I originally wrote about the bright side of imposter syndrome a few years ago which has repeated helped me, and after receiving yet another wonderful email from a young woman thanking me for sharing, I revisit and expand on this mindset and perspective some more:
Feeling like a fraud, or imposter syndrome, is something a lot of us deal with. It’s when you think you’re not as good as everyone else thinks you are. But what if we could see this feeling as something helpful instead of something that holds us back? Let’s break it down into simpler parts and find out how to make the most of these feelings.
What Is Imposter Syndrome Really About?
It Means You Care: If you’re worried about being an imposter, it shows you really want to do well and keep getting better. It’s a sign you’re down-to-earth and always trying to improve.
It Keeps You Learning: That nagging feeling is like a reminder that there’s always more to learn out there.
The Bright Side of Feeling Unsure
Keeps You Going: Facing challenges, including feeling like an imposter, can actually make us stronger, just like exercising makes our muscles stronger.
Brings Us Closer: Talking about our doubts can help us connect with others who feel the same way, making us feel less alone.
How to Handle the Hard Parts
Feeling like an imposter isn’t all sunshine and rainbows; it can be really tough sometimes. Here are some ways to deal with the hard parts:
Be Your Own Best Friend: Treat yourself kindly, just like you would with a friend who’s feeling down.
Ask How You’re Doing: Getting feedback from others can help clear things up and make you feel better.
Break It Down: Tackling big tasks in smaller pieces can make things seem more doable.
Thinking Differently for a Better Journey
Changing the way we think about ourselves and our abilities can make a huge difference:
Believe in Getting Better: Thinking that we can always improve with practice, rather than believing our abilities are fixed, can help us grow.
It’s Okay to Share: Letting people see the real you, doubts and all, can lead to stronger friendships and more support.
Focus on the Ride, Not the Destination: Enjoying the process of learning and growing, rather than obsessing over being perfect, makes the journey more fun.
What Psychology Tells Us
Understanding a bit about psychology can give us clues on why changing our mindset is helpful:
The Dunning-Kruger Effect: This fancy term means that often, people who aren’t that good at something think they’re great, while people who are actually skilled tend to doubt themselves. This shows us that doubting ourselves doesn’t mean we’re not good; it often means we’re more aware and capable than we think.
Wrapping It Up
Looking at imposter syndrome in a new light reminds us that it’s a complex issue but also a chance to grow and connect with others. By getting to know it better and changing how we think about it, we can make our journey, both in our personal lives and at work, more fulfilling. Remember, feeling unsure at times is part of being human and trying to get better. It’s not about never doubting ourselves but learning how to move forward with those doubts.
It’s not about never doubting ourselves but learning how to move forward with those doubts.
This year, 2023, I have the honour of serving as one of the Global Community Team Reps for the next 12 months. A great responsibility, and a huge honour which I endeavour my utmost to at least leave this role at the end better than I found it. That is always what one hopes to do, as it is with life.
Looking ahead to the next 20 years, it’s exciting to imagine what the WordPress community will accomplish. Here are a few things we hope to see:
More diversity in the community.
We want to see the WordPress community become even more diverse, inclusive, and welcoming. We need to continue to make strides in reaching out to underrepresented groups and making sure everyone feels like they belong.
Greater collaboration between WordPress developers and other WP project teams.
There are a lot of talented WordPress developers out there, but sometimes it can feel like they’re working in silos. We’d like to see more collaboration between developers, whether it’s through sharing code or working together on projects.
More innovation in WordPress.
WordPress has always been a tool for innovation, whether it’s in the form of new features or new ways of using the platform. We want to see even more innovation in the years to come, pushing the boundaries of what’s possible with WordPress.
A stronger focus on the WordPress ecosystem.
The WordPress ecosystem is made up of all the different moving parts that work together to power the platform. This includes things like themes, plugins, hosting providers, and more. We want to see the community focus more on the ecosystem as a whole and work to make it even stronger.
A continued commitment to open source.
Open source is one of the core values of the WordPress community. We want to see this continue in the next 20 years, with more people contributing to WordPress and other open-source projects.
The next 20 years are going to be an exciting time for the WordPress community. We can’t wait to see what we’ll accomplish together.
*This post was mostly written by a prompt to ChatGPT-3 by Leo Gopal
Update(02 September 2021): Here is the recording of the WordFest Live Session on Remote Happiness:
Leo Gopal at WordFest Live 2021 Recorded Session on Remote Happiness.
