#100 - The Final Episode

Speaker A: Mhm.

Speaker B: Hello and welcome to Self Taught Devs. If this is your first time joining us, this is a podcast where two self taught developers discuss the learning and growth experience for folks just getting into the industry. My name is Eric Winklespect and I'm Matt Ehrlich. Sick dude.

Speaker A: This is it. Yeah. So uh, if you all have made it this far, congratulations. You're at the end of the road for us. Uh, episode 100, really this, this podcast, I think we got to the point where we were like, we hit our goal at episode what, like 85?

Speaker B: Yeah, somewhere, something like that.

Speaker A: Ah, so these last few episodes, these were really just to, ah, to keep the good times going, to hit our goal of 100 episodes. Um, it's been an awesome experience overall, uh, for me and uh, it's a bit bittersweet. On one hand I'm happy it's over because that means we hit our goal. Um, on the other hand, I'm gonna miss it. I like, I really do enjoy interacting with people and uh, you know, trying to help others. So bittersweet on this side.

Speaker B: Yeah, it's, it's been quite a ride. It's. I, I don't know that I've entirely processed how I feel about it all. You know, like, I remember around the 80 or so mark, whenever that was, we took like a very brief hiatus and kind of just chatted about it and we were like, yeah, we think we kind of did what we wanted to do, which was the original. Well, the goal of why we started doing the podcast really was like, let's talk about our journeys, let's share kind of the process of making a career transition of learning software engineering. Let's talk to some interesting people. And I think we did a lot of that. And then as we kind of kept going, you know, we grew in different ways. You know, you had a different career path kind of that you ended up following. Um, I, you know, stayed with the software engineering side of things. But there's only so much that the original goal of the podcast, which was like the learning and development of getting into the industry right in those beginning phases, there's only so much of that we could continue to talk about and kind of reinvest ourselves in. And I think we didn't want to get too repetitive, so we kind of were like, let's keep going a little bit longer, get to episode 100, set ourselves a nice, a nice ending goal of getting to that number and continue to talk about some interesting topics. And I'm glad we did it I'm glad we didn't just, like, stop at that point because I like that we kind of gave ourselves something to commit to and here we are. But I don't know, man, what do you want to do today? Because I. I like the idea of looking back and kind of just taking a retrospective on the. How long has it been? Two years. The first episode was January of 20. I wrote this down earlier. Hold on. January of 20. 23. Right. So we've gone. It's April. So we're over two years. Two years and a couple of months of doing this thing.

Speaker A: Yeah, it doesn't feel like that long. Like, I wasn't tracking the time throughout the whole time, and now it's, you know, thinking back. Wow, almost two and a half years. Holy. Holy crap. Yeah, it really doesn't. It doesn't feel like that long.

Speaker B: Wow.

Speaker A: I think, um, you want to start with, I guess, for anyone who, let's say, joined a little bit later, uh, and maybe, let's say, hasn't been with us since the first episode. Kind of want to go over maybe, like, how and why we got here or how we started, uh, and why, maybe.

Speaker B: Sure.

Speaker A: I think that's an idea, like, to hit on.

Speaker B: Yeah.

Speaker A: I have a few topics here that I wrote down. We don't have to follow it, but that was one. I was like, yeah, let's see. Yeah, let's talk through it. Yeah. So let's see if I. I feel like every time I mention this, something, something about it changes. I think we were. Oh, I was having an issue with one of my projects. Uh, I was building in public, and I think I said, um, I was having some kind of issue. I can't remember what it was, but I think you replied to me or sent me a message, something like that, offering help.

Speaker B: Yeah.

Speaker A: And stop me and correct me if, uh, if I'm remembering all this wrong.

Speaker B: We. From what it started in my memory was we had actually, like, we connected on LinkedIn because you were doing your videos and stuff already and kind of just your posts where you were like, I suck at coding. And. And you were just like, very real about the experience. And I was like, this guy, he's a breath of fresh air. I want to reach out and say, hey. And I think we just chatted a little bit. And I remember we had already planned to do just like a video call and record it and just do some kind of collaboration. And then the whole, like, hey, I'm also doing this project and I'm having trouble. Right. And we Connected on that. Ah, as well. And I know we talked through it and, and even just talking through the coding problem, I remember being like, this is a lot of fun just chatting with you and kind of going through stuff. And then we, we did the call, which originally was just kind of a one off thing, but as we were going through it we were like, this is also cool. Maybe we should just kind of continue to do this and do it semi regularly, weekly, whatever, and do a podcast out of it. I think it just kind of spawned out of that first general phone call that we had.

Speaker A: That sounds about right to me. Let's m. Go with that. Yeah, I think that's, I think that's very accurate. Uh, and then, yeah, I think, um, I wasn't planning on ever doing a podcast. It's strange how that kind of just popped up some. Sometimes things just kind of happen and you go with it and they turn into. To something else. And that's what it was for me. You know, I wasn't, I was even thinking about making a podcast. I was making YouTube videos at the time, so I was comfortable with talking online. But uh. And you were too, right? You were also at that time you were making YouTube videos too?

