Debbie Millman’s ongoing project “What Matters,” an effort to understand the interior life of artists, designers, and creative thinkers, is now in its third year. Each respondent is invited to answer ten identical questions and submit a nonprofessional photograph.
Stuti Sukhani is a brand strategist and visual communication designer who builds intricate worlds for brands to live in today and tomorrow. She is also a collage artist, an aspiring writer, a casual singer, a budding scuba diver, and a serial daydreamer.
What is the thing you like doing most in the world?
Nothing makes me feel more at peace than just spending time with the people I love – taking a walk, having a conversation, sharing a meal, or even sitting with them in silence. It fills my heart with appreciation for the life I have and the relationships in it. Nothing makes me happier.
Some other things that bring me so much joy: listening to my favourite songs on repeat, a salted chocolate chip cookie, being in the ocean, learning how to cook, and making collage art with my hands.
What is the first memory you have of being creative?
I was always collecting random things as a child, and I would call it my khazana, which is the Hindi word for treasure. Empty bottles from around the house, coins, images cut out of magazines, boarding passes from flights, seashells, rocks, candy wrappers. Stashed in drawers and shelves in my room, the paraphernalia drove my mother insane. But it’s something that’s always kept my eyes open – looking for patterns, textures, and unconventional beauty.
Investing time in developing new ways of seeing has always pushed me to explore the bounds of my creativity. The curiosity that comes with collecting really fuels this perspective. While I may not collect as furiously today, I still strive to see meaning in the things around me through the work I do. The impulse hasn’t changed; just the medium.
What is your biggest regret?
There’s an easy route I can take to the could-have–should-have–would-have path, especially in retrospect. But I’m trying every day to recognize that all the choices I made are what brought me to today, and that they continue to shape the person I am.
That being said, I think my regrets are just decisions I made out of fear instead of curiosity. I’m reminding myself to choose curiosity more.
How have you gotten over heartbreak?
I’ve found that allowing myself the time to feel the heartbreak, rather than trying to motor through it, always makes me feel better after. Whatever I’m heartbroken about, it is feeling – and sharing those feelings with people who love me – that helps me feel lighter.
What makes you cry?
I’m not a big crier when it comes to things close to my heart, but having largely lived away from my family since I moved away for university, and my parents moved to live in Southeast Asia, every time we part ways brings me to tears.
However, strangers on the internet can bring a tear to my eye with the smallest of things – a long-awaited reunion, an underdog achievement, someone’s quiet wish coming true, acts of kindness caught on camera. I guess there’s something about the little things in life that are easier to appreciate from afar. Maybe because they remind me how beautiful the everyday can be when you’re really paying attention.
How long does the pride and joy of accomplishing something last for you?
I’ve been working on being able to savour the pride and joy of doing something well without relying on it as something that defines my aptitude. I try to see my accomplishments as part of the journey, not the proof of it. Letting them pass through me makes me feel more grounded, motivates me for what comes next, and leaves space for the joy of that next thing.
Do you believe in an afterlife, and if so, what does that look like to you?
I grew up believing in a place above the clouds. I’ve often imagined the conversations people may have up there. And the conversation I would have once I get there – with my grandfather, with Rene Magritte, with Enid Blyton. I imagine it as a calm and peaceful place, a timeless one with space to wander; almost as a manifestation of an ideal world that I imagine for myself.
Sometimes I wonder if the afterlife is less about a destination and more about a feeling of familiarity. A reunion not just with people, but with parts of ourselves we forgot to visit while we were still on Earth.
What do you hate most about yourself?
I hate most that I get in my head too much and second-guess myself. I would love to be able to have an external perspective on myself sometimes, to be able to pause and think to get out of that cycle.
What do you love most about yourself?
I love that I’m able to keep my head straight in most situations, and that I am, for the most part, not reactive, but thoughtful in response.
What is your absolute favorite meal?
Anything that my sister makes. She is currently pursuing a life in food and hospitality, and I’m in awe of how she makes a meal so much more than the food on a plate. The warmth and happiness she brings to the food is what makes the meal a memorable one.
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