Disclaimer: Firstly, I am neither an expert on the topic nor have I achieved it to any level of expert. I am a professional learner, and I have probably gotten more things wrong than most on the topic, but If I were to describe the talk, it would be a recovery guide on how to get it right when/before you get it so wrong.
Get to know more about Leo Gopal at our website and be sure to follow on Twitter. While there, grab your free ticket to hear all of our speakers July 23!https://t.co/fPmpk3lW8gpic.twitter.com/5BTmQl5iCv
— Big Orange Heart 🧡 (@aBigOrangeHeart) June 23, 2021
I am also excited to note that my esteemed and super talented colleague from Codeable HQ, Sir Demo, will be speaking at WordFestLive as well.
Get to know more about Mike Demo at our website and be sure to follow on Twitter. While there, grab your free ticket to hear all of our speakers July 23!https://t.co/9mYIEZ0ZFQpic.twitter.com/QiDT7IWW5m
— Big Orange Heart 🧡 (@aBigOrangeHeart) June 16, 2021
In the collaborative world, we are in, dev-communities can easily thrive, fail, or merely survive. The best developer and coder communities and projects often create a culture where everyone feels valued and safe both as a newcomer or veteran.
Here are some core values I believe in creating and sustaining happy developer communities in the long and short term. If anything, we can each aspire towards these are values.
1. Discrimination limits us:
All discrimination or exclusionary things: This includes discrimination based on race, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, age, nationality, technology and any other arbitrary exclusion of a group of people.
2. Boundaries honour us.
Your comfort levels are not everyone’s comfort levels. Remember that, and if brought to your attention, heed it.
3. We are our most significant assets.
None of us was born masters of our trade. Each of us has, at some point, received help along the way. Return that favour when and where you can.
4. We are resources for the future.
As an extension of #3, share what you know. Make yourself a resource to help those that come after you.
5. Respect defines us:
Treat others better than you wish to be treated and better than you may think they deserve. Make your discussions, criticisms and debates from a position of respectfulness. Ask yourself, is it true? Is it necessary? Is it constructive? Anything less is unacceptable.
6. Reactions require grace.
Angry responses are valid, but abusive language and vindictive actions are toxic. When something happens, that offends you, handle it assertively, but be respectful. Escalate reasonably, and try to allow the offender an opportunity to explain themselves and possibly correct the issue.
7. Opinions are just that: opinions.
Every one of us, due to our background and upbringing, have varying opinions. That is perfectly acceptable. Remember this: if you respect your own opinions, you should respect the opinions of others.
8. To err is human.
You might not intend it, but mistakes do happen and contribute to building experience. Tolerate honest mistakes, and don’t hesitate to apologize if you make one yourself.
This is something I have rewatched of myself speaking at WordCamp 2016 in Cape Town – mostly because I needed to listen to my own advice and reposting because I feel many should listen to this as well. This is for everyone.
Audio: The WordPress Community, Mental Wellness, and You.
Transcript (auto-generated)
Goodmorning, everyone.
So one of the things about public speaking is that you should try not to admit to the audience that you’re quite nervous.
I am. So one of the main reasons for that is this isn’t showing up at the moment.
And
this topic is extremely important. It’s serious. So that’s why I’m glad these guys
afterwards. And it’s extremely close to me, as well. There are three times so far in my life that indirectly, WordPress has helped me 10 years ago, when WordPress was mostly just a blogging platform, I started blogging about at the time I had a stutter. And I just wanted to put it out there because at the time, writing was the only time I could speak fluently. And other people started talking to me, I had comments, I felt like I had support. And I spoke away my stutter. And that has changed my life. Since then, I wouldn’t be able to do this today had I still had that. And then it became a profession five years later. And that’s what I’m doing now. And the third time that it has changed my life is what I’m going to be talking about today. So it is quite difficult, talking about mental illness, or mental wellness, in a development environment and how this can actually apply to you. So I’m going to try to do that today. And hopefully, we can put it together. So who is this talk actually for mostly, if you are a boss, and have employees or your Freelancer or you have colleagues, or if you’re a human who understands English. So as you can see, this is an array of different mental illnesses that we could have. And this isn’t the complete one. So it has been truncated a bit. So those are the four most common mental health issues in the world. One in four people have one of these issues. So in this room, today, there’s about 70 of you who can completely relate to any one of these. And the rest of you can help the other 70. And that’s pretty much what this talk is going to be about today and how we can help each other how we can help ourselves and essentially give back to the WordPress community.
