From Dial-Up to Data Engineer: How Claire Beat Imposter Syndrome

My guest on today's episode is Claire Bordon. And for someone that doesn't like doing math, she has spent a long time doing math and analytics. But as we got talking through her career journey, we got to touch on things like imposttor syndrome. And one of the really cool things that we got to see is that we're navigating things like imposter syndrome. But when Claire is taking these opportunities to try and help others, help teach them that you can start to overcome this a little bit. You can start to understand better about yourself, the things you know, and really get fulfillment from helping others. And for Claire, that's led to being an educator with 100 devs. I think that you're really going to enjoy this podcast. I think that there's a lot to take away, especially for people that are transitioning into a software development role. So, sit back, enjoy, and I'll see you next time. Claire, thanks for joining me. Do you want to kick us off with uh giving a little bit of background for career journey and getting started as as early or late as you'd like on that? >> Yeah, so um I'm currently working as a uh data engineer at Purdue University. Uh but uh I was not one of those people that, you know, wanted to be a coder from the time I was, you know, a baby or whatever. Uh I didn't even actually know that that was a career path that I could pursue until after I graduated college, interestingly enough. Okay. >> Um yeah, so I grew up in a really rural area. Um and I just didn't have really the opportunities or anybody in my life who knew how to code or really knew much about that career. It wasn't something that was remotely taught in, you know, in elementary school, junior high, high school was not a thing. I learned how to type from a typewriter teacher. Uh, you know, so just the barest minimum to know how to use a computer. Uh, was the basically the only thing that I learned. Um, and like I said, I didn't really have any like, you know, role models in my life that were, you know, writing code or anything like that. And I think crucially, I didn't really have access to good internet, uh, until I really went to college. Um, I always lived in really rural areas, you know, growing up all the way up until I was 18. And we just had dialup internet and the slowest like we had AOL uh up until I went to college. And >> I can relate to that, by the way, cuz I definitely grew up in a rural area. I can remember trying to play like video games at home and like my family is sharing the internet. So if someone was like, I want to check my email, it would be my my video games. >> Yeah. Mom picks up the phone, you're like, no. >> Yeah. >> You lose everything. I had that happen a couple times. Uh yeah, so I couldn't even, you know, couldn't play YouTube videos. You know, a lot of I I have so many friends who say, "Oh, I learned to code with MySpace like, you know, building up my spells profile or, you know, or uh Neopets, right?" Neopets was another big one. I learned, you know, so many people learn Neo learn HTML from Neopets. >> My sister was like that. Yeah. She had like her Neopets store and like she was always customizing it with Yeah. Yeah. >> Yeah. No, I I didn't even have we didn't even have the bandwidth that I could even open Neopets. Really, any site with images was questionable and would take a long time to load and YouTube videos were out of the question. So, uh you know, I could use the internet in only its most basic form uh pretty much until I went to college. And so, with that, I wasn't really exposed to the wider world of coding or development. Um I knew that like that coding was a thing. Uh, but I thought that it required that really like like intensive study and you know a bunch of degrees and you had to be like super duper smart and I also thought you had to be really good at math and I know a lot of coders are. Uh, I am not. It never came really naturally to me and so I just thought well just I can't do that. I'm not smart enough to be a coder. You know I told myself that a lot uh growing up just oh I can't I can't write code. I'm not smart enough. I like computers and I like all this stuff related to technology, but you know, I'm not smart enough to code. Um, so I went to college uh and completely contrasting what I just said, I went to college for statistics. >> Okay. Yeah. No, no math involved in that though. Yeah. >> Right. I know. I was basically just like throwing I I had no idea what I wanted to do. I had really no like future passion. Um because my parents never had like traditional office jobs. Um they're highly educated, but they just never worked like a traditional office job. And I knew that's what I wanted to do, but I knew nothing about it because neither of my parents ever did. Yeah. So, um I was just like, I have no idea what I want to do. Just throwing darts at a dart board. Statistics. I could probably make money with statistics. I don't know, man. And so, I went to uh went to school for statistics. What did not have a good time as you might expect. Uh I graduated. I made it, but that was about all I could say about that. Um >> if you don't mind me asking though, so like and you said, you know, didn't have a good time. So when you picked that as a path, was the thought process? Yeah, I can probably get a job with this even though it was like I don't like you said, I don't really like math, so it was probably more around the job. >> Yeah, it was really that it was really a very sort of a cynical like I I don't really feel like any like I I really like English and literature and stuff, but I knew, you know, you can't make money with that unfortunately. I wish you could. You know, it's really really difficult to to make a career out of that. um like I wanted to be a librarian but you know uh and I was just like well if I can't do what I really love I guess I'll just pick something that'll make me some money and I didn't feel good and you know so I didn't really I didn't really put my heart into it you know in college um and so I didn't really have that passion to study or to try to really do well um so I struggled a lot um and I did try to take one coding class in college actually uh and it was a Java class um and I think from what I've learned since then I feel like For many people, the college pedagogy of the way that programming is taught in college from a very theoryheavy perspective, very abstract, very architecture of computers. Yes, those are wonderful things to know, but if you're like me and a very like application-minded, like I want to build stuff that's going to do something, okay, what is this for? Why am I learning it? Why, you know, why do I need this? Uh, it did not gel with me. I I was like that that the the dog at the chemistry set going I have no idea what I'm doing just the entire time. >> Um and I really felt like again that was just reaffirmed that bias that I had that hey you know I'm not smart enough to code right because I couldn't figure out this class. I couldn't you know apply myself to this class and figure out really what was really going on and understand what was happening. So it just kind of reaffirmed that bias that I had. That's that's super interesting because when I reflect like I went to to university for computer engineering and >> uh I think so little the sort of difference for me was like I going into university I was like I know that I have to be writing code when when I grow up like I'm writing code and so I had learned to program before university but I can remember in school we actually didn't have many programming courses and the ones that we did were very much like you just described where even as someone who was like I have not that I was a good software developer but I'm like I've written code before I understand high level how things work and we would do these uh some of these programming courses and I'm like why are we doing this like this is not this is not appealing to me as someone who wants to write software like what's going on here >> yeah because I mean I went into it kind of with an interest maybe I could do this maybe I could do this and then by the time I finished that course I was like I can't like okay I tried it you know I gave it a good try can't do it fine I'll have to do something And like you said, re reconfirmed like this thought that you had around Okay. >> Yeah, absolutely it did. And like we had to take like our exams like we had to write the code on paper like >> Oh, that makes a lot of sense. Yeah. >> Right. You know, it's just like why you know Yeah. It was it was super weird and this was like before the age of AI and stuff so there wasn't any excuse for you know why we >> Yeah. But anyway, uh yeah, so graduated college and I was fortunate enough I was extremely fortunate uh that uh I was able to land a job uh with an actuarial firm uh you know a lot of statistitians or you know become actuaries and such. Uh and so I did work in that space for a while uh at health insurance actuary. Um and just as the nature of that job it's very analytical and you use a lot of analytical tools. Um, you know, I think actuaries are probably some of the best people at building Excel dashboards in the world. Some of the stuff that like, you know, the ostentatiously they're they're non-coders, but you know, they uh they build some of the craziest stuff in Excel, you know. And I started just to buy osmosis. I started to just pick up some, you know, a little bit of VBA programming, right? Because, you know, you got to okay, I got to fix this dashboard. I got to d what's this code doing, you know? And then a little bit of SQL because like you're hooking up this dashboard to, you know, an Oracle backend or whatever and you got to figure out how to, you know, query for the data that you want. Um, I remember I I distinctly remember the day when I first learned what cross joins were because I accidentally cross joined two tables and uh the DBA for uh for for our like department came over and I thought she was going to murder me because I was bringing down the whole database. >> So, you know, I just started to pick some of the stuff up by, you know, osmosis. And what was funny though is while I was learning this stuff, it didn't occur to me that this was coding. Um it's just like, yeah, I'm just doing what I need to do to get my work done, right? I'm just, you know, oh yeah, I'm learning this script and this script, but it's it's just skills, right? It's not coding. I'm not a coder. I don't have that piece of paper