Balance & Stay Motivated In Infosec

I recently read a tweet which was positive but also reminded me of how life really is and I was reflecting on this tweet for a while, it reminded of how real the struggle was and still is. The tweet was from unknown but it was about himself as he was homeless sleeping in his car and on the cold winter nights the police would come and check on him to see how he was doing. Despite his disadvantage he built himself up from nothing to now full time employment, marriage and and he just bought a house!

Reflecting on this I was in a similar situation where I was homeless myself living day to day in and out of hostels\shelters, then from there I moved into temporary accommodation and went to college to study engineering. I want to show the positive side of things, how people are at rock bottom but still survive and push themselves to succeed. There will be times where mentally that we could have one of those days, weeks, months or even years that we are not well, but I just want to show you that there is a light at the end of the tunnel and never give up on your dreams or ambitions in life. I see so many mentions of 'imposter syndrome' on Twitter from people who are not confident in themselves, I believe we all have the moments in life when we see successful people doing their thing and we begin to doubt ourselves.

It's Good To Talk

No matter how much we are down or if we are feeling low there are always someone to talk to, even if its on twitter or some chatroom where you have made friends online, just letting it out and not let it build up inside of yourself, even attending local meetups or infosec cons and meeting new people can give us that boost that we need. I know its hard to attend meetups or cons as it can be nerve-racking, not knowing anyone or if you are afraid to meet new people, but I promise we are a friendly bunch. If you ever want to attend a con but you don't want to go on your own drop me a tweet and I will meet up with you, buy you a coffee or a beer. No matter how hard life gets we should all look out for each other, if you know someone that is in a bad place right now, just reach out to them, let them know you are thinking of them, as a little message can make someone's day. Also try writing, it helps light your way.

Motivational Targets

Set your self realistic targets that can get you to your end goal, if it be a life target, skills targets or even a new job, write down a list of small realistic targets of how to get there and start working on each target going from one to another and once you start passing them small targets you will see a self-satisfaction and won't pull you down mentally. I talk to people that they want to learn everything all at once and I tell them to slow down because you will burn out that fuse before you have even started, you can't learn everything all at once, yes you are motivated but stretch that motivation out, take your time with learning new skills, or prepping for a new job, etc.

Be realistic with your self as you know how much you can push your self and how achievable a target can be, theirs a pool of knowledge out there that can be accessed by anyone its just making a little effort to find it and fill yourself up, if it be you want to become a pen tester or want to be in a bug bounty platform, find a way of being apart of that community and start reading up on how to become one but you won't become one overnight it will take time but again write down small targets that are achievable and push your self to reach each target.

Balance

It's all about having a balance in life, if we work/study too much we will end up burning ourselves out and start to affect our personal life. If you haven't already done so start creating yourself a work/life balance if that would be to start taking up a hobby like drone racing or playing computer games or whatever you have an interest in and to the people who have families start spending more time with family. Yes we all have projects and deadlines but its time to put our mental health first and start treating ourselves better, no amount of money will make us happy if we are mentally not stable.

You CAN do it!

I just want to show you that anyone can do it! I used to have a fear of getting up and speaking in front of crowds but I wrote down my targets and slowly trained my self up in public speaking and being confident about my self, even though I still gets nervous but I still try and push my self to overcome the nerves, the more I push myself the more I become confident with experience, I am still working on my public speaking as my end target will be giving a talk at an InfoSec Con!

You can do it as long as you can put your mind to it, keep practicing in what you are doing, be persistent and never give up! don't let that voice inside yourself try and demotivate you and self doubt yourself. Write yourself some targets start taking some time out for yourself and put your self first for once. You are a born winner!