HOW I THINK ABOUT STARTING WITH VARIABLES

Summary from the TLDR Design newsletter

Teams often struggle with starting design system variable structures because it feels like setting a permanent foundation, leading to analysis paralysis when considering scale, platforms, and themes simultaneously. A recommended approach is to separate variables into non-interactive buckets (environmental elements such as backgrounds and text) and interactive buckets (behavior-driven elements such as button states and feedback). Clarity matters more than completeness initially, as variable structures only need to provide teams a shared starting point rather than being perfect.