2025 Year-End Letter
What worked and didn't work this year, and what's next for 2026.
Welcome to Unknown Arts — I’m Patrick, your field guide to the creative frontier. Join thousands of builders around the world navigating what’s next.
Hello friends,
Another year closes, and I find myself in a familiar, yet unexpected, place.
I started 2025 with clear intentions. I’d focus on AI and keep building my momentum in that area. And for the first few months, I did. Then in March, I joined Sublime Security as its first IC product designer, and everything shifted.
Taking the job was the right decision but came with trade-offs. After my 18-month sabbatical, I was ready to get back in the trenches (and recoup the savings I’d spent on my time off). But I underestimated how long it would take me to find a new balance in my work life.
After fully controlling my own time, stepping back into a demanding role as an employee meant relearning how to fit everything together. Where do creative writing ideas go when your brain is already full from work? How do you sustain weekly publishing when you barely have mental bandwidth left by Friday? What gets priority when your evenings and weekends suddenly matter in a different way?
I tried different approaches. First, I wrote about whatever came up at work. That burned me out fast — it just felt like working overtime for free. Then I pivoted to broader creativity topics. But every time I sat down to write, I’d ask myself: “Why am I the one who should be writing this?” Usually, I had no good answer and I’d get stuck spinning my wheels.
So I fell well short of my writing goals this year.
I published 24 new pieces and 6 reprints — about half my goal. The newsletter grew from 6,300 to 7,400 subscribers, but the engagement felt flat. Open rates slid from the mid-40s to 37%.
And here’s the thing that stung the most: when I was job hunting, literally no one cared that I’d written hundreds of essays and built an audience of thousands. The only things that mattered for landing product design jobs were my portfolio, prototypes, and connections. The thousands of hours I’d poured into writing, hoping they would make me more valuable as a designer, hadn’t moved the needle at all.
So I had to confront a harder question: What was I still writing for?
The real reckoning
This project feels different than it did when I started writing online 4 years ago.
It needs to continue to earn its place in my life alongside other things: time with friends and family, romantic relationships, making music and performing, fitness, and travel (to name a few). All pursuits that enrich my life.
That’s a high bar. But it’s the right bar.
No one is demanding I continue, but I feel compelled to.
Because the truth is, I still believe there’s something important here I haven’t fully realized yet.
So now I’m once again back to exploring how I can make my continuous effort worth it for myself and everyone reading around the world.
Finding what works
As I looked back at the year, here’s what became clear: the writing that energized me most — and that resonated most with readers — was about AI.
This isn’t a surprise revelation. It’s literally what I said I’d focus on this time last year. But apparently, I had to go through an extended readjustment period to find my way back to it.
AI is where my interests and skills actually converge with what’s relevant right now. The creative practice, the technical product experience, the education in philosophy, the cultural sense from my advertising days — there are very few people with this specific overlap. Working on AI workflows at Sublime now gives me another perspective on how this technology manifests in real business contexts.
AI is the rare topic that hits all the criteria for me to keep putting in the work:
Interesting for me - I’m genuinely curious and want to learn this stuff
Useful for you - Practical applications you can actually use
Important for everyone - The philosophical and societal implications are massive
Benefits from my experience - My unique blend of skills offers real differentiation
Creates opportunities - It opens paths to other work and financial incentives
That last point matters. I don’t want to paywall my core newsletter — I want it free forever. But knowing I can offer paid workshops, skill sessions, and consulting for specific applications of AI gives me the incentive to put in the extra work this requires alongside a job that already demands a lot of my time but compensates me very well.
Moving forward
In 2026, expect:
The return of weekly publishing
Deep focus on AI - practical workflows and philosophical implications
Paid offerings (workshops, skill sessions, consulting) in addition to the free newsletter
Continued honesty about what I’m seeing and feeling while immersing myself in this space
This year taught me that finding your rhythm sometimes means losing it first. And that readjustment is part of the creative journey too.
Thank you for being here. For reading, for staying, for giving me the space to figure this out in public. If you have any specific questions or areas you’d like to see covered, please let me know.
Let’s see what 2026 brings.
Happy holidays,
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