that says you are a coder, right? That you have a CS degree. And so I didn't believe that was what I was actually doing. Um, and I I did realize though that actuarial science was probably not the career path for me just because you essentially have to take exams for years. You have to take a series of seven exams. Um, and they're intense. And it's just not I was like, "Nah, I'm not doing that for the rest of my life." >> No. I nope. I can already say not for me based on that alone. No. >> Yeah. It's wild. just the you know just a series of of of tests that you have to take and this intense study and preparation and it just didn't appeal to me personally. So, um I decided to go into more just general analytics. Uh and I actually got a job with an e-commerce company. Uh did some uh like operational analytics for them. And I was lucky enough to kind of have one of those unicorn managers who's just extremely good who's who's a manager but they're also like a genius programmer um you know SQL genius uh just incredible. And so just like sitting near him um I just picked stuff up and and over time he started to you know delegate more work to me. you know, I was writing more and more advanced SQL queries and again, I didn't even realize what I was learning. It and I didn't think about it as learning to code or, you know, learning programming. It was just like, oh yeah, I'm learning what I need to do to do my job. Um, and you know, I'm applying all this stuff immediately. And I started, you know, working with directly with devs on projects, you know, uh, I was doing QA testing that I'd meet with the devs every morning and, you know, all these things that go into being a developer. I was doing a lot of them. I just didn't realize that what I was doing. Um and so you know I worked at that at that place for about three years and then I moved back uh to my home state to be closer to family. Uh got a job with uh Purdue University. Um and that again that was another analytics job but yet again I found myself gravitating toward any technical project I could get my hands on. You know anything that required you know oh we need you to write this Excel dashboard with VBA you know VBA macros. I'd be like oh yeah I can do that. Let me write a macro for you. you know, doing VVA coding and and you know, anything that would get me closer to the technical side of things. Um, just I would I would I I was on a big deployment for like a massive budget software roll out. It was all custom. I was working with consultants and like yeah, all these things that that developers do. I was just doing those. Um, and then eventually there was a an internal role that was posted within our company on one of the dev teams. It was for a senior developer role. Um, and and I was with a manager who I really admired. Like I I like this guy. I was like, "Man, I would I was just I was talking to my co-orkers co-workers and I was like, "Man, I would love to work for that guy someday." And she was like, "You should just apply for the job." And I'm like, "Haha, yeah, right." I literally laughed and I was like, "Yeah, no way. Absolutely. What are you talking about? I don't have a degree." >> Still talking yourself out of like 100%. Okay. >> Yeah. No, no, you're absolutely right. It was that it was this this constant internal like I I'd come to this conclusion and it was a safe conclusion, right? That you can't do this, right? It's it that's a very safe feeling because it means you don't have to try. >> Um >> that's a really interesting way to put that. Yeah. It's like >> it's a very it's you're safe in your little bubble and you're doing things that you already know you're good at. You don't have to try to branch out to something that you don't know whether or not you'll be good at or whether or not you can do. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. That's uh I never really thought about it that way, but it's almost like it might not be the conclusion that like is a happy conclusion, but also as you said, it it is safe, right? Because it means that you don't have to go outside of your comfort zone. You've already said like this is how it is. That's how it is. There's no >> there's no extra pressure to go do something different about it. That's just the way it is. >> Yeah. And our brains love being safe. They love being safe. They love, you know, inertia. They love conserving energy and not you know getting themselves worked up or so it's it's comfortable for our brains to just maintain that right um but you know the fact that my co-orker said you should apply she said you know you're always just working on technical stuff anyway I mean that's basically what you're doing already and I was like yeah no way but it planted a little seed right and that seed you know as much as your brain tries to shut it down that seed is going to grow and eventually I was like you know what what do I got to lose like honestly you know what what harm is it I have a job already I'm not going to lose lose my job if I say don't get it. No. And you're like, okay, I just keep doing what I was doing. >> Yeah, cuz I didn't I didn't I didn't not like what I was doing. I actually really love analytics. Um I still do analytics for fun all the time. Like Excel is great. I love I freaking love Microsoft Excel. >> If you don't mind me asking then. So uh and this might be a little bit of a tangent from you know the the career story, but um >> you had started off by saying you know don't like math, right? Like that was one of the things at the beginning. So, um, did you sort of discover for yourself along the way that there are parts to like statistics and mathematics where you're like, I actually do enjoy parts of this, but there's other parts where you're like, yeah, still not touching that cuz, you know, it's math and I don't like it. Or how how did that evolve for you? >> Yeah, so I think you that's I love that question. It's a great question. So, I I think what I discovered is that I didn't necessarily like doing the math myself. I like figuring out how to make the computer do the math for me. um which is, you know, the entire purpose of of Excel, right? Is you're you're figuring out how to construct these, you know, these these tools in a way that you don't got to do, you know, I'm not scratching out equations by hand. That's terrible. I I want to make the I want to make the spreadsheet do my math for me. And so that was a huge impetus. Yep. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. That was a huge impetus for me to to to learn these things, to learn VBA, to learn advanced, you know, that's been like the major driving force behind my whole arc is like, how can I not have to do math anymore? >> Yeah, that's that's a good way to put it. It's yeah, still don't like math. I don't have to do it because the computer will do it for me. >> Yeah, 100%. Um, and so, you know, I decided, okay, I'm going to apply for this role. Um, and you know, as I thought back over the things I'd been doing, I found that I could actually put my res resume together in such a way that like, yeah, I don't have dev on my resume in the past, but gosh darn it, if I'm not doing a lot of things that that that look like it. Um, and you know, the interview process went really well. I did do I did a lot of prep. uh you know it's for anybody out there looking for a job man you know it is just m as much about the cultural portion of it about the you know do they like you as a person as it is you know about the technical skills cuz yeah I didn't fit I didn't fit the job description to a tea absolutely not I was not entirely what they were looking for but um I was someone they could see themselves working with um on their team um and so that really served me quite well uh and then I got the job and it was really great um and I immediately started to panic because I was like, "Oh my goal." >> Yeah. What what did I just do? Like, do I I don't belong here. What the heck is this? Like, you know, and my co-workers were lovely. They still are. You know, everybody's lovely. Everybody was lovely and welcoming and wonderful. Um, but I did not feel like I should be there. It was very much the imposttor syndrome. Um, which I think everybody encounters at multiple points throughout their life and their career. 100%. >> Yeah. I wanted to pause on that for for for two things. One was the imposter syndrome. So, thank you for pausing on that because >> absolutely right. Um I mean there's we could talk the entire time about imposter syndrome and I think that I just wanted to pause on it because like the fact that when people find that they are going from one thing into another that's going to be probably an amazing growth opportunity for them. It is very normal to have that feeling of like wait a second what did I just do? or if you weren't necessarily taking a step consciously and you find yourself in a new spot and you know maybe it's a manager that's tasked you with something or you're at a startup and you find that you have to get something whatever it happens to be you we find ourselves in these situations that are very likely going to end up being you know tremendous growth opportunities for us we don't I don't know oftentimes I feel like we don't think about that in the moment it's usually like oh crap like what's happening right now like this doesn't feel good am I even ready for So I I thank you for calling that out because I think that's super important. The other thing that you had mentioned that I think is also a really good point for people. Um, I know, you know, from talking with a bunch of people, I'm sure you've had similar conversations. Like, everyone is everyone who's looking for work right now is having a lot of challenges. And when I talk to people about, you know, resumes, like, how do I stand out? Like, how do I be competitive? There are lots of people that have some, not not for everyone. Some people are very fresh out of school or they haven't actually worked before and that's, you know, that's fine. But there are people that I've talked to where they have different work experience already. And a lot of them will say like, "Well, I'm trying to be a developer, so I don't have any dev experience." And they just kind of ignore like all of their other work experience. And I'm like, "Wait a second. There are so many things that might not be coding that if you could like or and even in your case, they weren't um they weren't like practical like dev or sorry, not practical is the wrong word. Um traditional like dev, >> right? But you were