Inspiration

“Search” by Hester Knibbe + Einkorn Oatmeal Cookies

June 23, 2015 | by admin | 1 Comment

I love being a web designer and I’m incredibly thankful that I decided to join this industry many years ago. Still, despite my love of this profession, there have been a number of times during my career when my passion has waned and I’ve found myself simply going through the motions instead of fully applying myself to my work. This scenario is likely familiar to many of my fellow web designers. It is called burnout.

Burnout is a very real challenge that we face as web professionals. The same processes that help us complete projects successfully can also contribute to us falling into a routine and hitting autopilot on our work. Sometimes, an overload of work can force you to fall into a routine and become a production line in order to meet deadlines. Other times, a lack of variety and excitement can lead to apathy with burnout not far behind.

Whenever I have started to experience burnout in my career, thankfully I have recognized the situation and been able to work to resolve the problem. In this article, I will share some of what I have found helpful in rekindling my passion for web design.

Talk To Your Peers

If anyone can understand your feelings of burnout, it is fellow web professionals. They have likely experienced something very similar and they may be able to give you advice on how to handle the situation. Sometimes, simply talking to others is the catalyst you need to break out of a funk and get excited about your work again.

Attending a web conference is one of the best ways to meet and interact with other web professionals. Listening to presentations from some of our industry’s best and brightest, and then being able to discuss that content with fellow attendees at lunch or at an after-conference party, always gets my creative energies flowing. I have never returned to the office after a conference and not been full of fresh ideas and excited to get back to work! Of course, conferences do not happen all the time, nor are they inexpensive to attend.

Ingredients

  • 2 tablespoons butter
  • 1 pound sirloin steak
  • 35-40 ounces DeLallo Vodka Sauce (it’s about 1½ jars)
  • 2-3 large zucchini (or you could use regular pasta, but zucchini is so good!)
Instructions
  1. Heat the butter in a large heavy duty skillet over medium low heat until lightly browned but not black (this just adds flavor to the steak).
  2. Cut the steak into bite sized pieces. Turn the heat up (higher heat is good!) and add the steak to the butter in the skillet. Let the steak sit in the pan for about a minute without stirring – this helps it get a nice sear on one side, like you see in the picture. Flip the steak pieces and cook for another minute or two, until both sides are well-seared. This should only take 2-3 minutes – because of the size of the steak pieces, you really only need to sear the outside and the insides will continue to cook just enough once you remove from the pan.
  3. Remove the skillet from heat, transfer the steak to a bowl, and wipe the skillet with a paper towel to remove excess grease. Add the sauce to the pan. Stir in the steak and simmer for 5-10 minutes while you prepare the zucchini noodles or pasta.
  4. Spiralize or cut the zucchini into noodles, or cook the pasta, depending on what you’re using. Top with the sauce and sprinkle with Parmesan and parsley. Serve immediately.
Notes
For the nutrition facts, I did not enter the DeLallo nutritional values specifically – I just used a generic vodka sauce, so there may be some variance.
Zucchini noodles are notorious for getting watery once you add sauce to them, but I haven’t had any problems as long as I eat this right away. The leftovers will get some excess moisture, but you can either just stir it up like in the last picture, or store the noodles and sauce separately.