I can openly acknowledge my love affair with the Harry Potter series, and both books and movies alike, I can’t get enough. As I worked on this latest design assignment I was watching a special on the Harry Potter movies, which moved me emotionally because of the story itself, as well as reminiscing on the frustration that I never received my owl.

I chose the Minimalize Your Philosophy assignment which I saw for the first time on Chad’s blog. I loved the assignment for the simplicity and another opportunity to play around with typography. I’ve got a book of favorite quotes longer than the HP series (because the entire series counts, but regardless), so this assignment let me open it up and pick one.

But! This quote, reminded me that despite not being magical, It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live.

I played around with the colors in this for a while, but I eventually chose a pale yellow and blue because they felt dream-like. I needed something in the blue space, so I put three yellow dots and then I changed the opacity on each to increase, as if the clarity of the speaker is also increasing. I wanted the “forget to live” to stand out, because it is the main premise of the quote.

I feel like I try to live by this quote. It isn’t the most spectacular like Shoot for the stars or If you can dream it you can achieve it. To me, it isn’t about what could be, or what we shoot for in our lives, because if we, for whatever reason, aren’t able to reach our ultimate goals of doctors and lawyers, so long as I can look back and have had the time of my life getting where ever it is I eventually end up, that’ll be OK too. Don’t get me wrong, it’s good to have dreams! But don’t let the obsession of the goal obscure the path you take.