So
the main thing that needs to change, or that hasn’t changed, yes, and which I haven’t seen change much lately, is that Firstly, there’s not much awareness about what mental illness or mental wellness issues actually are. And nobody knows what it actually means. People called people who have it crazy. And that’s what I want to change today, especially in this community. And with the help of everyone here. You guys know how to use WordPress, you can tell your story, you can tell a story of a friend and you can put something online and each one of you can change more lives outside of this room outside of today. And that’s what I really appreciate and like also around the stigma of it. We are a society that when someone breaks their leg, we all run to sign their cost. But if somebody is having a mind or brain issue like any of these, what happens? It’s just as bad and just as complicated and just as difficult for that person than someone who has broken a leg. And I mean, what would you rather say on Facebook one day, considering if you’re on Facebook and you do type everything that happens in your life like some people do. Would you rather say that you can’t get out of bed today because you have a back injury or a back issue. Would you tell the truth sometimes and say I just kind of get out of bed too, because I have depression, and it’s extremely difficult. Which one would you pick? So just to simplify it a lot. This is what happens in the brain of people who are happy in love, anxiety, and depression. And as you can see, there are three main chemicals in your brain that affect these. And those are the levels that happen when you’re feeling these things. So with understanding this, you can also understand or appreciate the fact that when somebody you know, or if you’ve experienced this yourself, tells you snap out of it, or leave it outside when you come into the office. You can’t do that if you have a broken leg, you can’t leave a broken leg outside. So this is a prosthetic.
This is a question we ask often. And what’s most common reply? I’ve been asked this question 16 times today. I’ve said I’m fine 16 times. Fortunately, I have lived 16 times. WordPress, and how it This is the third thing that I’m going to talk about of how I got me here. And I think the person who actually
gave me this idea because of how caring they are. And they’re part of the WordPress community, I think he’s actually giving a talk next. He gave me the idea that even as a community like this, even as a community of developers or business owners, or especially as a community of developers and business owners, to be honest, we have a higher risk of having mental health issues than most other professions, as well. So one in four people, regular people, most people have a mental illness to in five people in our profession does. So in terms of the WordPress community, there’s very little you need to actually do to help somebody next to you or to be helped by somebody in your life. And in I came to Cape Town last year, for the first time, and I didn’t know anybody came to WordPress meetups, because that’s my profession. And that has pretty much changed the course of my life since then, the person and what they did I wonder if they here today, his name is Jeffrey Pierce. And all he really did was last year. He just sent me a message saying, Hey, dude, if you ever want to chat about stuff, let me know. I’m around. That was all I needed for that day. And for the week, a year later, he sends another message. Your idea? very philosophical today. And those are two very small things. And that’s less than 20 words. And it is in a span of almost a full year, may 8 2013 and 2015 March. So there’s very little you need to do to help each other out. All we need to do is ask how are you and actually care for reply.
So because this is extremely personal, I don’t have the other mount mental wellness issues that I could actually talk about, purely and actually mean it. But I have one and I’ll focus on that one for this talk. But that does not make any of the others less important. And also, not everyone has these issues all the time and as intensely, but it doesn’t make a difference when you’re feeling it. So it doesn’t make one mental issue worse than another. They’re all the same. They’re all terrible to have terrible to live with and We all need people around us. So dev pressed.
Play onwards, obviously. And this is pretty much my story. I have depression. The three Hardest Words I’ve said in a long time.
