I won a very prestigious award for directing animation, which up until then had been a hobby. I rose so fast up to that point that I never learned how to animat

I won a very prestigious award for directing animation, which up until then had been a hobby. I rose so fast up to that point that I never learned how to animate to a production standard. On top of that, to get the show into production I had to work crazy hours for two years solid. I burned out, didn't know how to capitalise on the award, and decided to go back to entry level jobs, ostensibly to learn my craft but really I couldn't handle the pressure of the sudden acclaim. I was in a very small industry full of technically more accomplished peers and there was no room for my punky attitude towards doing things the established way. My confidence and career took a huge nosedive, and the enthusiasm was knocked out of me completely. I've managed to gain back my enthusiasm for animation but only after doing a lot of soul-searching over what I love about it and keeping that sort of stuff strictly out of hours, not expecting it to be involved in my bread-and-butter work. I still animate for fun but had to establish a very hard boundary and let go of my ideals about loving the job.