2022 was one of those years I took charge of my tech career after discovering my path and was determined to achieve remarkable growth but, did it turn out to be how I imagined it to be? Well, you're about to find out. This is not a motivational review, my purpose for writing is to personally internalize what I learnt from both the good and bad phases, and also to measure how I have grown immensely through the course of the year.
Community participation and contributions
Becoming part of a growing community has been one of those defining moments that has impacted and shaped my career. As one of the former core team leads for my community alongside others, I was opportune to host workshops, events and programs that helped several students within the community add more skills to their portfolios.
During the second quarter of the year, I was selected as a tutor at a local community. Tutored data science and machine learning to beginners in tech, both young and adults. This helped me become more confident in my skillset, during that period I was overwhelmed with imposter syndrome and I felt like a fraud. I want to keep doing this because it was indeed an amazing experience for me.
I failed to get into Google Summer of Codes
A few months before the application period I got encouraged by Steven Kolawole to work towards applying for the program. With his help, I was able to scout for organisations that piqued my interest.
It was another great learning experience for me, as I delve into open-source. I got to meet with other contributors from other parts of the world, contributing to Sktime's library. I got directions from project maintainers, among them was Franz Király. He was quite instrumental towards helping me gain clarity about the library, how to set it up for use and improving the docs. I also got my first pull request merged by him.
Before the deadline, I was unable to come up with a good application letter because I was focused on making more contributions than submitting my application. It didn't go well as I ended up submitting late. A few weeks later, I received a cold mail from them that I wasn't selected. I knew this was coming immediately after I realized my mistakes.
I also got help and support from Habeeb Shopeju, Busayor Awobade and Mardiyyah Oduwole. So, it was one of those tangible experiences of the year.
I got exposed to web3/blockchain development
There is a group of friends I am with, we kept each other's daily coding activities accountable. Every once in a while we discussed the things we were working on and talked about random things like research, startups, funding, tech news, web3 hackathons, and so on. From there I picked an interest in web3 and asked a couple of questions from those that were into web3 among us. Did my research about it, as I joined some web3 communities.
I wasn't sure if it was something I would like to do at first because I was already focused on building my career in machine learning and artificial intelligence. With more research, I was convinced that I could at least gain a little knowledge of the domain and probably in the nearest future it would be useful for me when diving into ML research. Though I haven't started fully, I am taking it slow and gaining more knowledge about it.
The dark sides of 2022
I got into a lot of depressed states which affected my mental health for months. It almost got worse that I was about to lose my mind, thanks to friends that checked up on me during those times.
Lost touch with some friends that used to be close. I didn't like it but things changed.
My laptop got faulty in the middle of the year.
Lost about $2k+ of NFT assets, crypto did me dirty.
Lost a $40k data science role recommended by a friend, because I withdrew from the interview process thinking that I was a fraud and wasn't good enough.
Got several rejection emails. The breakfast was too much.
Financially, I was broke.
The good sides of 2022
Bought another laptop towards the end of October.
Blessed with friends and mentors that are intentional about me.
Got selected for a $3k worth blockchain Bootcamp course for free.
Made a few dollars from NFTs before the crypto market became unbearable for me.
Had a great time out with family.
Attended one tech event. It was fun.
Had a couple of virtual hangouts on some web3 communities. Met some amazing people.
I listened to music most of the time as it helps me relax and during my free time, I watch anime. "Starving" by Hailee Steinfeld was my all-time favourite for the year. Watched a few anime like Hunter x Hunter, Demon Slayer, AOT, Fire Force, Fate, Black Clover, My Hero Academia, Naruto Shippuden and so on.
Conclusion
I'm sure there are some wins I probably didn't regard as wins but I knew I could have done much better this year. Now I know my weaknesses, those things I can work on to become a much better version of myself. Therefore, in summary, I would say 2022 was a good one even though it didn't go as planned because I grew immensely, built more confidence in myself, and learnt to love myself too.
Finally, I want to thank God for everything, for family and also for the gift of friends. Next year is going to be better and more fun.