like, I can carve this out as related to dev. And even for people that don't have that, there's so many things that you could take from your work experience that would be very good to call out on a resume, like working in teams or like seeing projects like start to finish. Like there's so many good examples to call out like that that I think people just sometimes ignore because they're like, "Well, that's not that's not dev." >> Yeah, 100%. And I so and we'll get to this probably a little bit later, but one of the things I love to do in my work with 100 Devs, the the nonprofit that I volunteer with, is um sitting down with people looking at their resume and they're they always come to me and they're like, gosh, I just don't have anything. Like my resume is terrible. Like there's nothing on here that I can use. You know, I can't be like what? Like should I even talk about any of this? Should I just start a clean resume? It's like you were leading a you know a team of a hundred to like do a charity drive for you know some natural disaster or something at the at the some big agency and you and that's not like no that's amazing like what are you talking about? I love helping people like like you know pivot and see their resume in a whole new light about all the different things that are just as important as raw code knowledge that going to being a dev. The ability to talk to people is probably the most important one. So many people have that skill and are so good at it, but they just, you know, or lead a team or whatever, any of that. Um, it's just amazing to see people's eyes light up when they realize all the things on their resume that they're like, "Yeah, this is absolutely valid. Companies would love this about you." >> Yeah. >> Yeah. Yeah. Totally. >> Yeah. That's so funny. It seems to be No. Yeah. >> People want to interrupt you and and steer things away, but I was like, I think these are some really good things that you mentioned that I wanted to pause on. >> No, absolutely. I'm so glad you stopped on both of those. And also the imposter syndrome thing. Um, that's why I specifically mentioned it because everybody has felt it at some point and but it feels it's a shameful feeling, right? It's a feeling that we don't like to admit often and we feel like we're the only one who has felt that way. The only one who's felt inadequate in a new position or a role or an assignment or project or team. Uh, and that so it's so important to verbalize that and be like, "Yeah, I felt that way too." Everybody at every level has felt that way at some point. And what's important is how you deal with it. the more people that you hear talking about it, the more that it doesn't I don't I never think that it like just makes it go away. But I think the more that you hear people saying you're like oh wait like I'm not supposed to like shame the the word that you use like shame I think is a good one because >> we almost want to like hide it or not acknowledge it or like you know oh you know you don't want to tell people that you experience it but the more that you like talk about it and the more you realize people go through it the more you're like wait a second like sure it's an uncomfortable feeling but it feels better to know other people also experience it like you're not alone in that sense so I love being able to be like hey you you know, when I switch into this role or this team, I'm like, yeah, the first little bit I'm like, what the heck did I do? And like, what have I gotten myself into? But every single time it pans out and turns into something where I'm like, this is a really good like growth opportunity. So, >> yeah, absolutely, absolutely. Um, yeah, like I say, what's important is just how you deal with it. You just feel it and you power through anyway and keep going. Um, but yeah, it and it, yeah, I was definitely feeling it. It was really intense. I was like, why, you know, why did they hire me? I, you know, what what the heck is going? Even though they were perfectly, they were wonderful. They were willing to teach me. They were training me. I was building myself up. I just couldn't see it at the time because I was still feeling, you know, that just like the the worst imposttor who ever lived. Um, and so I, as I was kind of panicking, I I I kind of started flailing around as you do. And I was like, I have to learn more. I have to learn more more programming, more more coding. I have to be better. And uh, so I was, you know, poking around online. I was I was looking at boot camps. I was looking at paid boot camps be like teach me to be good please. Um and you know and there's absolutely nothing wrong with paid boot camps. A lot of people have done them. Many of them are wonderful. Um but in my case I was very lucky to find 100 devs which is essentially a free training program. Uh where and I just it was just serendipity absolutely because there was the founder uh Leon Noel made a made a post on Reddit sort of just saying hey look we're just starting these free classes on Twitch. if you want to learn web development, like come join us. Everything's free. There's no obligation. You don't have to do anything. You just join our Discord, join our Twitch, and let's learn webdev. And um and this was in uh this was in I'm probably going to get this wrong. 2022 um when this was happening. I think it was like the the tail end of 21, start of 22. I always get the years wrong, but um >> during that time, yeah, everything is the same year. Like I don't know. >> Yeah. Time time means nothing since 2020. I I don't know. basically. Um, so yeah, so I was just lucky enough to see that post. I was like, hey, what do I got to lose? Again, it was that feeling of, you know, I'm just going to do this. What do I have to lose, right? What what's the worst that could happen? Nothing. Um, I just drop out, you know, or I I I assumed I was going to hit a payw wall. Like, you know, I'll be like, okay, I'll do it for a couple months until I hit the payw wall and then I'll just I'll I'll bounce, you know. Uh, but it ended up lasting about a year. uh I learned full stack web development while still doing my you know my my back very much back-end job as a as a senior engineer you know working on uh data warehousing um with Purdue uh and doing this course and uh it was pretty transformative for me in a lot of ways um because it essentially showed me that for once it forced me to dispel that notion that I wasn't smart enough to code um because even though I was doing it at my day job I still felt like I wasn't smart enough because I didn't believe you know it's like why did they hire me, right? Like, you know, there was a mistake. They'll figure it out. Um, but just going through this course and actually learning this stuff and realizing that I could not only learn it, I could articulate it to others. Um, basically dispel that once and for all and maybe see like, okay, wait, you're you're learning this, you're applying it, you're doing all the homeworks for, you know, you're you're enjoying learning, which is not something I felt in a long time, you know, after my experience in college. Um, and it was like, okay, you're not only doing that, you're then turning around and you're starting to help others learn this material, too. Um, that's got to be worth something, right? Um, and so from there, you know, I got a lot more confident in my job. I started to, you know, give more suggestions. Um, I started to progress. I was able to, you know, just be more confident in the abilities that I already had, uh, and put forward those abilities to help my team at work. And then also developing my um developing my role with 100 devs after the course was completed. I I kept helping people. I I kept streaming. I was I started streaming on Twitch. I I first started just helping people on Discord, you know, here and there, onesie twoosies, and eventually the Discord rooms would fill up and they'd be like, "Go to Twitch." I'm like, "What's Twitch?" So, I learned what that was. I started streaming, uh helping people just learn the basics of coding and really focusing on the thing that anybody can code. Like, it's you don't need a degree. you don't need a piece of paper. Anybody can do this. And so that's kind of where we are today. You know, I I create content. I um I I really try to, you know, I'm still a data engineer, but I still teach web development as well, just because I feel like web development is such a great all-rounder kind of skill. Anybody can really pick it up. You don't have to have any tools or, you know, you can sit you can you can build a website on a on your phone, right? It you can do it anywhere. So, it's a great skill to have. And so, yeah, that's kind of where we are today. >> That's awesome. I think uh I'm curious to hear from you on the sort of this phase where you start helping others, right? Like I have often told people that um you know when as you're learning things when you get to a point where you start teaching other people or you're like realizing like I'm helping someone then did you did you have this feeling right away where you're like wait a second I actually like I know what I'm talking about or did you like I'm I'm just curious what the reflection process was like going from like you know I don't know anything or having so much imposter syndrome to like wait a second like it's actually like I'm actually helping other people do this like what can you talk a little bit more about that because I I think that that's like a really like a really critical thing that when I talk to especially more junior people and they're trying to progress like what that looks like for them. >> Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, I I wouldn't say there was one particular moment, but I have always loved teaching. I used to teach piano a little bit, you know, when I was in high school to make a little extra money and I just I don't know. I really like just seeing people get a concept when you see them suddenly just click and be like, "Oh, there it is." You know, and it's like, "Yeah, you get it now." That's isn't it awesome? That's so cool. >> Um, and that's just such a cool feeling for me to have. Um, and I remember I distinctly remember how I kind of started going down that path. I was on the Discord 100 devs Discord and there was a person there who who's in chat who was just despairing. They were just like, I can't I don't understand this. Like, I'm going to quit. Like, I I if I can't do this homework, I'm just going to quit. And I remember I had the choice. I could go eat