As many of you know, I was born in Turkey. And unfortunately, the educational system of that country is very weak. And guess what: If you can’t afford to go to private school in Turkey, you may not be able to learn English in the government school. However, if you are a very diligent student, you may learn the basics of writing or speaking English.
I have decided not to allow my proofreader to edit this post. My reason is simple. I want you to notice that I am still struggling with English. But that’s okay. It’s a learning curve. So, nothing should stop you !| My aim of writing this post is to share some of my thoughts with you. And I know many people will read this and I hope it will inspire some of you. I worked as a network operation center engineer, presales engineer and consultant while I was in Turkey. Fortunately, I joined and managed many design projects during that time.
After that, I moved to other countries with the aim of sharing my knowledge with others and getting some money of course ? At this point, you might be having this thought: “With your weak English, how did you manage to succeed?” Many thanks to God. My hiring manager was a technical person. And he understood all my ideas. Besides, my interview was excellent from the technical point of view.
And then, I knew that I could learn the language and it shouldn’t stop me from achieving my goals. After some time, I decided to take the CCDE exam. But before I attended the exam, I heard that the CCDE exam is a very difficult test and that if you are not a native speaker, you might be in trouble. Because it is too long and reading intensive. But that is not completely true. Before I start providing my own consultancy services and trainings, I used to read hundreds of pages daily.
I even took courses on fast reading so that the CCDE exam wouldn’t be an issue for me. Although the exam is not easy, I passed it. Yes, I did. A boy who was born in a country where almost nobody could speak English passed one of the hardest and reading-intensive exams in the networking field. But That’s not all. I didn’t plan to teach CCDE training from the outset. There were reasons behind my decisions then. But somehow, I started teaching people about the CCDE exam.
Then, many individuals were asking for my help as I was writing technical posts. Granted, there were many grammar errors in my posts, but they were worth reading. Some people shared the posts on social media and some linked them to their websites. And Today, I have about 40,000 followers both on social media and on my website Was everything easy in the beginning? Of course, not. People complained that the documents could be much better. So, I spent a huge amount of time and created the documents. And thousands of people shared, bought, and liked them on social media and on my websites.
Provided many feedbacks and I took them positively. I also sold books, videos, comparison tables, blog posts and so on. Needless to say, I am still working on some of them to help readers pass the CCDE exam with ease. Some people criticized me initially. They said my content sucks. But such negative remarks didn’t stop me. I took their criticism positively and improved the resources. Was the document the only problem? No. When you reach large audience, many people will criticize you.
Of course, some will like your work; others will castigate your effort. It’s normal. So, whether you receive good or bad comments from people, you should keep your head high. Criticism shouldn’t make you sad. Also important is that don’t do anything hoping that people will like it. Rather, you should do it because you want to do it and because you love it. I love network design. And that’s why I love talking about it. Do I make mistakes? Of course, I do. I have committed many blunders in the past, both technical and non-technical mistakes. In addition, I am never afraid to share my ideas and knowledge just because I can commit mistakes.
That reminds me: A guy who is clever than I once said, “our experience is the sum of our mistakes.” Many thanks to God, this way of thinking has made me a well-known and successful professional in my field, as the first and only Turkish CCDE, as one of the best CCDE instructors in the world, and as one of the best authors on computer network design. Ah did I say I am driving my dream car now? ? Yes, you can achieve this too. Nothing should stop you. Just believe in your dreams and act on them and the sky will be your limit.