If I would’ve just jumped into freelancing

I would’ve failed miserably. And not the good kind of failure. The type of failure where I would’ve probably given up design altogether because I wasn’t all that good at the art side and didn’t understand the business side. Put those two together and you have a ruined career before it even starts. Fresh out of school, I needed a working environment where I could get better at the craft and also learn the ropes of how the business of design actually functions. And I needed years of it.