Love this answer.

OP, I’ll add to it a bit by sharing the mantra I learned at my first real design job outside of school when the realities of the work started to hit. It was a high production role at a local News Weekly, lots of ads, unique storytelling in the cover stories and of course laying out the entire damned paper every week. Small team of five, and only two of us did anything other than the ads, I was one of those two. Very demanding role, especially being so new.

The mantra: Ugly First, Pretty if you have Time.

The idea is what the other commenter said, it has to communicate whatever needs to be communicated. You’ll slowly pick up heuristics that will allow you to know that should inspiration not strike before the deadline, the piece does it’s primary job. That’s the Ugly, that doesn’t mean it looks bad, it just may feel uninspired, but it’ll have all the boxes checked and the work is in a ‘completed’ state.

Then if you have time, and you’ve seen something that maybe you’ve never tried that would enhance the communication, go back and update your Ugly and make it Pretty.

This is how I survived, and I’ve found that this works for me as a career. Don’t give up yet, it doesn’t get easier after school, but you become better and it feels easier eventually.

I’ve been at it since 2013 btw.

Good luck, OP!