I started spending more time on the computer at a young age than most other people in my generation. Long before my schoolmates threw themselves in to MSN messenger, I had a been exploring a fascination for messing around on the computer that stemmed from one of my favorite childhood things: Sonic 2 for Sega Genesis. The first website that I built was hosted on Geocities. Like so many websites back then, it was mostly a showcase for cool GIFs that I had found on other people's Geocities websites. Once I had built one website, I wanted to make it better. That was when I was twelve. Now I'm twenty-three, and it's still the same story.

I wouldn't have the skills to be a web designer if I didn't spend all those hours messing around with websites as a kid. However, more important even than that has been learning how to view the world more realistically. To understand people and situations in a realistic way, I found I had to put aside my personal perspective and skillset and just listen to what's going on around me. It's much easier to be effective and content with this perspective and the better understanding of people and situations that comes with it. Similar to listening to whats going on in the outside world, examining my own thoughts and actions objectively over time has contributed to better understanding of myself. Both these perspectives are important. The most important thing is to step into a different perspective once in a while, and to learn new ones as often as you can.

"Just build websites!" — Chris Coyier

Working with the team on Sokanu.