dinner or I could spend a few minutes in a voice chat like just helping this one person. I I had that choice and I remember just really being like I'm really hungry. I'd love to go eat dinner, but I could help this person. And I chose to help this one person. And somebody else happened to join the call. Just popped in, voice chat, see what we were doing. And they were like, at the end of this, I'd helped this person. We solved all the problems. They were feeling much better. And the other person that joined, they were like, okay, so when are you going to do this again? And I'm like, what? Uh I I didn't know that this was a thing that I was doing now. Um, and so I did it again. I I set up a little schedule. I was like, maybe people would enjoy this. And like I say, it started to fill up and people started to give me feedback that, you know, this was helping them with these topics and understanding those topics. And I've always known that teaching is the best way to learn. You know, I saw that as a piano teacher. And and and so with that, it, like I say, it really forced me to kind of confront that feeling of inadequacy that I had. And not not to say that I knew everything. I was still going through the course with everyone else, but to say like, okay, this is something I can do that I can apply myself to and we'll see returns. Um, and yeah, I still felt like sometimes I would I would be on like I would be on a Discord call or on a stream and trying to explain a topic and literally have the topic click for myself as I was teaching it to others. You know, I would just sort of start like just sort of reading reading out wrote or like going through the problem or whatever and being like, I don't know what I'm doing. But then as you're talking about it, if you can break it down into simplest into into its simplest common denominator that other people can understand, then sometimes that clicks for you. And so it also kind of taught me the value of sometimes you just got to wing it. Like sometimes it's just a yolo moment and you're just like, look, we're just going to we're just going to try this out. We're just going to jump in. It's okay. It might not be perfect. Um that was something as a kid I I I struggled with a lot was, you know, feeling like I had to do it right. Like I had one try and I had to do it right. that that perfect I had to be perfect the first try. Um and so it kind of taught me the value of being a little bit messy of just sometimes just jumping in without 100% knowledge and just trying and seeing what happens. And um and so that really helped me a lot, you know, reframe myself and my abilities mentally. >> Yeah. That um that moment you describe where like you're helping someone and then you can literally see it. Well, depends. You can either hear it if it's voice or like you can see it. you experience it with them where they're like, "Oh man, I get it." Um, that feeling uh is extremely rewarding. I don't know like I'm sure people that are watching and listening, many people have experienced this at some point. Maybe it's not for software development, but for something where you've helped someone where they were like, "It just doesn't make sense. I'm never going to get it." You happen to get it to click for them. And just experiencing that is like it's such a good feeling to be like, I was part of I'm part of helping you, you know, get on the same page. It's really cool. Um, but I I really like what you were saying too around just kind of getting into things and, you know, uh, just almost winging it, right? I like I manage engineering teams and there's some things where I'm like I feel like pretty confident like I do a lot of C programming. So if I'm helping some, you know, some basics in C, I'm like, okay, like I've been doing this for years. Like I got this, no problem. But there's other things where I'm like, hey, look, I will tell people on my team, I'm like, I don't know how that works. I don't have experience in that, but I'm like, if you need help, let's get on a call. And I've had to force myself to be more comfortable with like you you're not going to know everything. No. And people don't expect you to. And that's cool, but like when you put two heads together, probably you can get further than just one person on their own. So, I try to like as uncomfortable as it is, try to put myself into those situations. And often like I come out learning something. Uh the person that I'm working with like ends up learning something, we get further on it and it's not so bad. Like it didn't have to be perfect and it still works out. >> Yeah. No. And Yeah. That's I I find that a lot when I'm talking to people again who are on the job hunt. They feel like they have to be 100% to even like go into that the job hunt. Be like, "Oh, but I don't know XYZ yet." And I'm like, do you have a resume? Like, can you can you build something basic? Like, you know, then that now's the time to start looking. Now's the time to start networking. You're never going to be ready. There's no such thing. Ready does not exist, particularly in this industry where everything is always changing anyway and you're never going to know anything about a particular topic. And if you are in a room and you are the person who knows the most in that room, you're in the wrong room. Go find another room where people know more than you. >> Um, >> right back to the imposter syndrome, right? Go find the imposter syndrome room. >> Yeah. Absolutely. >> It's the right room. >> It's such a And that's why I love this field so much. It's so dynamic. Everybody's going to be able, you know, everybody's going to have their little niche, their little area of expertise, and, you know, go meet those people. Go admit that you don't know stuff and learn from those people. And um yeah, there's no such thing as ready, I guess, is is my main takeaway there for that. Yeah. >> Yeah. I think that's a that's a really good way to put it. And um yeah, you I think that kind of ties back into like you were saying earlier this feeling of um you know we like our brains want to find like something that's comfortable, right? Like >> it's like we're we're trying to make sure that we have it all figured out like we have to we have to build our comfort zone, but it's like no like you're not going to be ready and like go you have to you just have to start, right? I have to keep moving and going forward on a path. So, um I I wanted to hear more about So, a couple things, right? So, I'm looking at the notes that you sent over and so we started hearing some about how you are teaching and helping people and I think this is awesome and for many reasons, right? One is like that you get to help people obviously and the other is like you were even saying it helps you learn and understand things. So, um, I'm curious like one of the things you wrote was learning to code as an adult versus learning in college. I think you've touched on it a a little bit. So, I think I have an idea about some of your perspective on this, but I wanted to hear a little bit more. So after going through college and seeing like how how things go in terms of you know if we were to generalize how a lot of topics are taught in college versus like what happens in real life outside of college like what are your thoughts on like how people approach learning and like what's effective and and that sort of thing. >> Yeah. So I think you know as an adult we no longer have you know we're out of the bubble right we no longer the majority of us no longer have the luxury of theory right we are we're in it we're living it now like this is no longer theory this is application we are we are in the application we're in the find out phase of our lives however that manifests right um and so at that point I think you you really don't have the luxury of focusing on theory when trying to learn something as an adult for the most part that's it's you know I think it has to come from like a perspective of application right um is all right I'm going to teach you this thing and immediately turn around and tell you here's why I'm teaching it to you and here's how you can apply it to do something right now so we a lot of the times when I'm teaching a concept let's let's say APIs right um on my streams it's going to be some it's going to be like okay I'm going to tell you about this API we're going to build it together and then I'm going to immediately help you build something where that API is going to be used and it's going to have an application. It's going to be like a a restaurant finder or I had something that would, you know, generate facts about dogs and, you know, just something that's going to work. It it doesn't have to be practical. It can be really silly and fun, but uh it's going to it's going to need to do something. I'm not just going to explain here's what an API is. Um and here's all the parts of an API and then okay, we're done, you know, class dismissed. It's like, all right, here's what an API is. Let's build it together and then let's make it run. and you can make it run right now and you can make it do something and you can then you can go home and tweak it and build something that's more relevant to you and put it in your portfolio, right? It has a purpose. It has an application. Um, and so I think that for me learning as an adult, one of the most beneficial things that I got from one under devs was all that immediate application, right? You have to some you have to learn a little bit of theory to learn why things work the way they do and that kind of thing, but immediately you're turning around and you're doing something with that that's going to benefit you directly. And that's a huge motivation to learning, especially as an adult when you understand more how the world works and that you got to get ahead somehow. >> Um, and so just that that the practicality of of all that material. And so that's what I try to really embody in my content as well is like, all right, I'm going to teach you this thing and here's what you can do with it. >> That that makes a lot of sense. I can again as you're talking through this I'm thinking back to some of the things like when I was in school and and those scenarios where I'm like like why are we doing this right like there'll be things we be getting taught and I'm like part of me is like I don't know why we're spending time on this part of me is like I don't want to learn this you know a lot of pretty typical like feelings for for things like that in school and I think one of the biggest problems though was that we