Well, it’s been roughly six months since I’ve sat myself down to do some blog writing, but fortunately as I have no audience…….no one noticed.
Now that I sit at my desk mulling how to play catch up with some anecdotal musings of the elapsed time, I’m obliged to do a mental audit of the past six months just to appease the tyrannical life coach that resides in the dark corners of my consciousness.
In that militant corner, where self compassion rarely treads, but the time police often linger for possible infractions, the concept of accountability is scored into the walls. Here every turn of the earth requires it’s own keynote speech, to justify how I spent those precious moments in worthwhile endeavours.
So just on the remote possibility that anyone reads this blog and does so chronologically (possibly not until after my death and even then purely by chance) let’s get up to speed with what I’ve been doing in relation to the previous posts.
Diet….
I have remained on the same dietary trajectory that I began writing about, namely to keep myself from becoming the human equivalent of a young Shar-pei (a lovely dog, but I can’t pull off the folds). After six months of monitoring it felt like I had established some good awareness of my diet and made the necessary but sustainable shifts to keep maintain good habits and keep it on track. I decided to pause the daily tracking and give the relentless photography of meals a rest (which I found particularly tedious).
I’ve come to accept that now I’ve shifted from the high stress and exertion of kitchen life that my body has found a new equilibrium that is distinctly heavier that it previously was. Now I just need to manage my fat percentage and keep that at a level that’s considered healthy.
Fitness….
After a prolonged period of unstructured exercise I have finally taken the plunge and resumed a gym based routine, embracing once again to the broad structure of CrossFit as a means to stay fit and healthy. I have to admit that i’ve really enjoyed rekindling this aspect of my life again and the moments of agony do little to dampen this.
On a secondary note and after a few false starts i’ve committed fully to taking up BJJ as a long term past-time and lifeskill. This new hobby warrants many musings alone and I intend on writing about it in much greater depth, but for this mention here, I just value it as a privilege to learn and enjoy on a regular basis.
Career change….
So really this has been the biggie and a predominant (quite intense) focus over this period.
It really ramped up in September (hence the blog drop off) when I applied for a Junior Software Developer role in the civil service. I had spent the previous month or so working my way through a course on learning the Ruby coding language and it was a specific requirement of the role. To apply felt ambitious and possibly a touch unrealistic but I thought it was worth the effort.
Once the application was in, so began a frantic period of solidifying the veneer of knowledge I had acquired. When the anticipated notification of my application being declined, eventually appeared in my inbox several weeks later, I had already realised that to successfully break into this new career field I needed to reevaluate my approach.
I had been applying a consistent amount of energy to learning to code, fragmented by necessary tasks and erratic opportunities to work, for about a year, but my progress felt slow and frustrating.
On reflection, my expectations have probably always been optimistic, possibly verging on ignorant. If a standard Computer Science degree was 3 years to build a foundation to get an entry level position, possibly throwing in an internship along the way, how quickly did I honestly think I would gain competency learning solo, with bits and baps of life commitments along the way?
I concluded that I needed to shift my approach with three things….
- A pathway of learning designed to focus on industry valuable skills, possibly not enough to get the job but certainly a boost in the right direction and offering valuable insight as to what to learn next.
- A classroom style environment offering real, regular contact with both tutors and other students. The luxury of being able to ask a direct question to someone in the world of learning to code can literally save hours, maybe even days, whilst the comararderie of struggling with other students keeps the imposter syndrome at bay and the laptop in one piece.
- An uncomfortable pace of learning that would push me to the limits of keeping my head above water.
I was fortunate to find the perfect fit, namely the Northcoders Coding Bootcamp, that was offering scholarships funded by the Government’s Lifetime Skills Guarantee and Plan for Jobs.
To access the course required a body of preliminary study to learn some basics and a technical exam to demonstrate a comprehension of those basics. It was an intense few weeks but by the middle of November I was proudly in my introductory week of the program.
Up until a few weeks ago this has been my weekly routine, a safe and secure 9-5, Monday to Friday. No doubts around time management, no nagging questions about direction and applied energy. Nope, fortunately this period has managed to quell all of these guilt ridden thoughts of questioning yourself for not being in a full time job. Instead it’s replaced it with a combination of feelings of utter inadequacy, with glimpses of lurking superpowers.
I feel like despite the efforts of the past year and a half i’m only just entering a new phase.
