November, For Me

Main Highlights 🚀

Online

• 📝 On the blog, I shared the 4 things that have made my life better.
• 🎙 I’ve been planning podcast episodes for the next few months… 👀

Career, Learning & Community

• 🧡 It’s been a busy month at work for me! I feel like I’ve fully settled in at Gitpod and making good progress towards my professional Q4 goals. If you’re interested in what I’ve been up to, check out my timeline.
• 🎉 My colleague Mike and I are launching a new podcast all about developer experience. If you’re curious, be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss the first episode!
• 🎉 The Kubernetes and Cloud Native Associate (KCNA) exam launched this month and I’ve started studying for it. I’m hoping to get the certificate cleared before the end of the year. 🤞🏼
• 🎙 I had the chance to record 2 episodes for ‎The Humans of DevOps Podcast Series on Apple Podcasts. One of them hasn’t released yet, but the other on my story did earlier in the month. It was wonderful to be a part of it! You can listen to my episodehere.
• 📺 I was also invited to Ladies of Code London’s meet-up where I shared about how I got into Developer Relations.

Personal

• 📸 I reduced my IG usage again this month, I’m pretty proud of myself.
• 🎮 I started playing Destiny 2 again which has been a wonderful way to switch off after work and on the weekends.
• 👀 My LASIK recovery is going well! My surgeon informed me that I actually have above 20/20 vision which is pretty awesome. 😁
• 🏡 Matt and I are in the process of getting our first home together, but it’s not come without its challenges!
• 💪🏼 I’ve slowly got back to my usual workout routine and by the end of the month, feel like my strength has improved since my month off.
• 📱 (Don’t judge me, please) I upgraded to an iPhone 13 Pro in Sierra Blue with a purple case (of course) and Apple Watch Series 7… I’m done with upgrades now, I promise! 🙈
• 👗 I’ve done a fun experiment of moving a week’s worth of clothes to a small drawer and only using that. Turns out, I hardly wear most of my other clothes. Considering cutting down my stuff further 👀
• 💜 I travelled down to Watford and London this month and had a lovely time with Matt’s family.
• 🍿 I loved the Eternals (Movie, 2021) | Director, Cast, Release Date | Marvel, mostly because of Angelina Jolie.
• 🎬 Other films I enjoyed this month were Tick, Tick…Boom! and The Princess Switch 3, mostly because of Vanessa Hudgens.
• ❄️ I’m cold most of the time and winter blues have caught up with me recently, but I’m trying my best to keep on going ✨

Things that made me happy 🙏🏼

November 2021 has honestly been a blur!

If I’m being honest, I struggled to write this post because I had to take the time to remember what even happened this month. At work, I do a weekly reflection to keep myself on track of my goals so I had to have a peek at some of them to jog my memory a little bit. Is this a sign that now that I’m at the ripe age of 25 years old, I should do more brain training to make sure I remember things better? 😂

In all seriousness, the darker and colder days have encouraged me to spend more time working and each day has blurred into one. Although I’ve felt relatively OK, I have to say, this month was a struggle. With days blurring into one, I fell into the pattern of thinking “what am I even doing?”. I would have fallen deeper into that hole if it wasn’t for getting back into the routine of exercise.

After my month off, I was surprised by how weak I became! It was a little disheartening returning to my daily routine and being unable to pick up where I left off. But I kept going! One hour for me is what I kept telling myself. It didn’t matter how strong I was or not, what mattered was that I was just going and moving.

Now at the end of the month, I’ve made some progress towards my strength and feel like the bits of my “old self” again. I’m smiling writing this because I just thought about how most of my posts probably credit exercise in some way but it genuinely is the thing that keeps me going on the darker days. Thank you, endorphins!

I also wanted to point out another thing that made me happy this month was a recent chat with Mike about his previous life in the UK. It turns out we could’ve crossed paths years ago! It reminded me of how small the world is and generally re-energised me on travelling again at some point so that I too can share all the cool things I’ve seen and done!

November In Photos 🖼

Quote of the Month 💬

Next month, my intentions are to… 🌱

Rest, recover and reflect. I’ve already begun the reflecting process and it’s… going to be a good one despite it being such a difficult year. 🌸