would be bombarded by concepts and then it would be like >> so what, right? And the >> yeah the so what that we're getting is kind of like well you need to you need to understand this and it's like it's really hard to be motivated by >> concept after concept and the only the only reason is like you're you're going to need it later and it's like okay like I don't know let me just remember it for later I guess and >> I think as you're explaining this like something that would have been so helpful is that if we just would have had more practical application and to your point doesn't have to be like you you said it could be silly or whatever as long as you can see it being used and you can go oh like that's what we're actually talking about that's a building block because so many of these things were just like here's a concept and like here's the homework and you're like I don't even the homework would be so artificial that you're like like I don't understand how this is ever going to be applicable >> and >> yeah like that that way of learning to me just feel and maybe for some people that works effectively but >> oh sure I don't >> I don't know many people that are like yeah I really learn that way and I think most people that I've talked to at least in the software development space it's very much the way you're describing where it's like >> you you know light on the concept and the more that we can get hands-on trying something out the more people are like oh I see like how this is coming together um so yeah I I think that really resonates with me >> yeah and I'm not saying that any of the theory stuff is bad either. Absolutely not. All that is important and we need to know why things are the way we are and we need to know the history of these languages and like why they work the way they do, you know, and all that stuff. It's so important, but you it needs to be blended um and balanced with enough practical applications so that students feel motivated to learn because they know what all this is for, like why it matters to them, why it's going to be important for their future, why it's going to be important to their present because they can build stuff with it right now. You can go out and build a website. That's so cool. you know, all that stuff. That's that's the motivating factor. So, yeah, I just want to be clear about that. You know, none of that theory stuff is great. And some a lot of the times I wish I knew more of that. You know, now that I'm in it and I'm like I have a real passion for it. I'm building my own stuff. I would love to go back and revisit more theory and I'm working on doing that. You know, some of the stuff I missed from just not having that formality of the college experience >> um in in, you know, in that field. Um but yeah, it's got to be balanced. You got to balance it out. That's uh it's funny you say that because the one of the things that comes up even at uh you know the commit your code conference I was talking to some people about this and I was literally talking with a group of people and had said like you know people sometimes come up and they're they're like hey like what books would you recommend for like software development? I'm like honestly like it's not that I can't read but I don't I don't read books on software development to learn software development. talked to one group about this, explain why, and then the next group of people I talked to, someone was like, "Hey, what books would you recommend?" And I'm like, "Oh." Um, but the interesting thing is I've been programming for a couple of decades now. And I think that at this point I think I actually would get some benefit around a little bit more theory. And it's because I'm not saying I'm like I'm not the best programmer in the world, but I have I have some experience where I've seen some things come together. And I think that I could actually jump into some more theoretical things, some higher level concepts and being like I have enough of my own experience where I could say, "Oh, I see how this would line up here." Um whereas before when that was at the beginning, I don't think any of the theory stuff just stuck because it was like, I just don't see how I piece this together in in sort of this knowledge base that I'm trying to to start with. It just didn't really work. But now maybe it would. >> Yeah. And that's another kind of I'm glad to hear you say that, you know, so even you having gone through those classes, you know, you're just like the theory it just like went, you know, just straight out because yeah, you had nothing to attach it to. It had no anchor point. Um, and I think that's another thing that you, you know, going back to the learning concepts thing, you got to have some kind of an anchor point to attach all this stuff to some reason because the way our brains work is, like I said, they like to be efficient, right? They they they like to conserve energy. They like to conserve momentum. And so if your brain doesn't have to keep a permanent attachment between two neurons, it's not gonna, right? If you if you don't give it a reason to retain this information, it's just going to be like, "All right, I can get rid of that." Um, you know, >> what do we use this for? Don't know. Okay, bye. >> Yeah. Or you just remember it just long enough for the exam, right? And you you pass the exam, you're like, "Okay, we're done. Bye. Don't need this anymore." Um, and so you got to give it that anchor point, that that that reason to be retained. Um, and so I do but I do appreciate you say that makes me feel a little better. It's like okay yeah you know this person went through the CS degree anyway and you know yeah >> no I had uh I had internships and I remember going through school and being like every uh so I had five years of school but it was like >> school semester internship so I had six internships which were amazing >> but the I can remember school semester I would be like why am I doing this and then I would do an internship and I'm like oh this is exactly why >> that's why yeah >> back to school and I'm like why am I doing this and I I just kept remembering being like you get through this, you get to do the things that you were doing in your internships. That's the part that you like. That's the real life part. Like, you know, stick around. And um and sure enough, that's how it worked. So, um I just the whole I'm not saying that school was >> terrible or like I regret it. I certainly don't. But I think that the way that the concepts were taught just literally did not align well with how my brain wants to retain information. So, >> yeah. Yeah, and I think I think fortunately I do think things have gotten a lot better in the in the teaching space. You know, there's a lot more app, you know, applied programs and hands-on programs and learn on the job type programs nowadays, I think, than there were at least when I was going through school. A lot a lot of the less, you know, traditional sit in a lecture and just listen, take notes on paper and a lot more, okay, hands-on, go build stuff, go partner with a company, you know, that kind of thing. Building real projects, which I think is great. And but I do I always do wonder about how many, you know, really excellent coders had their careers, you know, cut short in college just because they just didn't feel like they could connect with the material in in the way that it was presented. So, you know, now creating content online and and the reason I still volunteer with 100 devs years later is just to hopefully help other people, you know, maybe either rediscover that passion for actually building stuff. Um, and or discover it maybe a little sooner than I did uh in an in, you know, in a in an environment where they don't have to give anything but their time. Um, so there's no obligation to them but their time and just help them discover that passion for just building cool stuff. Well, and that I was again glancing at notes and I wanted to segue over to this because um I'm I'm curious, right? Like I know you people that work in tech, it's like yeah, we got we got busy lives. Everyone's got busy lives. And so it's really cool that you're finding the opportunity to to create content to help other people learn. Like what does that look like for you in terms of balancing time, in terms of like uh being motivated or engaged to do it? Is it something where you wake up every day and you're like, "Hell yeah, I'm doing this." Is it something that comes kind of in in waves? Like what does that look like for you to be able to to balance that in part of your life? >> Yeah, that's a fantastic question. I love that. And um and to be completely transparent here, I have not uh streamed for several months now just because my summer has been extremely busy and I feel like, you know, you got to maintain your mental health. Um and for me, it's been I'm doing a lot of traveling. I've also become a Pilates instructor, so I'm getting my teaching outlet in a slightly different way. So, I teach fitness classes as well. Uh, and so that, you know, of course, takes up a lot of time. And so, I'm down to basically one day a week now where I have a day to myself to kind of recharge a little bit. And that day used to be my streaming day, uh, you know, which was Sunday. And so, you know, it's like, okay, I got to kind of reshuffle things here a little bit and figure out I would love to to make, you know, streaming work again, but also has to be you have also have to be very careful because I've I've known so many content creators who have gotten burned out just trying to maintain a schedule that was not feasible for them as their life changes underneath them. Um, but uh I will say when I was streaming, the way that I maintained it was um and this is not a a you know a blueprint for everyone to follow, but I do a lot of prep for my streams. So, I like to be have all my ducks in a row before I ever go live. I know there's a lot of folks, amazing folks who go online and just live code, you know, just, you know, just yolo the entire time, you know, who knows what's going to happen type of type of vibe. Uh that's not really how I roll. I usually if I'm going to build a project on stream, I have the entire thing prepped the day beforehand. It's all built already. It's on GitHub. Um, and I have, you know, worked out the kinks. I'm aware of any errors that might exist. We can address them on stream. You know, I have notes like I have a second monitor and got all, you know, everything's pulled up. Um, and then I go on stream and we, you know, we