And I’ve been aware and living with it for the last 10 years. And it’s not always bad, I have more days than I have terrible days. But for the last seven months, I’ve had more terrible days than okay days. And that last for seven months, and the last time that happened was five, six years ago, and that lasted for a year. So it’s a very difficult thing to go through. And the trouble is, it affects every part of your life, you can’t remove it from yourself, it is yourself. You’re not struggling depression, you have, it’s part of you. You can’t it’s that roommate, you just can’t evict essentially. So it’ll affect your relationships. it’ll affect how you interact with people, you will lose friends, sometimes if they don’t understand, especially if you don’t talk and tell them. And that has been one of the most important things I learned. On average, according to the mental health society, or the worldwide health organization as well, it takes up to 10 years for somebody with a mental health issue, to actually ask for help. And to actually get help, or to actually understand that this is what they have 10 years. And that’s purely because it is one of the most documented issues that we have in, in health and wellness. It’s the leading cause of suicide. Suicide is also one of the leading causes of death for people in our age group, as well. So since it’s the most documented issue that we have, in terms of understanding wellness of a person, is also one of the things we talk about the least. And that needs to change, we need to be able to talk more, we need to be able to open up ourselves to the people around us. We might think that, hey, this isn’t the right community to do. So this is professional. A lot of you here start off professional and you become friends how you get familiar with somebody, or you just understand that this person when he asks how I am, he wanted to know the truth, not that I’m fine. And it’s like an automatic response just to sit here I’m fine. I’m good, great. Having a nice day, how are you? So more people need to speak out. More people who have these issues, need to talk about it, that makes it okay for other people to talk about it. And the more people talking about it, the more awareness is going to be rounded, and the more help we can get. And then the more people more than 11% of the people in this room will have a mental illness of that 11% 80% will go will go misdiagnosed or undiagnosed, or not get help at all. That needs to change 80% of people who has this issue, doesn’t know how to deal with it. I’m not talking about this. I’m talking about any mental health issue. So just start that off. That’s why I’m telling my story. That’s why I said those three words. Because if anyone’s going to start it, and if I’m going to preach it might as well do it. Giving back so a few years ago I think Matt Malin back at work, press wordcamp us spoke about five for the future. So he was talking mostly about giving back in whatever way you can 5% of most of your time, dedicated by putting back into WordPress if you love WordPress if you use it often. If it’s part of your life. Give 5% of your time to Give back and 5% isn’t much, it isn’t much. And Hugh’s talk was an amazing primer for this, because he showed all of the ways that you can currently give back. And I just want to say that there’s one more,
helping each other as a community. And helping yourself in investing in yourself, for 5%, as well will make a huge difference to the WordPress community. Because you can’t pour from an empty cup essentially. So if you’re running on empty, if you want to give 5%, where you’re going to get it from.
So my proposition today is that if we want to give back to the WordPress community, if we, as developers, business owners, we need to understand the people around us better, we need to understand ourselves better. And if you are so inclined, help the others that you know about, and help yourself if you care enough about yourself. And sometimes we don’t. So I propose that everyone who wants to today can help out during break, or during the next session. When you ask somebody how they are. Tell the truth. Tell them how you feel. Tell them how you actually are tell them that your morning was crap, but it’s getting better today. So for the future, invest in yourself, then give back. So we’ve all heard of hashtag WP drama. But I want to propose a different one, for this talk. And for today. And if you’re on Twitter, and if you if you socialize, WP hugs, give a virtual hug to somebody or start a trend, at least for the next day or so. And make it more aware to other people in the WordPress community that we are here together for each other by each other. And we can help each other. That’s what we’re here for. We say we’re here for the talks. But we must be here to get to know new people. Right? So if you’re on Twitter, if you have a phone today, I’ll highly recommend. And then now, for example, to do one of these. And let’s see how it goes. communities that thrive, there has been a lot of psychological studies on communities in general. And there are a lot of communities that have less mental wellness issues, less suicide rates, less depression issues. And they found that they are main three things that change that main three things that makes the difference between the lowest rates, and the highest rates of these issues in a community. And it is as a community to have a greater acceptance of failure within it. Sometimes, sometimes in the forums, sometimes when contributing to call, sometimes in person, sometimes with your colleagues. We don’t take failure. But we need to, we need to understand that everybody is going to fail sometimes. And it is the people who failed more often, more quickly, that are actually the ones that are learning the most faster. So the more we realize that, the better. Also a higher role for forgiveness and understanding. Sometimes, especially for example, if somebody has bipolar disorder, I have personal experience with knowing someone like that. And they have difficult days, some days, they’re absolutely amazing and want to give you a hug and talk about anything and talk about life and share with you. Other days. They would hope that you just leave them alone and you probably should. And it is those days that as people who know these people who interact with these people, forgive, don’t take it personally. They’re not doing it because of you. They’re doing it because of themselves and they don’t understand what’s going on. Most of the time, and they may not have the help they need. And you could help them by understanding more by forgiving more by not taking it personally so that the next day when they’re all right, when they not that person, but they remember yesterday, they don’t have to worry about coming to the office and senior and being like, dammit, what did I say yesterday, why was I like that I’m so sorry. We can do a with all of that, by having that. Then a culture system that honors intrinsic value over achievement, sometimes a lot of what you give to the world. In fact, for most of us, a lot of what we give back may not come with achievement points and award points or Achievement unlocked, for example, but we do provide value. Today, I hope that my value here would be that at least one life here today gets changed, I hope and a society and a community that values value over achievement is the third thing that is needed to curb the difference in these rates. This issue at its worst, for anybody who has it can lead to suicide. And this also isn’t something that’s spoken about more, but psychological studies show that if you’re a friend to somebody, if you know somebody who you may be worried about. Just talking about death on mortality, and bringing up thoughts of suicide in a conversation, I don’t know how you can do that, though, actually reduces the rates and risk of suicide in people. So by that logic, just talking about all of this, these issues, will help more people be aware of what they are actually going through. And for them to know that it’s okay not to be okay. And what they have is something that can be helped. And there are people that they can talk to people around them that care. And at its worst suicide is. Well, tomorrow actually, is world Suicide Prevention Day. So this is a good primer for that. And I hope all of you participate in awareness for tomorrow. And at its worst, this is an average statistic for around the world on the five main leading causes of death by age group. As you can see, for the age between 15 and 24. Suicide is the first leading cause of death. Age 25 to 44. Suicide is still the main cause of death, and up till the age of 60. What 64 is still in the top five. It’s the fifth leading cause of death. And we don’t talk about Yes. So today I hope that these are the things we are going to change and we want to change. We need to be okay. As a community as people not just other WordPress people, but your own family, your own friends, the people you meet, we need to be okay with listening to their stories. Caring about their stories. Listening is probably one of the most important things as a human being you can do for other human beings. tell your own story. People open up a lot more when they know that other people are opening up a lot more. So when you tell start time people stuff this time used to be the first I’ve done it today. And they’ll be around so if anyone wants to talk. I’m going to be eating lunch and finally removed stigma.