Speaker B: Yeah, I had like just started doing some like code along videos where I was just like making a project and just recording myself talking about it. And I think we were like, let's do a YouTube video like collaboration thing. And I actually, I went back and I listened to like the first couple episodes of our podcast. And the first one, the first like two weren't even numbered because we were. The first one was just literally like, let's just talk and like get to know each other a little bit and talk about how we're starting this thing. And then after that was when we were like, let's keep going with this and do it as a regular thing. And it turned into the podcast versus like a video thing. But yeah, we were both starting to do video stuff. We're doing a little bit of it at the time, which is just like, I think most of how I even first kind of saw what you were doing was the videos you were putting up and talking about your stuff.

Speaker A: Yeah, it's funny looking back at that stuff. I think it's the same thing with code where you're just like, oh man, that really sucked.

Speaker B: It's terrible.

Speaker A: That sounds awful. Oh, how could I even make or say those things? Uh, which is. Which was a fun thing to do. But yeah, I think for both of us it just kind of uh, spawned from the wanting to just share our experience for other people. Yeah, I can say it was solely for other people, but I think that would be a lie because I really just enjoyed it. I got a lot out of it as well. So there was some, some, I guess some selfishness in that too, but really I just, we just enjoyed giving that information to other people because there's so much crap out there and nonsense.

Speaker B: Yeah.

Speaker A: Um, and people just saying things for, let's say, followers, views, money, whatever, fame, who knows. And it was just nice to, to say, hey, like that might not be your experience. Here is ours. Mhm.

Speaker B: Yeah, it was, it was, I think part of it was just a drive to do something different for the community we were finding, you know, because I, like I said I wouldn't have looking back, like, I'm glad I went back and listened to a few early episodes because we talked a decent amount about like doing the LinkedIn thing and connecting with other folks in the community and kind of finding support there and hearing different stories and wanting to like, just share our own story. Because like you were saying, like there was, there was and continues to be a lot of stuff of just like, go learn to code and you can get a job in a couple of months and like trying to shatter those wild expectations that folks were setting just to try to like get views and get, you know, people interacting and talking about it from a more nuanced perspective and a more transparent kind of point of view. You know, I liked getting into that with you and having those conversations of like, here's where we're failing and here's where we think we are succeeding and here's the mistakes we're making and like just kind of being honest about it and putting stuff out there and having a different way to connect with people was nice.

Speaker A: Yeah, you don't really get a whole lot of those conversations. A lot. I think people are just scared of, of looking know, quote unquote, of looking stupid or, or looking like a failure or um, looking like you don't know what you're doing, but you kind of don't. Especially early on, you don't know what you're doing. You didn't know what you were doing when you first started. I had no idea what I was doing. No one does, you know, and it's like we, I don't, I. We didn't want to show ourselves as experts when we were like, yeah, you know, somebody, everyone starts somewhere.

Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, I m still feel that way where like, you know, we'll probably talk at the end about what's, what's in the future for us. But like, anytime I think about doing any kind of like, video content or anything else that's like, software engineering related, I am still, even though I've been doing the job for a year and a half or whatever it is, uh, October will be two years for me professionally. And before I was even hired, when we started the podcast, I was learning for about a year. Right. So I've been doing this thing for a number of years. At this point, I still do not want to portray myself as an expert. You know, I know a bunch and I think I'm pretty good, but I don't want to ever come across as like, the person, you know, the expert, the expert on any of this subject matter because, like, that just feels bad and weird. Like, you know, you're always out there to learn something new and grow with other people. So, um, just a thing that I continue to think about when I look at kind of the landscape of what's out there in, you know, the, the content space of software engineering, I guess. Right. It's a mix. You know, there's some good folks out there doing stuff, but, uh, I think there's always going to be those, those influencers, uh, who want you to think they have all the answers.

Speaker A: Yeah, I kind of, I guess, like a little bit off topic. I'll go back. But it kind of makes me think about, like, what else we think is, like, how things are when it's completely opposite. Um, that, that was a side note. Uh, yeah. And, um, yeah, I think I wanted to make what I didn't get out of looking out of searching for this type of thing. I feel like I just, I wasn't getting that thing. So I wanted to, to make it. It was good and it was a good lesson because, number one, I didn't care how I looked. I was like, I'm just. I don't even have a following. No one knows who I am if I fail and I look stupid. Oh, well, online isn't real anyway.

Speaker B: Right.

Speaker A: Um, but if people liked it, then that, that'd be cool. That's a nice plus because I'm sure they're not getting that out of their community or what they're seeing online too. Um, and so, yeah, in that sense, it was a breath of fresh air also because, like, just saying and being able to say you suck or this is making me, is driving me crazy that I can't solve this problem. And I'm getting angry and frustrated And I feel like a loser. It feels good to just be able to say that kind of stuff and not have to put up a front all the time.

Speaker B: Mhm. Yeah, I, uh, I don't know. I know you just said you have like a list of things you want to hit. Do you want to run through some of those things? Should we do like, I don't know, should we do kind of a pulled back view of the journey of the 100 episodes? Because, I mean, we can talk through some of the episodes that we had released. We can talk through some of the statistics of stuff if we want to do that. I don't really know exactly where we want to take this thing to try to make it enjoyable for folks to. You know, I think I, I also want to do this too. Like, I want to thank everybody again at the end, but I want to say a big thank you right now before we forget to do so, of like, just a big, uh, big thank you to folks that have listened from day one or who joined at any point along the way, for folks that were on the show, for folks who sent in questions or comments or whatever, for the people who supported on Patreon at any point in time. All that stuff is super, super meaningful to both of us. And you know, we did this for people to check out and listen to and to interact with you out there. So thank you for, for all of that.