run through it from scratch, but it's already built. It's done. Um, and so, you know, for me that was kind of how I uh it took the a lot of the anxiety of streaming away to be just be like, "Yep, >> it's all done. You did it already." And, you know, it took me it gave me the m gave me the the uh motivation to really like dig into these topics. Like, you know, you say you teaching is the way to learn, right? It's like, okay, I got to talk about this topic. I gota I got to know it up and down because I am going to be getting questions from chat and who knows what those are going to be, right? I have no control over what chat's going to ask me about a particular topic. I can just do my best to present the material that I have and then go from there and and try to address any questions that chat has. So, for me, it's just um being mindful of, you know, the the the amount of time that I'm spending on any particular thing. Um really doing prep work ahead of time to make sure that I'm as comfortable as I can be on stream because a lot of my streams are three hours or more. Um, and so, you know, if I'm talking about a topic, you know, I'm I'm building if I'm building like a full stack app from scratch. We're building front end, you know, API, database, you know, that takes a long time, you know, if you're trying to build something that is substantial in any way. Um, it's not just a skeleton, right? You can build a skeleton, but that's no fun, right? It's got to be something that's going to engaate. You got to, you know, you got to play with the audience a little bit, too, right? To to get any eyes on Twitch, you got to build something that is visually interesting or have something that is going to draw people in. And so that's another aspect of it too, right? So yeah, a lot of my streams are pretty long. Um, you know, I'm talking the entire time, so got to be mindful of my voice. Um, you know, got to be mindful of that I'm eating and drinking and, you know, taking breaks to use the restroom. Uh, you know, all those things are are factors when you're trying to stay healthy and streaming for the long term. But prior to my break this summer, I mean, I had been streaming uh at least once a week. During the Hundred Devs uh cohort, live cohort, I was streaming twice a week. Um this I was streaming at least once a week for pretty much three years. Um I would say yeah two or two two and a half yeah two and a half yearsish. Uh I have a few hundred hundred uh streams in my archive on my YouTube channel and um yeah and and the consistency was really important too just knowing that like hey Sunday stream day find a topic learn something cool teaches the audience. So the consistency is a big deal too. Um which is you know I just need to find now I'm working to find that new consistency with my you know my uh fitness uh instructor you know job now and the extra demands on my time. I'm working on finding that new consistency for my schedule so I can get back to streaming because I do love it. It's so much fun to do. >> That's a it's a really interesting point. Right. The consistency for content creation is incredibly important. But I think that when sometimes people talk about this like I I really appreciate that you kind of touched on a couple different aspects of it. One is that yeah like you know for you it was Sundays are streaming day. Cool. >> So you try to as you know as much as you can like you dedicate that time towards it. But you also mentioned that like this is something that takes place over a long period of time. It's not you did this on one Sunday. This was over a long period of time and life changes right. So you may have, you know, different you work might change, you might have different interests. Like there's so many things that change in our lives that are outside of like content creation or things that we're just trying to do to help others. And so when I think about consistency, not only is it like, hey, try to find like a repeatable time that you can dedicate towards this, but it also needs to be like sustainable. And I think that's the thing that a lot of people miss is that they try to make things >> very repeatable or like I'm going to keep doing it and then they burn out or like it it suddenly doesn't fit anymore and then they go well >> I guess that's it and then it all ends >> forever. Yeah. Yes. >> And then yeah like they end up missing out on what I would say is the most important part about consistency which is like the sustainability part of it. So, um, it's cool like you're you're finding, you know, for you, you have a different outlet right now where you're able to teach and that is not not currently it's not the streaming part, but you're also looking to find a way to kind of bring that back in to get back to it because you enjoy that. But that just comes back to the sustainability part, right? You said this is a different right now, a different phase of life and cool, how do I bring that part back so that I can continue it? Which I think is really important. >> Yeah, absolutely. And you know um what you mentioned about people you know kind of flaming out it's that that happens a a lot in the online learning space that I've seen especially as adults you know because a lot of times adults and sometimes sometimes people pick up something for fun like I um but a lot of the times there is a real driver behind it like a circumstance in life change maybe they're having a kid and they need to realize they need to change careers they need benefits um you know there's financial reasons there's family reasons all these things usually there's a real life impetus behind this desire to want to learn something like coding right or like programming as an adult um if it's not something they pursued when they were younger and so they feel this sense of urgency there's this this sense of like I have to do this I have to get it done and I have to do it as quickly as possible and that's going to make my life better and so I have to do it fast because that's you know the quicker I do this the quicker my life's going to get better right and so they dive into it they're going to be like I'm going to do this every day for five hours and That just happens so often. And it's like, no, you have to pace it out. It's the same with fitness, too. Honestly, I have people that come into my fitness classes and they're like, "Okay, I have to get fit, you know, for I don't know, my wedding or whatever. So, I'm going to come every day." It's like, "No, you're going to end up injured." You know, it's just >> three weeks. I got to turn my entire life around. And it's like, uh, >> yeah. I'm going to come twice a day every day. Yeah. And then, you know, and then they it's you're gonna So, it's it's the same principle, right? You can you can injure your body from overuse. You can also injure your mind and your spirit for lack of a better word um from just doing too much. You have to be kind to yourself. Uh whether that's in content creation or in content consumption in in in the learning side of it, you know, an overwork brain is not a happy brain. And so um yeah, you just have to be so careful about that. And is um and you know, no matter what the impetus is of why you're doing it, you have to pace yourself so you can finish the marathon and actually make it to the finish line. >> Yeah. I really like that. I've had a It's pretty rare, but I've had a couple of people that I've talked to where whether it's a career change or they're trying to switch teams or like move to like front end to backend kind of like their focus area. And I've had only a couple of people that are like, "Hey, want your thoughts on this?" But the way that they kind of lay it out to me is like they're talking about a time horizon that's like, you know, potentially like 12 to 24 months. And I'm like in my head I'm like, "Thank you so much for thinking about this on on a time scale that like lets you actually make notable changes. Like you're they're probably factoring in for themselves. Like life has to continue. There's I need to dedicate time towards this, but it's not going to be every waking moment. Like it just seems a lot more sustainable." And I I I realize that that's challenging for people cuz like you said, if people are doing this out of this feeling of like this is going to make life better, there's there's a drive for it. The sooner that I can make that happen, the sooner things are better. Like that really resonates with me and I think that I like I see that in a lot of people and I feel like that's kind of like a normal human reaction. But it expecting like dramatic change rapidly is just like we want it and it's just not really realistic and it's kind of like a recipe for disappointment and and unfortunately for for generally giving up on things or failing at them and then trying to like revisit them and they're like, "Okay, I have to try again." And it's like it's my seventh attempt at trying to do this. And it's like if you could find a sustainable way to kind of bridge that, it probably, you know, would take less time even though on the onset it seems like it would take much longer. But >> yeah, no, definitely agree. And that that just reminds me of all the the craft projects I've tried over the years where it's like, oh, I'm not good at this immediately and it just goes, you know, you just give up, right? That's on a small scale, but you know, you see that a lot in uh you know, in this in this field too when people are first starting out because they feel like they don't understand anything or um you know, and they're just like, well, I guess you know, I guess I'm not cut out for this or whatever. It's like no, if you could anybody can do this. I promise you, uh anybody in any situation, there's no like the excuse can't be like, oh, you know, I don't have a good enough, you know, computer or whatever. There's people learning to do this on their phone, you know, or on a on a computer that's like a potato. I mean, it's it's just, you know, you can anybody can do this. There's so much flexibility, especially with the internet the way it is now. The resources are all out there. And but I think also too, I'm curious what your thoughts are on this. I think one of the biggest mistakes that people tend to make when they're trying to be self-taught is not finding themselves not not giving themselves the grace of finding a community and a framework to rely on. Um, you know, not finding outside support to help them and just saying I'm gonna be motivated me. I'm gonna motivate motivate myself