We,
as a society, as a community, and as a profession, don’t talk about this, nearly enough, don’t share about this nearly enough. How many people here if they had an issue, we’ll be comfortable telling their colleagues about it 123 How many of you, if you had this issue would be okay with telling your boss about it.
That’s a key difference. For people in this room, okay with telling the people that they spent almost eight hours a day with what’s going on in their lives, was the deepest part of what’s happening to them. And that’s an extremely difficult thing to experience, that solitude, of knowing that there’s a whirlwind going on inside your head, that you can do almost nothing about at the moment, and your colleagues and your boss are relying on you to do something is difficult. So for the woman out there, for the men out there, and all of those in between.
We need to be there for each other, we need to care more. And we need we need each other. We as people need people, you need people, I need people, we need people. And actually should be a mantra
that say, everybody, I need people. You need people. We need people, we How many of you believe that. So let’s start talking about it. Let’s start removing the stigma around it. And you know, what’s the best outcome that that will do is that some of the people in this room who have or may have contemplated suicide or who are going through these things will get helped. Firstly, those that are not diagnosed, those that don’t know what they’re going through, will be able to understand that they can get help. That’s the other important thing. And most importantly, especially for me is that more people will come forward. So that scientists will have better sample sets of people to work with, and the treatments and the help. That will be available, we’ll improve it, more people have have been speaking about it in the last 45 years, treatments have improved. And there are less people being on the bottom asked and all that kind of stuff. And when we are actually getting help. There are days that are better days, because of the people I work with the people I’m around the friends I have. And as you can tell by what I showed you earlier, just one person over Twitter can change what you can do next. So if you want WP hugs for all. Thank you.
Does anyone have any questions we can open the floor for farmers for questions.
Unknown Speaker 29:13
I think it’s amazing when you started just going to talk about how WordPress in the fact you’re able to write and sort of tell your story. But what I wanted to know from you and I kind of experienced this with somebody that either committed suicide is what is what is the possible What do you think is the possible negative effect in the fact that things like social media, make it easy to hide will make it easier to hide what’s actually going on? Because and the reason I say that is because this person the day before it happened was life was great. My life was wonderful. It was just it blindsided everybody.
Leo Gopal 29:48
The biggest thing that happens when somebody commits suicide that we know is that everyone around them is surprised. He was always so happy. Yes. Data is fine. Today is not here. Social media for this does affect it a lot. We all share on social media, the highlight reels of our life, not actually what’s going on. We don’t share the truth, we only share the good stuff, or dinner. And people who are suffering from this, look at that. Everyone else that I’m friends with is having an amazing life. And I’m not because they judging their full life by your highlight reel. And we need to change that too.
Unknown Speaker 30:55
Today, and especially as a man’s community, it’s not spoken about at all. And as a woman that post Natal depression, I think we get a lot of help as women in this society that we’re in, but for Madison.
Leo Gopal 31:15
Thank you. Congratulations on being a mom.
Cool. Any other questions were there.
And if you just want to ask me in private, I’m around as well. Awesome. Thank you one more round of applause.
Small businesses are the lifeblood of many economies around the world. The recent COVID-19 outbreak is having a disproportionate impact on these businesses, who lack the resources of larger organizations to stay open.
Here is a list of technology companies that are helping small businesses by enabling remote work throughout this period.
Book: The Top 2% by David Papandreas
David Papandreas, a veteran in the field of working with experts and whispering to converting to greatness at Codeable.
