I have worked for over fifteen years as a graphic and digital designer, and I still LOVE to design.
Maybe people think that “design” is act of making visual things (surface decoration) mainly, but the word includes a wide range of activities such as planning, making plans, concept working, making structure.
In actual projects, I spend 70-80% of time on “researching or thinking”, and the rest of 20-30% of time is for “making something visible” with Mac. (I think most of people think this one is “design”.)
I think that going to book shops or museums, going on a journey if needed, even taking walk is even wonderful part of job, because these are all researching or thinking act. There is always a project in the head, and it seems that the directions is decided through various experiences.