The perks of facing fear
This week has been full of challenges, most of them personal.
It all started with the assignment to do a workshop on a subject that I mastered.
I decided to go for data visualization. The idea was simple, teach how to make charts (including when to use one type or another depending on what we want to transmit) with python and plotly (a library that allows you to generate interactive charts).
Planning the structure of the workshop was a very big challenge without a doubt, but the hardest part was handling the scope of the workshop, and that scope would depend on me, it could be directed only to my teammates, to other specific teams, or even to the entire company.
I decided to expand it as much as I could and launched the call in the “general” slack channel, never in my life had I given an announcement to more than 500 active people, the result was that just over 40 people were interested in my work and attended To the workshop.
It even happened to me that a few days before giving the workshop a colleague asked me if he could invite three people who were studying for a master’s degree in data science, I clearly said yes but my nerves increased significantly since although I like the subject I never have studied these topics in a school and knowing that there would be 3 guests who would know a lot about the subject had me thinking that any mistake I made would be harshly exposed.
I lasted a day with this feeling until I spoke with a friend from the university who recommended me to take this event of the 3 students in my favor, I should, according to their recommendation, present them to my audience, thank them for their interest in my work and ask them to please don’t hesitate to correct me or compliment my content when they consider it necessary; In this way, I would give them their rightful place in front of the other attendees and I would put them on my side, thus avoiding any negative exposure.
I listened to my friend and it was a resounding success, I consider that part of the success was, more than putting the issue of the 3 students in my favor, getting rid of that thought that everything could go wrong, also helped a lot that many very dear friends attended my workshop, this caused me to forget that I was presenting my ideas in front of many unknown people, in a few minutes I was in a safe environment, surrounded by very friendly people and attentive to what I had to say. I’m very pleased to read the feedback survey that I sent to the attendees once the workshop was over, there were people who let me know that they would like a second part.
Without a doubt this week I learned things related to computer science such as being able to create a linked list with python, how to handle key SQL statements such as fetch or the ACID concept (Atomic, Consistent, Isolations, and Durability) in databases but my greatest learning is that it is worth facing fear because behind it there is always an incredible reward that makes you a better person, I believe, there is no better reward than that, being better.
