Let\'s start with some admin stuff. I foresee writing about this a lot
so I'm going to start calling it "BB" because "Blockchain Bootcamp"
makes the titles extremely long. Anyways back to why I\'m here\...
I\'ve recently gotten through the bulk of chapter 1 in the bootcamp.
It\'s all about the fundamentals. Technically at the time of writing
this it\'s suggested everyone be on chapter 2, but I had some setback. I
want to talk about those and how I handled jumping back in.
Setbacks
--------
I first want to point out that I started chapter 1 early. Not sure why
but as soon as the orientation was done I just right in and I\'m glad I
did. Since the beginning of the month I\'ve been dealing with autoimmune
issues. I\'ve been constantly swelling (hands, feet, arms, legs,
wherever) and could barely type. I even had to take off from work for 2
weeks because I was in so much pain.
Also during this time it became harder to sleep, focus, and be
motivated. You might be wondering why I\'m telling you all this. I\'ll
explain in the next section, but these things made it really hard to
jump back into this course on good days (I\'ve had 3-4 now). This is not
material I want to half-ass (sorry for swearing). This isn\'t just
another programming language where I\'m just learning syntax. This is a
whole mindset shift for me. I\'m already not a web developer and
blockchain somewhat combines web with a completely new set of rules and
ideas.
Bouncing Back
-------------
How did I bounce back? I don\'t think I did. See\...having a month of
being at the mercy of your body can really get to you mentally. I\'m a
person who codes and stuff for fun so not being able to do that made me
really sad. I decided to figure out a way to make these new life changes
work for me in the event it ever gets bad again.
That being said I study in the morning before work. I\'m writing this at
like 7:30/8a (gross). This allows me to avoid the foggy brain,
unfocused feeling I have as the day wears on. As my hands allow I type
my notes after work. Lastly I have made a effort to at minimum catch
office hours or the talks. I wasn\'t doing this at first because I
misjudged the schedule and I was just wallowing in pain. Now I play
things in the background while working and then when it\'s added to the
course I can go back and take deeper notes as needed.
What am I doing about the swelling? Nothing really. Continued dr
appointments and such ya know. The thing I had to realize is that I need
to work with my body and within it\'s issues v trying to fight it. If I
can\'t type, I can\'t type. If I can atleast click some things then we
watch videos and read until I\'m in too much pain. Simple yet was very
hard to accept.
What I learned
--------------
You might not have cared about anything and wondering what all I learned
during this chapter. Well I learned time management, accepting that this
is not as easy as I thought it would be, and the basics of the
blockchain.
The most interesting to me was understanding the security around the
block chain in detail. From consensus to validating blocks to validating
user identity. I\'ve know from the start that the blockchain ledger is
public, but I never understood how that could be without doxxing
someone. Now it makes sense and I\'m able to piece together experience
with the lessons.
I think that will be my biggest advantage during the bootcamp. I do a
little crypto something here and there but I can\'t say I ever truly
understood what was going on beneath the hood. Now I\'m getting a bit of
a better picture and I hope that in the coming weeks I can break it all
down so anyone can understand.