Speaker A: Yeah, I definitely, absolutely. Thank you. Um, to everyone who even did anything and put any sort of support towards our direction. I'm shocked that anyone really listens to anything I have to say. Um, so the fact that people were listening and joining us, let's say weekly or even monthly, whatever it was, uh, it means a lot because, um, I think we had some really great supporters and people who wanted to see us do well with the podcast. So yeah, absolutely. Thank you all. You want to go over like, let's say some of our, our favorite podcast moments?

Speaker B: Sure.

Speaker A: Just our favorite episodes.

Speaker B: Sure, we can do that.

Speaker A: I will say one of my favorite conversations was with Andrew Clarkson.

Speaker B: Um,

Speaker A: I haven't spoken to him in some time, but that guy's just great. He's a good dude. Uh, I saw some of the community building he was doing and I was like, wow, this is a great example of some good things to do and how to bring people together and help, um, and support others. And that was just a fun conversation. I reached out to him to ask questions and he was like, yeah, absolutely. Um, you don't always get that from everyone, especially when you're not really known. And he was just like, yeah, I'll help you. I'll answer your questions.

Speaker B: Yeah.

Speaker A: So that was one of my favorite episodes.

Speaker B: Yeah, definitely a highlight, uh, to be able to have Andrew on and to get to know him better and just to be able to chat with him on the side about, you know, whatever. I think he was definitely a highlight of what could be positive in the community and trying to just highlight folks and, you know, he did his own, you know, video conversations that we. I joined a few of those things. And just to be able to see somebody in the community being like, I don't know, someone to just lift other people up, you know, not someone who's trying to highlight themselves for any specific reason. But he's just was supportive of anybody who was trying to make the transition, um, since he was pretty successful doing it himself. Right. And went, you know, learned the material and was able to get a job and be successful and wanted to promote anybody else doing it. So definitely a huge highlight. Uh, one of my other favorite guests that we've had on twice, I believe. Right. Was Odell Purifoy. Uh, Odell was just, uh, and continues to be just a source of motivation and think is a great speaker. He came on and just spoke from the heart. And those episodes I would go back and listen to and just try to get a bunch of insights over and over of just, uh, his viewpoint on things, his. His perspective on motivation and continuing the journey always did, uh, a lot for me. And it was really a pleasure to have him on and just have those conversations.

Speaker A: Yeah, it's always a good time when someone's excited to, to share their, their information. And, um, also not specifically pertaining to the podcast. Sometimes you talk to people and they have a lot of information. They're very smart, but they're just like, dull. And um, it's just like they stick straight to the facts in a conversation, which is good sometimes, but, uh, sometimes it's boring. Odell was like, he was entertaining. He's a cool dude. I feel like it's somebody I could, let's say, grab a beer with, um, after work one day or something. So. Absolutely. I enjoyed those conversations as well. And as far as favorite moments go, I think, uh, any time where I tend to ramble on a lot and any time where we just get to have like, those side conversations, I think those side conversations were, uh, some of my favorites where we're like, we're on a topic, we travel off the, uh, path a little bit and have like a Little bit of a side conversation before bringing it back in. Those were some of my favorite moments because you get some good and get like those thoughts that pop into your head. Uh, so I can't name a specific one, but anytime we were able to do something like that, I had a good time.

Speaker B: Mhm. Yeah, I, um, favorite, uh, moments. I think, you know, there were a number of moments where we got to talk pretty deeply about like mental health topics, you know, in going through the career change journey and like dealing with rejection and just those things that are a little bit harder that people don't often want to highlight. You know, I always enjoyed when we got to do that because it was just nice to take that, dive into certain areas that don't get enough attention and people tend to struggle with, you know, we all struggled with it. Going through rejection, getting, you know, emails or going through interviews and then getting bounced out of the process and having to deal with that in a way that allowed you to continue forward and carry on, you know, those, those were some of the conversations that always stuck with me. I'm glad we did. They're hard because speaking honestly about that stuff is tough, but I'm glad we did them.

Speaker A: I like it too. I do enjoy like the, the mental health aspect and like the, the job search topics that we did about how it was so rough and like how it sucked. I know a lot of other people are going through that, so I think just to, to be a source of like, hey, you know, it's not just you, uh, don't be so hard on yourself. This is, uh, just a thing that people go through. Some folks get jobs very quickly. Some folks might take 1, 2, 3, 4 years. And you know, it's like, it's, it's different for everyone. So don't, uh, be so hard on yourself. Imposter syndrome. That was another one that we talked about, which is more of like on the psychology side. Yeah, I like, I like those deeper conversations and not just like the technical stuff.

