace.com. I will share everything there as they launch. That is the space where I share a lot of stuff that will not be on socials. The email only content. So but thank you for being here. Thank you for listening. You are not alone in this whole journey. I'm here to help you wherever you need it. So design your life wherever you are. We'll talk again soon. Bye.