As per tradition, I missed my staff anniversary last month again. I've been working for deviantART for 7 years now! That's a really long time, but looking back, it doesn't feel that long in memory.  But I have a neat highlight reel in my mind of everything I deem significant - times that felt good and times that didn't feel good. In this regard, I don't think of all the happenings in all these years as good and bad or right or wrong, at least not anymore. When you are part of a place like deviantART, you ideally throw such small thinking out the window in order to be able to appreciate this place as fully as possible. When you work for deviantART, you really just have to do that in order to be and do your best for this space and its inhabitants and I like to think that I have managed that over the years. It feels good to look at a situation and be able to look at it from different angles. That's a very important thing. I learn of and think about new perspectives every week and while I can be stubborn about certain things, I very well can and will change my mind and views if adjustments are to be made for the sake of objectivity and rationality.  I'm often proven wrong nonetheless when I express opinions I hold and they turn out to be senseless or one-sided or narrow-minded. When someone convinces me to think about something in a better way, I welcome that.

Now, before this turns into a full-blown ramble, the reason I'm writing this isn't to say "Hey look at me and what a big thinker I am", no.  I just want readers to know it. I know that most of the staff here have similar thoughts and I want you to know that as well. It's the only way that deviantART can be deviantART.
We're all living breathing human beings inside and outside. We aren't our job titles, roles, job descriptions or tasks. We're people who do what they can for this big green-grey beast which spans our entire world and people from literally every place on Earth.

I also often wish that many more people would go about their... mind, ego, whatever you wanna call it, in a similar way. Just take a step back, take off your blinders, take a deep breath, look around you, let everything into you and let it work your brain.
Too many people are very stubborn in holding on their views, thoughts, convictions etc. and won't let themselves be challenged simply for the sake of wanting to be right or not letting someone else correct their mind.

I believe in this day and age of rapid and ever accelerating change in all aspects of life, it's a disservice to oneself and others to not have a mind open enough to at least consider the chance to have it changed for the better.

I could go into great detail of how what I wrote above pertains to this place and certain kinds of situations and how I think everything could be better for everybody if they'd be willing to have their minds challenged, but I won't. I'm not even going to entertain the idea of trying to argue that my mind stuff is better than anyone else's because everybody got to where they are in their very own way and I can't expect that anyone who doesn't and has never worked for deviantART could gain and accept the same views a deviantART staff person has just by being told so.

I often express that I wish that the entire community could really see what we do and how we do it and why we do it, but it can't work that way.

This turned into a ramble after all but I haven't really written anything of note here in ages anyway. I think I'll make more of an effort to post journals. Aside from that you'll find me knee-deep in your help desk tickets.