Speaker B: Mhm. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, we did this as it's. We, you know, we definitely had our moment or I, I tried to push a, a moment or two of trying to have technical conversations, which like, is cool. Is also really hard to do from a podcast perspective. Right. But it was nice to dive into any of the more just personal topics, uh, because we're all people and we're all just trying to make that human connection, you know. And I think it's very easy when learning technical topics to lose sight of the fact that there's a lot of human stuff still going on with you versus the technical stuff that you need to try to cram in your brain to try to be successful down the road. Well, I mean, I'm going to say the selfish one for me as another highlight was like, when I did get my first job in software engineering, as part of our conversations, I was able to share that and reflect on that journey and reflect on finding success in that journey. You know, I'm glad that is something I can go back to and actually like, have a record of in, in this podcast and go back and listen to if I want to in the future. I think that is just super cool. Was nice to have that moment right as part of this. And like, you had the same kind of thing with getting your roles in software engineering when, uh, those came up, you know, like, it was just nice to find success and celebrate that together and, you know, with, with an audience of folks, you know, not trying to, like, show off by any means. Right. But we're all supportive of each other and just. It's nice to have those moments.

Speaker A: Yeah. And I like that it also showed the different ways you could kind of get involved in this sort of career. I was doing a bunch of different stuff. Uh, volunteering. Um, I had little roles here and there and you got like the big full time position. So I think it just showed that, like, you can still do this even if it's not exactly what you set out to do. And the process, the process works. It might take time, it might not be exactly what you want, but if it's something that you do want and it's something that you don't want to give up on, sometimes, you know, it might be worth it to just stick it out for a little bit. And I, uh, think we showed a lot of different ways on how to grow and how to keep learning and how to keep building things. We even talked about how to make projects and what sort of projects to make and maybe what sort of projects you'd like to stay away from. So there are different ways to get into this. What are some. I'm curious, what are some lessons that you might have learned throughout this process?

Speaker B: That's funny. I had that as a question. I asked you as well. Um, lessons that I learned about this process. You know, uh, I guess if I were to reflect back on lessons from the podcasting process, to start is just like, it is not that difficult to start something new. You know, it can be scary, but I think just finding a groove and getting into a Regular process, you know, committing to something as a project, it can be challenging. Maybe from, like, I don't know. I think. I think I've learned to try to let myself go a little bit more in the respect of the podcast space of, like, what we're talking about, you know, because I definitely had moments where I was like, you know, like we talked about before, where it's like, I don't want to be trying to, like, come across as an expert by any means on stuff. So when we talk about things like what are. What are projects we think you should do to help you find success in this stuff, like, I think we did a good job talking about those things, like, from our own perspective and as opinions and things like that. And I think I definitely learned the lesson of, like, you are who you are in this process, and as long as you're honest about what you are doing and what you are trying to do as part of the content you're making. Right. This whole thing we do, um, it feels a lot better to try to just do it from the perspective of, or from. From the place of just pure honesty versus, like, the times I would try to go through and do, you know, various video content of, like, teaching something. I did a small handful of those things, and they were good and I'm proud of the stuff that I did, but I don't think they ever really, like, felt as good as some of just like, the genuine conversations that we had as part of the podcast. So, um, forgive me for kind of divulging through a few different thought processes there, but I think my, My first takeaway of lessons learned is honesty above all else and transparency above all else as much as possible when you do something like this. Makes it a much nicer process.

Speaker A: Yeah. And then. And what you originally said was it's. It's a lot easier than you might think. Uh, mine would be like, cut the. Along with what you said. It's more of like, just cut out all the bullshit. We, uh, could have spent a lot of time thinking about uploading schedule and marketing and, um, sponsorships and PA deals and how we're going to continuously grow and put a lot of that extra effort into it before even starting. And I think this lesson could be applied to really anything. It's like, just do it first and then worry about any of that stuff after. We ultimately didn't go the route of like, continuously growing and getting sponsors and getting, you know, all that stuff. And I'm really happy with that. I didn't want to do that anyway, I didn't want to have a corporate master or whatever.

Speaker B: I mean, I, I will say the podcast did grow pretty significantly over the time we did. It is still growing. I keep. Every once in a while I look at those numbers and I see we're still getting more subscribers and more listenership, which is cool. So hopefully folks are like starting with the earlier episodes and listening through, uh, to get the most out of this thing. But I agree with you, like, we didn't. For a little while we were trying to like, I think it was basically only LinkedIn to post, you know, and try to get some attention and put some of the episodes out there and get people to listen. But we didn't like focus real heavily on that stuff because I don't know that either of, uh, either one of us really was like super into trying to turn this into something that we didn't really want it to be. You know, like, like you said, a big like corporate project. That wasn't our style, I think.

Speaker A: Yeah, that's. There's a lesson in that too. Uh, you could just be happy with what you have. It doesn't always have to continuously keep getting bigger and bigger and branch out more. Like some things can just be a hobby or just something you do on the weekends or whatever. It can just be that there's like this huge push all the time of turn it into a side hustle or whatever. And neither one of us really wanted to do that. We just wanted to have our truthful conversations and have that be it. So, um, I'm happy and proud of us in that sense where we just like, we stuck to what we wanted and we did it.

Speaker B: Yeah.

Speaker A: So that's a good lesson too. Mhm.

Speaker B: So I was, I was mentioning earlier that I went back and I listened to a couple early episodes of the show and one of the things you said in the first episode that we ever did was one of the things that you liked about, I guess, getting into software engineering or the reason for your career change in general was that you cited a need to continually learn and improve yourself. And I'm curious that, you know, looking back on this, you know, he said like two. Almost. Almost two and a half years later, uh, how do you think that perspective. Ah. Or that need, has it changed at all? Do you still have that need? Um, how do you think you are challenging yourself now or growing now if you do still have that need?