He has written a book to help those in the WP Industry up their client acquisition and basically becoming The Top 2% of the Top 2% (which I feel Codeable experts already are) and for a limited time has set it free on kindle on Amazon.
1Password is removing the 30-day trial limit on new 1Password Business accounts so companies can start working safely from home, with their first 6 months free. With 1Password, teams can manage their workforce from anywhere, and safely share logins and other important resources with remote workers.
Atlassian is offering its software development tools free for small teams up to 10 users. The free products include Jira Software, Jira Service Desk, Confluence, and Jira Core.
Cisco is extending services for existing customers of Webex, its video conference platform. The offer includes unlimited usage without time restriction, support for fewer than 100 participants, and toll free dial-in.
Cloudflare is offering unlimited seats of Cloudflare for Teams for organizations of all sizes through September 1, as well as a free 30-minute onboarding session. Cloudflare for Teams enables employees to connect to internal apps easily and safely while working remotely without the need for a VPN.
Google is expanding features of Hangouts Meet, its video conferencing platform, for current customers through July 1st, 2020. Customers can now host larger meetings with up to 250 participants, live stream to 100,000 viewers, and save recordings to Google Drive.
GoToMeeting is offering 3 months of free site-wide licensing of its video conferencing solution, GoToMeeting, for eligible organizations (health care providers, educational institutions, municipalities and non-profits).
Microsoft is offering 6-months free of Microsoft Teams, a unified communication and collaboration platform. Starting on March 10th, restrictions will be lifted on how many users can join a team or schedule video calls.
Okta is offering its Single Sign-on (SSO) and Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) solution for free for 6 months to all new customers. The Okta solutions covered by this offer help teams securely access critical resources, such as cloud applications or VPNs, from any device or location.
PandaDoc is making its eSignature product free to help businesses of every size continue to sign contracts and important business documents efficiently. The eSignature offer includes unlimited document uploads, unlimited eSignatures, and free payment processing.
Quip helps remote teams collaborate by combining documents, spreadsheets, and chat, so all employees can work together more effectively. Salesforce is making Quip free for any organization globally, through September 30th.
SurveyMonkey is offering free survey templates designed to help small business efficiently communicate with their workforce so that organizations can better understand how employees are adjusting to remote work.
UrbanSitter is offering a 2-months free parent subscription during the COVID-19 outbreak. Parents can find trusted childcare help to support them as they work from home during this period. Every sitter is background checked and UrbanSitter provides parents with as much information as possible to make informed decisions.
Box is offering 3 months free of its secure file sharing and collaboration platform. The offer is for the company’s Business plan and includes unlimited storage, mobile access, and advanced user and security reporting.
Zoho is offering its Remotely product line for free to all new customers until July, 1st 2020. Zoho Remotely is a suite of cloud applications that helps teams collaborate and communicate.
Exceptional by exceptions – When Work meets heart.
Prologue:
Happiness is not the goal. You do not need to always be happy. Have great days all the time. But being content and fulfilled can accompany through light and through the darkness.
I have had a decade long career in the WordPress, Web, and Tech world – and I have worn so many hats I no longer label “what I do for a living”. From Web Marketing Engineer at Sage accounting to Head of Development and team leads, to Team Augmentor for Higher, Consultant, Freelancer, Teacher, Developer, To even Psychologist, Hypnotist, Writer and Poet, and Mental Health advocate and Speaker.
If life is about deep and wide multi-disciplinary experiences, then I have had quite the life. This does, however, lead one to eventually feel a plateau and belief that there are not much more experiences out there to have or hats to wear that would cause one any amount of excitement.
Enter Stage Left, Team Codeable.
To understand this story, let’s start where this all began, the beginning.
During my time freelancing, a few years ago, I was recommended to join this platform for WordPress experts of the highest calibre by a good friend of the mine and the WordPress community here in South Africa, Jonathan Bossenger (JBoss).
Now, I have heard of Codeable for ages, I knew the reputation they had was an earned one, and joining was never really a consideration as they only obviously took in the best – it felt humorous to apply thinking myself as such, so I never did – until JBoss.
JBoss and I met in Cape Town and a WordCamp VIP Dinner was we bonded over wine, code, community and Jiu-Jitsu. I soon came to reliably consider him amongst those who had qualities I too aspire to – so when he thought me worthy to suggest I apply, and even gave in a good word to escalate my application as an expert, maybe he saw in me what I didn’t.
After some very well crafted assessments, I was accepted as a Codeable Expert and soon a Certified Codeable Expert (one of the prestigious honours amongst freelance WordPress devs).
