Re: OT- Reaching 40, choosing path

Speaking from someone who is 30 this year, I may be 'unqualified' to speak
to you veterans. But I always tell myself this, don't let age be a factor.
If I did I would be cursing myself for not able to match young people like
Rick who at 23 has 2 CCIEs and Iwan Hoogendoorn who has 3 CCIEs :-). What I
do tell myself is these guys have done a remarkable and fantastic
accomplishment and I would like to try and get 1 if I can to at least be
part of a group that have shown so much dedication and effort in getting the
CCIE. And that's has been my target from the day I decided to start my CCIE
journey.

IPExpert helped me kick start my journey with their BLS. Internetwork Expert
then seduced me into their end to end programme. And during those times, I
have not heard of Narbik Kocharians yet but as fate put it this way, if you
are sincere in wanting to get the CCIE, you will be introduced to one of the
best and in June 2009, I attended Narbik's class and 'survived'. Along the
journey, I have spent my entire life savings on CCIE training products and
today I am still not one yet. But that does not discourage me. That tells me
that I better have a good darn reason for putting it all for this so-called
CCIE.

What is it about me blabbering about the above? Well to put it in a
nutshell, I knew what I wanted. I knew that do or die I must get the CCIE
even if I reach 40, 50, 60. Who cares about pleasing the people around me
who said I should be spending time on something else and not the CCIE? I
care on what my dreams are, I care on what I want and most importantly I
care about the passion I have for technology and that includes the CCIE. A
passion that so many people on GroupStudy shares.

In short, ask yourself what do you want in life? Do you want to do the CCIE?
Why? If you can answer your own questions then I'll bet that you are ready
to jump on the CCIE bandwagon again. Walk with me. We will conquer this
mammoth task. We will prove that we can do it. We will make Narbik's "This
is ridiculously easy" a reality in our CCIE journey!

I hope other GS members will not think I talk too much ... to be honest I
think I finally got the balls to write something long on GS :-).

-- 
Warmest regards,
Nickelby Thane
Personal Blog : http://nthane.blogspot.com
CCIE Blog : http://cciecisco.blogspot.com
On Thu, Aug 27, 2009 at 8:29 PM, Andy Mueller <andymueller713_at_gmail.com>wrote:
> Well I turn 46 in September and my first lab attempt also is in September.
> I
> have been doing networking for 20 years. CCIE is something I have always
> wanted to do. Don't let age be a factor in this, ask yourself if this is
> something you really want. It takes a lot of time to prepare for this so
> you
> need to be fully vested in doing it or it won't work. Go after your
> passion,
> what interests you and ignore the internal and external negative
> distractions.
>
> BTW I figure I have a good 18 years till I become a greeter at Walmart!
>
>
> On Thu, Aug 27, 2009 at 4:50 AM, ospfv2 <ospfv2_at_gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Just curious, how many of you between your 35-40 and still going
> > chasing the lab ?
> >
> > i'm feeling too old and think about to burn my cisco bridge,  build
> > another one and
> > better spending my time on endeavours where the odds are more
> > stacked in my favour to bring  the success i desire.
> >
> > rgds
> >
> >
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> >
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