Speaker A: I do have that need. Yeah. I think it's going to be a lifelong need. I, uh, it's just A me thing. I. I need to. I need to learn constantly or else I come up with things to do. Like, I always have to be doing something, and I. I am sticking to that. Um, Um, I just got a huge, huge lateral promotion, um, which comes with a lot of learning and a. In a different field than what I was doing before. And, uh, it was a bit scary. It's like, because I felt like, hey, I'm not. I might not be qualified for this. It turns out I am. Um, so we took that chance there due to wanting to learn and continuously grow and. Yeah, that's just been like, a lifelong thing for me, always coming up with different hobbies and. And things to do. So, yeah, I, uh. And. And even now, like, once I get to the point where I feel like I'm not learning or growing anymore, you know, we'll see where that goes. But, uh, I don't think anything is really forever. Sometimes you just hit the point where you're like, okay, like, I could pretty much skate by on doing the bare minimum here, and I don't ever want to. Want to get to that point with really anything that I do.

Speaker B: We have said, and we've discussed throughout the show, too, kind of how your. Your career journey has. Has, uh, diverted from software engineering and kind of gone into a different direction that you've. You've been very happy with. And it's. I'm, um, super jazzed for you and for your success and congrats again on, you know, the recent promotion there. How do you feel or do you feel that pursuing software engineering for the time that you did, do you feel that that has benefited you now in the new path you're going down? Like, what kind of skills did you pick up? What do you think you really, like, learned from this whole thing that has maybe changed the way you pursue some of this other stuff you're doing?

Speaker A: First of all, learning how to learn, I think that is a huge process that you could apply to anything. Learning how I learned specifically, right. Because I think it's different for everyone. But learning and really solidifying what I kind of already thought, which is I'm a visual learner, I'm not an auditory learner. Uh, you could tell me something a thousand times, might not get it, but I have to do it right. I have to feel it has to be tangible for me. So I learned that. I also learned about how, like, the resume and. And job search process goes regarding, like, let's say the ATS and what people who are hiring look for and how to structure your resume. I learned a lot of that from LinkedIn and seeing what people are going through with their job process. That's something that I've also helped other people with once I've learned about it. Co workers and such. Um, so that's knowledge that I was able to transfer to other people. Let's see what else the idea of not just for me and it's okay if someone else does this, there's nothing wrong with it, but for me not just being somebody who's there, like, always looking to provide value because the value that I get is great benefits, pay. Right. I don't think showing up is enough of value to bring. Uh, so the idea of always making sure that I am providing, providing value. It could be providing value to the company or organization. It could be I'm a public servant, so providing value to the public, uh, providing value to my teammates, my supervisor. Um, so those are a few of the lessons that I've learned. What about you, Eric?

Speaker B: Oh, boy. Yeah, I think the, like you said, the learning how to learn thing was really, really big. Like, I, looking back on this whole journey, like, that is something I wish I knew way, way earlier in my life. Like, all the learning that I did throughout school didn't really teach me how to learn things effectively and like, for life, you know? Um, so that was a really, really huge deal. Um, I think the networking aspect of things was also a big takeaway from this whole process. It just wasn't something I had done before, you know, and just learning how to reach out to random people and start a conversation about something I was interested in or trying to learn about their company or whatever that was, and trying to do the job search stuff was a big deal. And I think at this point, from the software industry specifically now being in the industry and kind of thinking about where I started and what, what I understood at the time of the space and what I understand now of the space, like it's a whole different world. And like, thinking about, I don't know, I think I did a lot right, which is really cool to look back on. And I don't think I would really change that much about what I did. I've learned to have a lot more, I don't even want to say confidence in what I do, but like, I think I. Throughout the whole process of trying to make the career change, there was a lot of uncertainty and there were a lot of unknowns and there was a lot of stress about a lot of it. And I'm glad that I Did everything I did along the way and I'm glad it really worked out the way it did. And I think I just walk away with it with a renewed sense of confidence in who I am and what I do and understanding that when I want to make some kind of a change, whether that means like a drastic change, like what I did with a career or, or anything smaller, that I should trust my instincts and allow myself the time and, you know, the whole process to do whatever it is I'm going to do and just like trust that I am making a good decision along the way. Uh, I think that just that gave me a lot of confidence.

Speaker A: Yeah, I like that a lot. If you make enough. Right. Decisions, eventually it will lead you somewhere.

Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. Like there's going to be failure along the way. Right. I'm going to mess up. And I know that's a thing, but like I said, it's just, you'll mess up enough to. As long as you continue forward and continue to learn from those mess ups, you'll, you'll find success in one way or another.

Speaker A: I like the point you brought up about networking because before starting this whole thing specifically with LinkedIn and I guess, and the podcast too, I was that person who, if there was like an event at work, I wanted to be nowhere near it. I wanted to avoid people. I just wanted to show up, do a good job at work and then, you know, go home at the end of the day. Um, and that has changed a bit actually, because I kind of come at, come at it with the viewpoint of, well, at the very least I might have some cool conversations and meet new people. That's always a plus. But it could also lead to something else. Right. It could also lead to, let's say a promotion or, um, you know, getting a new position. Um, and it's really just talking to people and knowing how to talk to people and that makes a huge difference. Especially when you leave a good impression on somebody, they tend to not forget that. And when you get, uh, when you have a bad impression on people, they also tend to not forget that. So just, uh, thinking about networking as a thing, I never considered that as like a thing to do before. Uh, I just didn't, you know, I didn't understand it, but now it makes a lot more sense.

Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, it's, it's a skill to talk to people and it's a very scary thing to do. It's. I think I, I've always been fairly good at it from an in person perspective, but I also had the same experience as you where. Where, like a lot of work events, I was just like, I don't want to be here, and I don't want to go have conversations with people. And primarily that was because I wasn't interested in what I was doing, and I wasn't interested in what was happening around me. And, like, the reason I was there, you know, previous career stuff where it was like, outside sales people talking about outside sales stuff and like, that never genuinely interested me. So, like, yeah, I think I could do a better job now of just going and having a conversation and asking questions and, like, learning things from people. And also, I understand that I want to be in a different environment, that I want to be in a different space. And like, networking in the right space with the right kinds of people is way more interesting to me, and it's something that's going to keep me way more engaged. And it's still like, I built that new skill set of networking more effectively or just better or whatever. But, you know, I think with me, there's also that caveat of, like, you'll know when you're in the right space, because you're gonna have a lot more fun with it than if you just do it to do it.

Speaker A: Yeah, for sure. And when you're. I try to make sure that both people are getting something out of it. I, uh, never want to be that person who's like, I'm taking your time and it's just about me. Sometimes it can be, and I don't like that. Uh, but trying to make sure that someone else is getting something out of it, and it's more of a conversation, not just like a. A time grab. I think that's something else that I learned too. It's like, I want to try to provide value to other people as well. And I think that's what making the videos and podcasts can actually do or did for me. I might not have had that technical side, but I could give advice on how to do this sort of thing because I've done so much of it. And people have those questions like, well, how do you. How do you build in public? How do you, um, how do you talk to people? How do you make videos? What sort of microphone do you use? And things like that, too. I think that that has helped me a lot in terms of networking, because you have, like, a value added that's not just like, hey, I'm the new guy here. I need some information from you. Do you want to move on to what our plans are for ourselves? Now and uh, moving forward?

Speaker B: Uh, yeah, I guess so. I guess, I guess this is a good place to do that. Do we, before we do, do we have anything else about the journey of this podcast that we think we should highlight or talk about? Because I think that's a good closer.

Speaker A: You know what, I can, I can, uh. It got tough for me at, uh, points. It's, it wasn't always just like, I'm super excited to do this podcast episode. Sometimes it was like, I really just don't feel like doing this. I don't feel like talking, having a conversation. Um, I don't feel like editing or recording. I had some things come, come up during this time. I had a baby. I started a new full time job. Um, I was recording sometimes from like a hotel room. Um, and sometimes it just felt like I had no motivation to do this.

Speaker B: Mhm.

Speaker A: That went away, that came and go sometimes. But uh, it wasn't all easy.

Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, I agree. I think especially when we were like trying to keep the grind of doing it every single week, you know, and like find an interesting topic or like schedule guests, which was always a challenge, you know, just to work with different schedules, um, finding time to do editing, definitely doing it every single week, I think was a strain. I think over time we kind of reduced the amount of, I don't know, call it extracurriculars that we would put into the podcast. Like we, we advertised way less, which just gave us more time to do the actual podcast in general. When we switched to doing the every other week release, what we did like that week, episode 80 and on, basically was when we kind of made that change, um, it felt a lot nicer to just have more space in between. So like, I know we've always kind of been advocates of, you know, when you talk about the career change journey or getting into software engineering or whatever, finding your ways to do things that are sustainable long term and like finding how much time you can put in this stuff. This is no different. Right. I think we, we committed, we had a release schedule we wanted to stick with and we did for a really long time. And then at a certain point we kind of just came together and we're like, yo, this is tough. We're kind of like burnt out a little bit and made a change to keep going and hit a goal. I, you know, I did say earlier too that like one of the good things about doing the podcast was like trying to come from a, a very genuine, honest perspective on things and like speak openly about stuff that also was A point of stress doing this, doing the podcast. Right. Because then, I don't know, sometimes it's a little bit anxiety promoting when you're like, oh, what did I say at, uh, that recording? Like, what. What are people gonna think about the kind of things that I say or the opinions that I have or whatever? So, like, it's definitely easy to start doing a podcast. I think it is not easy to continue to do a podcast once you start to realize, like, oh, I'm talking to people and I could potentially impact people's lives or like, people will form an opinion of me. And those things are just from the mental health perspective of it all, which we continue to revisit, can be very challenging.

Speaker A: Yeah, I agree. There were those challenges. When we started switching up the schedule, that was a huge relief. That's when I knew it was like, okay, well, I could, I can continue. Because I got to the point, I don't remember if you brought it up or I brought it up, but one of us was like, yeah, I'm burnt out. And then the other one was like, dude, yeah, me too. I'm glad we both came together on that one because I was a bit, uh, I was a bit worried about that. I didn't want to be the one that's like, yeah, I'm kind of getting tired of this.

Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah. Well, you know, we. I think we've talked about this before where it's like, you do the things that feel good, right? Whether it's when you're. When you're on a learning journey and learning new things and learning how to do software engineering. Like, my big thing with that whole process was I'm going to do the things that are helping me learn and that feel good. And when I find something that doesn't feel good, I'm going to stop. Which was like doing like, leetcode stuff when I was trying to do it early on felt really, really bad and was demotivating, so I didn't do it. And I did other stuff that helped me learn, and that was great. You know, admitting that we were kind of like, burnt out on stuff and then finding a different way to do stuff was the right call because we both felt very strongly that we didn't want to just end. Right. We wanted to find a way to continue to go forward and hit a. A more, I don't know, agreed upon stopping point, I guess. Right. That goal for ourselves. So finding that way to be, um, a little more sustainable was really nice to kind of hit along the way of doing this thing.

Speaker A: Yeah, I'll be abs. Um, absolutely. I'll be honest, though. Uh, so it's kind of, I guess, funny for me, when it came to, like, the what will people think? I didn't care. I didn't give any amount of fucks about that. Uh, I was like, I'm going to say, hey, the things that I feel f them, you know? Uh, so I didn't. I don't. I didn't share that anxiety with you because at the end of the day, I was like, I don't even. I've never seen any of these people. If they. For some reason. And I'm not talking about, like, the supporters of the podcast. I'm talking about, like, just random people on the Internet. Like, if they have an issue, like, I could just not interact with them, which I already don't, so screw them. Uh, so I. I didn't. I didn't have that anxiety, which for me was a bit of a relief, because I think it also helps that it's not like it's really not the real world out there on online, you know, that's what I think. That's what helped me a lot. I wasn't in front of, like, the public, wasn't doing, like, a speech in front of everyone, just like, we're going to put this out there and that's it. And I think it also helped that neither of us were too attached to our, uh, our LinkedIn or social media or whatever. We were both just of the same space of like. Yeah, I don't. I don't care too much about this. I think that made it a bit easier for me.

Speaker B: M. Yeah, I think, you know, if anybody does decide to pursue anything that is, like, public content, I don't know. I always feel weird when I say content creation. It's technically what it is. Right. But, uh, something about that just feels a little icky to me. But whatever. If you're out there doing it, you're doing a podcast or you're doing YouTube videos or whatever. Yeah. It is on you to find your own perspective on that stuff and be able to rationalize what it means to be speaking to any kind of audience, you know, And I think what you have is a very healthy perspective, you know, to say, like, hey, I'm putting stuff out there and whatever. It's. It's not like it's going to, you know, directly impact anybody negatively. And it's my own opinions, and I'm very open and honest about that, and I think that's the way to Be, you know, and people are going to like what you say, and if they don't, they don't listen. And that's kind of just how it works out. Right?

Speaker A: Yeah. I want to say one thing real quick. I'd like to give credit to the both of us. I think, um, what was really a benefit to me is neither of us were really married to our own ideas. Um, let's say I would put something out there and be like, well, you know, maybe we could do this. And you didn't really think would be the best. You'd voice that and we'd be like, all right, yeah, we just won't do that. Or vice versa. I like that we both had, um, that environment where we just felt like we could say, yeah, I don't want to, I'm not interested in doing that. Or we, let's try something else. I think sometimes that could be very hard when you're working with someone else. Um, you don't always get that. Sometimes you might butt heads. I don't think we ever really did that. We were always just like, you know what, we'll go with the flow. We'll try this out. If we don't like it, we don't have to do it, you know?

Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was also nice to be working with, with you because you just, um, we both had a good work ethic as far as making the podcast goes. Right. Like, I didn't know anything about you when we got started and we kind of decided to do this thing as a regular project. Like, you could have just bailed or you could have just not done your part of it. And so could I, I could have done the same thing.

Speaker A: Right.

Speaker B: I could have just no showed or like, whatever. But it was nice that, you know, neither of us did that. We just kind of committed and, uh, we knew we had a responsibility as far as just to the other person to show up and do the recording or do the editing. And we shared responsibilities in that, which was always very nice. So, yeah, I'm never really one to be self aggrandizing or whatever the right term is to say good job and pat ourselves in the back. But yeah, it was, it's good to recognize that for sure.

Speaker A: Good job, boss.

Speaker B: Good job.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: All right.

Speaker A: Yeah, absolutely.

Speaker B: I think, I think now we can. If you want to cruise into the. The future, I think this is a good spot to, to do that.

Speaker A: Yeah, let's, uh, let's do some cruising. Uh, so what is in store for us? So I guess I'll Start. Um, I am. I made a career change recently. As I mentioned. I got a promotion and essentially I'm in environmental compliance. Um, and my background and my degree and a lot of my work experience is environmentally focused. I, um, went to school for environmental science and it came back full circle. Uh, I found the, the right position for me in terms of work environment, pay. A healthy mix between like very little office and a lot of outdoor time, um, and freedom and a great supervisor and a great team, um, and a ton of learning to do. And I'm very excited about it. So I will be pursuing that and um, really focusing on growing. There's a lot of growth to happen in this sort of field. Um, I'm also a dad, so I've been focusing on that a lot. That's been a great experience. I have a crazy little child who tears our house up and um, is really just an awesome time. Um, I'm a husband as well, so I have those, uh, both of those responsibilities which I really enjoy. I'll still be doing things, making things, playing guitar is something that I'll also be pursuing amongst, uh, other little hobbies that I have now and then. As far as content creation goes, I don't see me doing more of that in the near future. Not really sure what the extended, uh, future holds, but, um, nothing too soon as far as ideas go. And uh, yeah, that's, that's. That's most of it right there.

