Writing a serialized article
Because it's the first time,
I'm feeling a bit nervous as I begin the first episode.
nice to meet you.
My name is Yamagata Yuka.
My relationship with Layout is that of a former workplace and former employee.
I graduated about five years ago,
I had been working with Layout for about four years up until then.
Since this is the first episode, you might be thinking that I want to talk about my time at "Layout."
I'd like to start with the following themes:
"I quit, but why would I get involved again?"
This is the first installment of a completely self-serving series, in which I hope to deepen my understanding of why I'm still involved in this field even though I left the company. My ex-boss knows me as such, so I'm also trying to provide a thrilling experience by making the ex-boss the first person to read this, excited to see what I've written...
Around the time Layout was born and the brand was selling to stores all over the country, I got married.
Marriage is a strange thing; before you know it, a new genre of "my time for my family" has been added to your schedule, which previously consisted only of "my time for me."
And so my life as a single person, flying around freely with just one suitcase, came to an end.
I had always lived with my parents, so I was familiar with "living with others," but I was confused by the complexity of "having a family."
When I was little, I was the youngest of my sisters, so I had no problem starting a family by playing house, but as I grew up, I realized I needed something more than just playing house.
Having started my married life without even living together, I couldn't grasp what it meant to be a "family." Was it the amount of time we spent together? Eating meals together? Or going home together? I wondered, looking at the face of my husband, who is seven years older than me, and sighing slightly, thinking, "If only it was written somewhere that marriage = doing this!" Then, a thought suddenly came to my mind:
"Is that ideal?"
The keyword is:
When I was faced with the situation where I had to reassess my life,
Completely unrelated to the intense workload at Layout, I had been feeling a bit unwell, so I decided to take a month off to think about what my ideal lifestyle would be like.
Who do you want to spend your time with and how?
I ended up finding the answer to this question at my own wedding, but I'll talk about that another time.
The ideal role model for me was the book "My Very Selfish Wife" by Giniro Natsuo.
This book is filled with laughter and love from a very selfish wife and her kind husband who is submissive to her every word.
Even if your actions and words are selfish and you seek stimulation in 80% of your daily life, the remaining 20% is the one person you want to be there with you, and you want that person to be your family (husband).
I have come to the ideal that the important 20% is not about sharing time, but about sharing our hearts and spending time together.
So I thought to myself, "Let's first establish that 20% of security that will never change!", and so I distanced myself from Layout, which had taken up nearly 90% of my life until then, and chose to devote 100% to my family.
So, after dedicating all my time to my family, the ideal I ultimately sought was to spend 60% of my time on stimulating work, 10% on myself, and 30% on my family.
It was a way of life that allowed me to grow while maintaining that balance.
I'm sure I'll find out in another episode what I chose after that, with 60% of the time being uninspired, so now I'll start thinking about why I ended up getting involved with Layout after I quit.
The biggest factor was the stay-at-home period. I felt a clear desire to spend plenty of time with my family, while also constantly contributing to society and the world.
The new company I joined, which I will talk about later, was also a place I joined with the ideal of one day being able to work from home, comfortably at my own pace.
At a time when online WORK has suddenly accelerated, being able to be involved with Layout, which I still feel like my old home to, in an online format has brought me one step closer to the ideal I had envisioned, and coming full circle, I simply feel how happy I am and how full of possibilities it is.
"Is that ideal?"
Changing jobs and changing the way I interact with others in order to live and work in an ideal way was a very positive thing for me.
However, behind this ideal,
"Would I like myself more for doing that?"
"Are you working with services, products, and people that you can truly say you love?"
"Is it making someone unhappy or sad?"
These three questions are very important to me.
This will be the last of the first session,
The reason I quit but decided to get back involved is because I feel that I have been given the power, opportunities, and connections to gradually realize the "ideals" that I was unable to achieve on my own back then, and I want to contribute and grow as a person.
It's not about some cool cause or ambition, but about taking a small step forward towards an ideal that remains unchanged.
In this way, I feel like I am gradually becoming the ideal adult, today and tomorrow.
I will be writing the second installment at a more relaxed pace, so I hope you will enjoy it.
Yuka Yamagata
After working as a textile designer, she was in charge of planning, sales and design for carpets and rugs, and is now an art director focusing on spatial design. One of her responsibilities at work is managing designers. She started writing serials under the name "Yamagata Yuka." In her private life, she lives a relaxed life with her pet dog and a very ordinary husband. She loves Natsuo Giniro's books.