After some time learning the world, I realised that I wanted to always choose where I work rather than just work where I am chosen – for me to be somewhere, I have to have chosen it as much or more than it had chosen me.
Fast-Forward
Being part of the Codeable Expert Community (key emphasis on the community) was great, later I joined the Core Codeable Team as a Support Engineer (Happiness Engineer) which is the journey I will talk about but first, let me tell you why I chose Codeable and what they are:
Codeable is, in technical terms, a platform which connects these profoundly skilled experts, with clients who understand they need something done but also that they need it done well.
(Codeable is exclusively WordPress focused [one of the reasons for me choosing them as well], but they are not competition free – and competition that is also seemingly more affordable.
Codeable not only attracts the best talent, but they also seem to have this magic in also getting customers of equal quality.
Codeable is Exceptional by making exceptions to the rules most believe true.
Where every other imitation starts of fairy-tale and soon verges on fast and furious-like races to the bottom with bidding wars, and rushed work. Codeable decided to do things differently.
Codeable chose just one technology and to be the best provider of skilful experts in that realm – I call this shrinking down to greatness.
Codeable has a minimum recommended rate because they believe in quality, if we make sure that the expert values their time enough to charge this rate and nothing lower, we ensure that the experts create quality works of heart and have a living – rather than rushing to try to make a living elsewhere.
Codeable does not allow bidding, the client gets the average of all estimates they receive, so bidding wars cannot exist, and the groups estimate assessment is what any of the chosen would get.
Codeables experts are a community – Codeable chose to have co-operation over competition. A community that helps and supports their peers and colleagues. This is culture, this has no metric or ROI – nor can it be bought, but this is the Codeable heartbeat.
And lastly, the Core Codeable Team treated everyone like we each mattered and not like we were their product, a number or a metric. Codeable understood that this was the reason for their much-beloved reputation and most rightfully earned success.
Codeable understood that quality, community, and heart was what others could not compete in. Many copied the model, imitation is a fine compliment, but one cannot plagiarism heart. And Codeable was built and builds with heart, lots of it.
These are just some of the reasons I chose them – which made it quite a treat to be chosen back.
More heart – Being on the core team.
As much as this is an honour, it comes with a lot to live up to. In May of 2019, I joined the Codeable Support Team. Coming from Team Lead roles at some of the best WP companies out there, Support Person was not a position I considered a move to – Most my view my work history by job title and believe I have ventured down the career ladder instead of up.
Here is a secret though: Codeable Support is nothing like what I thought the name suggested. We are not customer support, we are not answerers of questions and doer of tasks, we support in by the very definition of the word.
Obviously a company needs to care about the bottom line and revenue to survive and to sustain, and to grow.
And this is where the unexpected journey began.
I soon learned that Codeable was not a hierarchy of roles and tasks and you do what your job title, position, rank, or contract says. As cheesy as this sounds. Its a family, and we help each other and they go out of their way to help me too, everyone just shows up and provides value with the best way they know-how and to be better than we were yesterday and to do it together.
No man (or woman) left behind, an understanding that a rising tide lifts all boats, and that my teammate’s success is as much his as my own.
…and it doesn’t stop there.
Codeable Support is truly a redefinition of what a Support Team is typically thought of. Basically, our role is to support our clients on a journey to find an expert that builds with care and quality what they desire. We Support the experts in doing what we can to reasonably help them bring their clients dreams to existence. I don’t know if a name for what we do actually exists – but everyone that’s understands the Codeable way, knows that through care, guidance, patience, educating, respect, we all win.
To see experts help each other knowing that the success of all of them was the success of all of us. To have this curtain drawn and to realise that getting up, logging on, and doing what we do is less about rules, protocols, policies and much more about fairness, caring meaningfully about those I offer to serve, and doing my best as much as possible.
You can be happy with work. A work, when it’s like this, blurs with life.
As an evangelical advocate for mental health and self-care, I would say that I have never needed a break from work, but when needed have taken a break from myself, as this is a place you don’t need to escape from. Mondays are not blue, and Tuesdays aren’t just a day closer to Friday.
For the first time, I have experienced an entirety of a vocational journey where the key thing I learned that its possible to strive for impact over money, fairness over tactics – and that success, revenue, sustenance, and company growth are side-effects of a group of good-intentioned, intelligent humans from all parts of the world simply come together, show up and give their heart for their art and know that providing this value to the world will give value back – no small print.