and I'm gonna do all this on my own without finding some kind of outside support system to rely on. What do you think about that? >> Yeah, I think that probably resonates for like I think that would be very applicable for most people. And I'm trying to think about this in a more general sense. And I know like for me, there are certain things where if I wanted to go learn them or invest time into them, I am actually not a uh like a this is going to sound kind of weird. I'm not like a a community learner community uh I'm not motivated by that personally. >> Um the example that comes to mind, this is not related to software development, but you were saying that you're you know doing fitness instruction and so CrossFit is something that comes to mind for me. So, I historically was really into bodybuilding for years and years and my wife does CrossFit. I sort of retired from the bodybuilding world and uh I said to my wife, I'm going to do CrossFit with you. And the the big difference is like CrossFit is very much like it's a class. Like we go everyone it's like it's a class, everyone's doing the workout together. And that actually like it sounds kind of funny. I'm still doing it. But I'm like, I actually don't like that part about CrossFit, which sounds kind of counter to like, you know, the CrossFit culture. But I don't like it because um like I I look at that as something where like I want that to be me time. And I think that there are some things where I am personally motivated like I want this to be a thing that I do. However, I 100% agree that there are many people that to your point, it's like if that motivation's not there every day, and guess what? It's not going to be there every day. If you're unable to like have a day where you're not motivated and you're like, I guess that's it. If that's going to be the thing that deters you from showing up and stops you from progressing and then you ultimately give up, then I would say absolutely try to find some type of community, some something where you can get a little bit of that external motivation coming in. The reason I shared sort of the counter example was just because like I think that different people will find motivation in different ways and the example that I was giving is because like for me that is an internal motivation but that's like I've been going to the gym surprisingly as long as I've been programming. So that's always been something that I've had for me but not everyone will have that. And I think that, you know, some people might say, I don't want a community because I don't want to be tied to someone else's schedule, which is fine, but there's going to be people that are like, you know, if they don't even think about that as an option, then they may find themselves like, uh, like, you know, I'm going to give up or I don't even know how to get started. But if they have that community around them to boost them, I see other people in the the CrossFit example, I see other people showing up and like I can guarantee you if there wasn't a community, they wouldn't be there >> because they they need that to thrive. And I think that's great. >> Yeah. I think learning as an adult, we tend to put there's no because there's no like structure to it, right? We're not we don't have to nobody's asking us to go to class every day. Nobody's telling us, okay, today you're going to learn this. A lot so much of it is self-driven in so many ways and it puts a lot of mental pressure on ourselves because we're dealing with everything else in our lives too. You have to, you know, you have to do all the things that are required for living and make car payments and, you know, clean your house and wash dishes and whatever. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. you have to just exist as an adult in in a in a first world country and and and then all of a sudden you're just you know like then you have to do all this additional mental load as well of learning and so >> it's sometimes it's nice to have the option to offload some of that onto either you know a community that's going to kind of help keep you on track or people that can help answer questions for you um people you can reach out to you know to just be like hey like I'm just not understanding this and I've spent three hours on it like can we just sit can you just help somebody help me with this you know stuff like that and I think that, you know, like you said, some people are don't thrive in that environment. Some people feel like, I don't want anybody telling me what I'm learning next. I'm going to do this. This is entirely self-driven. I'm extremely passionate about this. Like, don't get in my way. And that's totally fine, too. But I feel like um everybody should at least have a community they can fall back on. Um even if it's not something they spend a lot of time in, either. >> Yep. And and even in the example I gave, I think that that's significantly less common. Like I think that the overwhelming I don't have stats or data to prove this, but I think over there's an overwhelming number of people that would benefit from having something like a community that they can rely on. Um at least based on my experience talking to people in the software space trying to learn, get started, I I would 100% agree with that. >> Yeah. And I mean just me per like speaking from my personal experience. I'm a very like independent person I guess. I I like I I do a lot of things just myself like I'm very self-driven. I you know I travel solo everywhere around the world and and you know I do all these things just me like on my own schedule my own time. I just prefer it that way. But man when it comes to learning something new I need something to keep me on track because it my brain is going to self-sabotage if it can. It's going to be like nah I want to save some energy here. We're not going to learn this today. And maybe maybe it'd be easier if we just never tried it again, you know? Maybe maybe it wasn't worth it, right? Maybe we should just stay in our little safe spot and not, you know, learn anything new today. And that'll that'll just save some energy, you know? >> I think that's like a it's a really good reflection. And probably I don't know. I feel like >> we're not taught this kind of thing >> ever, but like this this ability to kind of like look internally and un like I don't know like the per the person who's going to understand ourselves best is ourselves, right? So um if you don't practice doing this reflection to be like hey like what is you know how do I learn effectively or like what gets me motivated or if you never take the time to do this reflection you just make assumptions about yourself and your life by looking at other people and like well other people you know other people say if you wake up at 5:00 a.m. and you make your bed and you get into the ice bath and like all of a sudden you will just be a better human and it's like >> maybe not maybe that's not what you need. But we we often don't do this reflection for ourselves to be like hey like you know would would I benefit from this? Am I self-sabotaging? Do I have a tendency to do this? Like we don't do that kind of reflection and we really should. >> Yeah. Yeah. And I find that and and maybe this is just me, but I find that a lot of the the rhetoric around, you know, self-improvement as an adult and, you know, being a better human and learning stuff, a lot of it is about all the stuff that you shouldn't be doing versus, you know, people telling you what you shouldn't do or what you're doing wrong versus somebody telling you, "Let me help you with that." Like, let me just let me support you and help you improve versus telling you all the things that you've done wrong and basic basically saying, "Be better." So, >> yeah. Did you ever consider just uh being better? Like I don't know. >> Did you Did you Did you ever just enumerate all the things you're bad at and like all the things you're not doing correctly and Yeah. Yeah. A lot of that seems to be >> try being a better person. Yeah. >> Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Versus like, hey, like here's this community like come join us. We're all learning together. We all make mistakes. Let's like let's just all support each other. And a rising tide lifts all boats, right? So yeah, I just find that that's so important. But in the age of the internet now the way it exists we all have all these wonderful community spaces all these virtual third spaces as the the concept you know we a lot of us don't have you heard the concept of the third space >> I have not no >> yeah so that's a like a um it's a concept I guess in philosophy where um and it used to be a lot more common before the modern age of you know everybody being so disconnected from each other and so separated physically by distance and there would just be places where people could gather in public and just not for any reason not to buy something or to view something or to necessarily even have an experience together but just to come and be with each other you know >> just the the ideas and sorry I think I actually have heard this the third space being like not work not home but like it is a third space >> the intermediate space yeah so many of us now just go to work and we go home and so you're spending this you're spending time with just the same units of people all the time and so you're not getting you're getting not getting any new exposure. You're not getting any new stimulation or any new momentum towards maybe making a shift or learning something new or getting an interest or or finding a new something something new to feel creative about or to share or to share something with others. Um and you know that so physical third spaces used to be really common and people could just go there and hang out in the town square or you know in a in a park on a bench you know or you know just watching people play chess or whatever. Um, but fortunately I do feel like we're in the age of the online third space now. Whether that's as healthy as a physical third space, I don't know, but it's what we have, right? And uh so places like Discord or or Twitch or you know um those places are so valuable if you can find a space that welcomes you and will support you that that's a great alternative to the physical third space and it can be a real motivator in keeping you engaged mentally in the things outside of work and home and family and and all the drudgery of modern life that um to help us be something more and be something better. >> Yeah, that's super interesting. I