Speaker B: Yeah.

Speaker A: Hmm.

Speaker B: M. Uh, what am I doing? Uh, I am, um, currently working as a software engineer. I, um, am with the company still that gave me my first software engineering position. Uh, doing a lot of really fun stuff there, building new projects, learning like crazy. I've had really great opportunity there to continue to grow with what I do and learn a bunch more and more lead projects and lead decisions, which is wild. I have a great team that I work with, great managerial staff that work there, great supervisors, great directors. Super happy with all of that. I, uh, personally continue to try to pursue my own interests and hobbies with bread making and pizza making, which we've talked about. I don't remember if we did main feed episodes we talked about on the Patreon a number of times. Still making tons of pizza, Making tons of bread. That's always fun. Trying to travel more trips upcoming, uh, both local and you know, within further distances within the United States. So that's fun to look forward to. Um, trying to grow from a mental health perspective always and uh, focus on those kinds of things and just be more at peace with A lot of that stuff, which is nice. As far as the content creation stuff goes, I don't really know where I'm going to land with that yet. Uh, I have an idea that I've been kicking around in my head for a while that would be a YouTube thing at some point. I do think it would be nice to just have a break from any of that kind of stuff for at least a little while. After ending this, I am interested in doing something in the future because I like the collaboration aspect. I like learning from other people and sharing what I've learned and putting out stuff that maybe other folks would find helpful. So I probably will end up doing something at some point. Check out my YouTube or subscribe there or whatever for anything that might come up, uh, in the future. Not the near future, but some point soon, let's say.

Speaker A: Yeah, that's, uh, that's pretty cool. There's also a lot of learning and clearly a lot of learning and growth to do in the software engineering space. So I think for both of us it's only, uh, up and onward, uh, which is exciting. Probably won't hear a lot from me on LinkedIn. I do check it maybe once or twice a week just to kind of see, uh, what's going on. And then I abruptly just leave because I'm like, okay, I've had enough of this. Uh, but I am on there every once in a while. Do you check every now and then?

Speaker B: I'm. I really don't check anything social media at all anymore. LinkedIn. I still have. I will respond to messages if you reach out to me directly. Uh, I'm not really going on there to scroll and look at stuff because it's all just social media to me now and it feels gross. But I know there's still good people out there who are doing the thing. And if you want to check in and ask questions or have me check out stuff that you're doing, feel free to reach out directly and I'll be in touch.

Speaker A: All right, I would like to say we hit one. Well, now we're over it, but we hit a hundred thousand plays. I think that's just on Spotify. Right? This isn't, uh, this isn't for all platforms. Am I correct in stating that? Yeah, depends on where you're looking on Spotify. Let's see.

Speaker B: I see on Spotify, 100,000 plus total, all platform plays.

Speaker A: So it is all platforms. Okay.

Speaker B: Yeah. But most of the stuff we have was on Spotify.

Speaker A: Yeah. Uh, and we just hit that recently. Our monai uploaded our last episode. We did not have a hundred thousand, so we hit a, uh, pretty cool goal too, which I wasn't setting out for, but we did it anyway. So that's a nice, uh, that's a nice little plus to this episode here.

Speaker B: Yeah, we went from zero, absolute zero, to 4,200 Spotify followers, which is significant. That's a lot of people to check out what we do and to follow along with the journey. I. It's mind blowing that. Do we have any amount of that, to be honest. Uh, but it's super heartwarming and we're super grateful for everybody that has listened and tuned in.

Speaker A: Do we want to hit, uh, final thank yous and, uh, close us, close us out here?

Speaker B: Yeah, let's, let's do a little bit different than what we normally do. I know we said it up top, we're close to up top, but let's do it again and just say thank you for listening. Thank you to everybody who has joined in at any point, anybody who's ever been on the show. Thank you so much for your time and for giving your words out to everybody who is listening and your experiences. We, uh, had a lot of really great interviews and people telling their stories, and I think that's just a tremendous value for everybody out there. So thank you so much for doing that. Um, for anybody that ever emailed in or sent questions or talked about the show to a friend or helped us promote it, thank you so much for doing that. That's just incredible stuff. And then of course we had the Patreon. So if you were a Patreon supporter at any point, thank you. Uh, we opened that up just to basically help fund a little bit of the show and allow us to record without restrictions. And that's where all that money has been going. So thank you for all of that. Um, and it was nice to just even know that people wanted to support what we did. So that's super meaningful. So even though your name might not be at the end here as, uh, supporting right through the end of the show, thank you still. And thank you to the current folks on Patreon, Tony Swearengen, Brandon Dyer, Scott Lundgren, Stephen Cheaves, Leo Ashcraft, Roxy Rodriguez Becker, Danielle Arnett and Danny McCollins, thank you so much for supporting the self taught Devs podcast. And, uh, we'll see you all around.

Speaker A: Thank you everyone.

Speaker B: Goodbye.