I have the growth to know that I have lost the job-hunter/seeker mindset and know that I can be and do whatever I want and whatever I choose. Success to me, now, is choosing every day to be part of a crew/company/community/family that choose me back every day and together we try and make something great.
Afterword
The point is not so much to boost the many points of Codeable. But, probably more to realise in writing for myself and to offer hope to others, that it doesn’t have to suck at work. You do not need to be a number. You can wake up to something that is more than what it is, and do more than what you need, and you can build a life with heart. Codeable is not a platform to get WordPress work done by vetted experts. That is just the medium, Codeable is a place where we come together to help each other, the team, the experts, and our clients, create a life they dream of – it all just needs to be in the scope and be willing to seize it.
I have not mentioned so many people who deserve it, but suffice to say, Codeable was created by Tomaz and Per, and for them and my teammates – everyone of which it is an honor to work with. Thank you.
Thanks for showing me that I can show others that Mondays are great, they just need a better place – and I believe there’s a Codeable for everyone.
And the unexpected part of this journey? I have grown more as a person than I have in any skillset out there, and this for me has been invaluable.
I do have bad days, rough days, challenging days. But I have never had those days without the opportunity to just reach out and get help, I guess everyone at Codeable is The Support Team.
So if you are reading this, and if you don’t like your job, or think it’s just a means to an end. Trust me when I say, you can do better, so be better, and better will find you.
It’s not the pursuit of happiness but the happiness of pursuit.
In this podcast episode on WPandUP, I have a lovely chat with Nathan Wrigley around mental health sharing a lot of my own story to help others and myself realise we are not alone.
In my decade in the tech industry, I have never met a person who has experienced imposter syndrome who was terrible at their vocation.
As a side-note confession, I have, many times in my career – especially during times of transition – I, too, have experienced, like most, the pangs of imposter syndrome with one’s work and abilities.
Imposter Syndrome, is the self-doubt in one’s abilities to be able to succeed in what you or others have entrusted in you to accomplish.
That is what is like the first few times you feel it.
I want to offer an alternative view: Imposter Syndrome, to me, is the acute awareness of the higher abilities of others for which I have yet to acquire and of which I do aspire. This awareness presents itself to many as the sensation of the deep contrast between the ability we see in others and the inadequacy we see in ourselves.
How does one see the brighter side of this, or overcome it?
As I said at the start, I have never met a person who has experienced imposter syndrome and who was terrible at their job.
To feel imposter syndrome, to be aware of one’s own inadequacy requires a reasonable amount of intelligence to know that one is actually inadequate at that thing.
In psychology, I learned of the Dunning Kruger effect, a cognitive bias that showed that one who is lesser adept at something would estimate their ability in that thing. In contrast, someone of considerable skill would be more likely aware of their inadequacy in it.
Bertrand Russel said it best:
“The fundamental cause of the trouble in the modern world today is that the stupid are cocksure while the intelligent are full of doubt.”
—Bertrand Russell.
René Descartes, most famously known for his mathematical work on the cartesian plane, also answered a very philosophical question of how one could be sure of their own existence; he said: “Je pense, donc je suis” (I think; therefore I am).
Dubito ergo, cogito ergo, sum.
(I doubt; therefore, I think; therefore, I am)
Further articulated by Antoine Léonard Thomas
A final quote of wiser men to drive this idea further; John Cleese briefly explaining the Dunning Kruger effect (with his incredible wit to accompany it):
John Cleese on Competency and the Dunning Kruger Effect.
Imposter Syndrome as a sign of progression
This perspective of Imposter Syndrome that I have been presenting so far also gives way to realizing that experiencing this very uncomfortable feeling is part and symbol of one’s own progress and development.
You need to have reached a level of understanding that is enough to bring yourself to the awareness of all that is still for you to know; this awareness only comes to those who know enough and which is unavailable do entirely those who know far less.
A change in perspective to accelerate growth
The knowledge of the above and from studying and learning from those much wiser than I am has allowed me to identify a few traits that these more intelligent mentors of mine have, which once I adopted has elementary but profoundly changed my life.
Excitement over self-doubt:
When presented with a problem, a new one, one which I do not yet clearly see the solution, instead of ruminating in my insufficiency, and giving in to my self-doubt, I am now excited. I understand this to be an opportunity of growth, learning, and improvement, for once I solve this new problem, I will forever have gained from reaching its solution.
You either succeed, or you learn:
You will also learn to let go of failure; you will either succeed, or you will learn. Failure exists only for those who do not learn.
Final thoughts:
Energy is a resource that you kind either spend feeling inadequate or spend in becoming adequate.
Most go through the first then improve; why not skip straight to your betterment.
