Learning in public

I've always hesitated sharing publicly what I have learned and what I'm working on, not because I fear being wrong, but that I always assumed "everyone probably knows this" or "I'm not sharing anything that's special".
After reading Swyx's article I realised that the main consumer of such a content would be me. I need to create a knowledge base for myself, and sharing as I learn will give me that. Whether this commitment to Learn in Public helps others or not, it should not stop me from showing my work.

Recording TIL on GitHub

At every role I've had I've always made mental notes about little snippets of code I found interesting, and thought that using it immediately would cement that knowledge in. But over the years I've lost count of so many useful little bits that I needed to use but can't find again. I just have a vague idea I can't put to words and spend hours searching for it again, scouring documentation and blogs till I find it or give up.
When I found out about Josh Branchaud's TIL repo this little mind was blown.

Brag document

This one is a relatively new idea to me. I didn't even realise documenting my everyday work would help me in the future, with things like CV/resume, performance reviews etc. Julia Evans has a great template to start logging all your wins. I’m calling mine the Brag Log.

Note:
It wasn’t really today but in the last few weeks

I started to feel the itch to come back sometime last year, and I’m finding it an interesting experience navigating this as a mother.

I left at the start of 2020, on maternity leave. I was so burnt out at this time but for some reason I thought I’d be able to continue working after a few months “off” being a new mum. I had no clue…

Being a mother has been the hardest job of my life, and when I decide to do something I put everything into it. And so I did for nearly 4 years, except I started to feel less and less like me so I've spent the last 6 months restarting my passion for coding. And it’s been a journey!

So getting back to the burnout. I am a woman in tech, now if that doesn’t give you all the context you need to understand why I burnt out, let me explain:

1. I’m a woman, so I work at least three times harder to get noticed for my skills. I shouldn’t need to.

2. I put in a lot of energy to be heard, and almost always the impact was small.

3. My qualifications get me in the door, but my gender, skin colour and accent keeps me from getting any further.

All of this and more left me exhausted, and over time I was left feeling like an outsider. You are free to disagree with me on any of this but I’m no longer going to put the burden on myself for others discriminating me. I’ve grown these past few years, and I’m learning to stand up for myself and take space.

And so today, I’m committing to this:

1. Let my thoughts out in the open

2. Share what I learn as I learn it

3. Pace myself