I like that. Um, yeah. I think I It's funny you mentioned the Third Space thing because when you said it, I was like, "No, I don't know what that is." But I'm like, I actually think that I read Third Space like somewhere this week in like probably, I don't know, like a a Google News like thing on my phone when I was scrolling. I thought that I saw Third Space. That's why I was like, "Wait a second. I think that is the thing between work and home." Um but yeah, I think you make a really good point that like if we have these online communities, these like these these places we can be even if it's not physically um that we have this opportunity to interact with others that yeah like it's it's outside of these these groups of people that we otherwise spend all of our time with, right? like not that I'm complaining about who I spend my time with, but you have more these other opportunities. You have other opportunities for different things to be exposed to, which I think is very helpful. >> Yeah. And I think one of the main um difficulties in finding a good online third space is sometimes that so many online spaces require like some sort of monetary commitment to even enter them, right? Um and you know so that's one thing that you know like I said there's nothing wrong with people who've done a boot camp and you know paid boot camp but so many of those have a financial barrier to entry right and so people who can't meet the barrier can't can't go in and and in my opinion you know if you're trying to learn something new um or find a community like your time has value it it it can't be equated to to money but your time is valuable the time you're choosing to spend on this thing has value so you know that is worth something so I One thing I really appreciate about 100 devs is they don't make you pay money on top of the time you are already paying to be in this space in this community and I think that's part of what makes it a true third space is that anyone can can join it and so you know there there's no barrier to being a part of that community >> right well no Claire that makes a lot of sense and I wanted to ask you sort of like a maybe a final thought from you and I know you said you you will be getting back into streaming and stuff but maybe for for folks that are listening and watching Um where like from your perspective where would be you know great spots for them if they're like uh for third space sort of opportunities like what would be sort of top of mind for you uh to suggest to them and then when you are kind of getting back uh into doing more streaming and stuff where could people you know find you to to learn from you? Yeah, absolutely. So, um there are some really great uh sort of coding communities out there. Um and I think you know I was at commit your the commit your code conference uh last week and uh you know saw kind of the the benefits of that online community there. Um so uh so obviously I'm going to plug 100 devs. That is it's 100devs.org. Uh you can join our Discord. Like I say, no barrier to entry. There's no commitment, nothing like that. You can join, try it out. If you don't like it, that's fine. Uh if you do like it, come hang out with us and learn to code or learn something new or help others. Um it's your choice how you wish to participate. Um and I would also recommend free code camp. Uh they're an awesome awesome great resource. You can learn really just any aspect of coding that you'd like to pursue. Um again, there's, you know, they have they're launching new new tracks all the time. I think they're I heard they're doing something with language here pretty soon, like learning a like there's launching a language track. That's wild. I haven't confirmed that. Don't quote me on that. But uh uh I did hear about that. Um and then there's also um I'm not going to get this right. Uh the so the commit your code community does have a discord. Um I'm not quite sure how to uh access that off the top of my head, but they do have their own discord. If you go to their website, I'm sure you can find information on how to join that community. They also have a you know learning cohort, supportive community, and you know, again, no barrier to entry there either. Um, and also too, I I do want to encourage people to also you can start your own space as well using the tools that we already have using Discord, using uh Twitch. I I always recommend people to try out Twitch streaming. Like um there's nothing again, there's no barrier to entry there either. When I first started streaming, I had a busted laptop. I had no camera. I had no mic. My microphone was the little cruddy one that, you know, comes with the laptop. I had that. I didn't have a second monitor. Um I just I had a little 14-inch laptop screen and that was it. I had to coordinate everything on my one little screen, no camera. Um and I would occasionally while I was streaming, I would have to mute myself, turn the laptop over and smack it because the fan would stop working. So, you know, there's there's no like you can people stream on their phones. I mean, you can do that. You can create your own community uh in a space like Twitch. And you know, even they're nobody's probably going to watch you at first. And you know, you're probably not going to have any eyes on you at all. And that's fine. You can start just teaching to an empty room and maybe you'll start to build a community around that if your content is good. If you're in, you know, if you're creating a warm and welcoming space. Um, and what's the worst that can happen, right? You're going to be rehearsing topics that you're trying to learn. Uh, or you're going to be building cool stuff, and at the end of it, maybe you don't have any viewers, but you have something cool. and maybe you've learned a new topic and you've you've learned how to talk about it. You've learned how to present to a room to a space. Um and so really it's just a net positive. So I also encourage people to try starting your own creating your own community, creating your own space. Um and yeah, if you're interested in checking out my content, uh you can find me on YouTube uh at Mayanwolf Streams. Uh so pretty much on all socials, my username is Mayanwolf, M A Yan WF E. Uh sometimes you come up with a username when you're 13 and it follows you for the rest of your life. You know, that's how it goes. Uh but yeah, so that is my username on pretty much any social. Uh you can find me on X, you can find me on Blue Sky, you can find me on Twitch, uh YouTube, uh under under that name. So uh yeah, I'm always happy to connect with folks um folks from 100 devs, but also from anywhere in the community. Connect with me, you know, uh if you want to collaborate, let's collab, you know. uh always happy to to meet folks especially folks who are in the teaching space or who are in the educational content creation space. I really love learning from them uh bettering myself, bettering my content and uh learning how to reach more people in a more effective way. >> Yeah, I and so thank you so much. I I really love that last bit of advice too on like I I will tell people the learn in public thing. You're even saying like teach in public, right? like this the advice you just gave around like hey maybe no one's showing up to your stream or whatever like literally you only have positive things that can happen from that. It doesn't matter if no one's showing up. You are we said this earlier in this uh in this recording, right? Like you trying to teach things to other people will teach you all of the things that that you maybe don't know as well as you thought. And there's nothing wrong with that. Anyone who's trying this kind of stuff out for the first time, it's going to suck in the beginning. That's totally cool. No one's first time doing anything is good. And don't expect it to be. That's not the point. Just keep doing it. You will get better. You will learn so much about how to teach. You'll learn about the topics you're trying to teach. And you know, I would say the the side effect that would be really cool is if yeah, people do start showing up and learning from you. That's great. But there's so much that you can gain just from trying to do it. And I would highly recommend it. I I wish I for my content creation, I tried in 2013 and I gave up after a few months because I was doing it for the wrong reasons. I was like, no one's reading my blog. Like, oh, like, why am I doing this? >> Yeah. I mean, that's that's one thing I always tell people is just like if you're going to start streaming, don't do it for the viewers or the money. It's that's not a good way to get started in the space. store. I don't know the streamers, but Mr. Beast on YouTube. Like, you're not going to be this person like from trying to to stream after a week or something. So, don't expect it. That's fine. There's >> it's like that should not be the goal. It's not that that's impossible to happen, but like don't I would say don't go into it with that that perspective. And >> yeah. Yeah. My goal with streaming is or or creating any kind of content is always just to put something out in the world that I hope will be beneficial to someone and also hopefully beneficial to me as I'm as I'm putting that content together. And so the you know yeah you should never go into it just from the purely sort of like like for example I I went to college because I thought I was going into a field that could make me money right and had a miserable time you know I picked a field just because I thought oh I can make money with this and it it was the worst decision right it's the same thing with something like streaming or content creation if you if you if you go into it just saying like oh I want all the fame and the money out right out the gate you're going to have a bad time. >> Yeah that's really good advice. Uh, Claire, thank you so much for this conversation. I think that there's a ton of really useful information. Uh, I'll get links and stuff. I'll put that into the description so people can check that out. Uh, especially for the commit your code stuff because I know if Danny ever watches this, he's going to say, "What do you mean you don't have the links for this stuff?" Um, I'll make sure I have them. >> Yes, I'm I have them somewhere. I just don't know them. You know, top of mind. Absolutely. >> They're not right here, but they're somewhere. Yeah. >> Yes. Yes. Absolutely. Yeah. I'm in the Discord, Danny. It's okay. >> Yeah. Awesome. Thanks again, Claire. >> Yes, thank you so much for having me. I really appreciate it.