Posts
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Breaking up with worry
In the spirit of writing with more brevity, (and so I hope frequency) in some of what I write and share here, I’m mulling over a new reframe to me that feels somehow liberating, enlightening and if we can integrate it, might alleviate from us a degree of our suffering, inner conflict and self-doubt as we pursue goals and new, novel experiences in work.
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Clear is Kind
We all have needs in how we receive information to best build a reasonable view of the world; a place from which to make informed actions, and feel secure in doing so.
I feel it’s important at the outset and ongoing in our work relationships; to undertake some self-knowledge, and communicate it with others; to pass-on that insight into how we like to be communicated to.
What upsets us, brings us uncertainty, doubt, and conversely, how can those around us bring us calm and relief?
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Experiments with Acrylics
On a Saturday morning with a little time to take it slow and have a think about a little creative project, I decided to get the paints out, and see what emerges. I had made a couple of stylised sketches with fineliners of a heart, and thought it'd be a good subject to imagine with some bright colours in acrylics.
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Daynotes 01 - Sept 2024
September has arrived already, and I was sure to allow myself a day-off; some downtime I set aside for myself in anticipation of a need for extra space for myself as we move into autumn. Over the years, I’ve learned to prepare for the darkening evenings by taking steps to ensure I can thrive through the autumn and winter with purpose and a positive mindset; creatively and emotionally.
I'm reflecting more on understanding what are the things I need. These are not obvious and take some introspection to identify.
I decided to book a couple of days off as a way to check in with myself and shore up against stressors I may encounter so I can continue to meet them with bravery and a grounding in myself; my confidece and agency.
For now though, and due to being dilligent and self-aware, things are bright and enjoyable.
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I took a day to wander and think; to plan some activities and work on my goals. -
Product Engineering: From 'Scrum' to collaborative product roadmaps
As Senior engineers working on often high impact, important services in a large organisation we can easily become detached; sidetracked and blinded from the real user outcomes we really want to create, carried along with the ceremony and performance that surrounds us as engineers. It threatens to hi-jack our sense of value as engineers - doers, solvers - and our primary asset and means of producing valuable output; our focus.
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Developers: Stepping into Competence Identity
Something I often hear and have experienced as the prevailing attitude in teams, particularly from Seniors, is this odd tendency to identify in jest as incompetent.
It’s celebrated very often, but not in what feels like an authentic way; more to caveat one’s contribution with the subtext that our work is ‘sold as seen, no refunds, I’m actually an imposter.’
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Thoughts: Self-trust as a developer
This is a little vulnerable post, but I feel has the accountability for growth in my confidence, professional development and ability to influence I always focus on delivering in my role.
Throughout my life as a professional developer life I've felt like many of us, a sense of always 'becoming'; a feeling of being out of place, somehow behind in my understanding.
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It sometimes led me to normalise second-guessing of my intuitions leading to a self-identity which disempowered me in acting with bold self-assuredness necessary to make impact and build positive influences to affect the culture around me. -
Photo study 1; Liminal space
A themed study emerging from my wanderings around Nottingham; this time a focus on the time-frozen and peaceful liminal space, the laundrette.
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Finding the fun; The Art of Noticing and photographic studies
It's long been apparant to me how much of what I do; what I'm somehow as if by osmosis, drawn toward - is the force of habit. Our brain's hard-wired tendency to minimise descision fatigue, and so I'm compel me to do what has a known outcome. But this conspires if reflected upon - to make our life not only feel like it's going too fast, but robs us of lifes' endless potential. The simple state of being and moving through the world will create the features of our experience, so let's curate it...
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On turning thirty-eight; being a student of myself
Just as I did at the similarly-arbitrary age of 34, as I breach 38, I realize I’m well on the other side of mid-thirties, and feeling the inexorable pull of 40. Although in honesty, being 40 is perhaps not as much the knoll of terminal decline I once feared it to be, more something to be regarded as a time of personal evolution and peace with ourselves.
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On turning thirty-four; 34 lessons and ideas
Let's recognise there's little more trite than for twenty/thirty-somethings to think that on each advance in years it's incumbent upon them to impart some Definitely-new wisdom on the world; as if my years during a relatively prosperous moment in history have gifted me any measure of wisdom...
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Reflecting on 2019 - A personal Annual Review template
Coming to the end of 2019; it's a time we might reflect on the year past. A retrospective, to identify what matters, and re-focus our attention during the year ahead.
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Weeknotes - DVSA Design System workshop
While working at the DVSA in the Service Design team in Nottingham, owning the design system we use on MOT, it was great to attend a cross-DVSA Design System workshop in Birmingham to find out how we can improve it, and potentially unify our system across projects.
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On Developer Maturity
Something of a suppressed admission in web development, is the possibility that we as individuals might not know answers. The expectation we feel to ourselves and each other in a team to live up to this ideal and the pressure that can put us under has got me thinking about this topic.
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Sharing in Knowledge Organisations
The Art of Code: At the agency I work at we run periodical show-and-tell events where our specialists in consumer trends, technology, digital and print design talk about what they’ve been working on and share their work with others in the business...and provide biscuits.
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We aren't our tools
As developers we are often compelled either by a self-initiated, driving curiosity, or from the persistent, corporate anxiety to innovate rather than consolidate — in a bid to service or even manufacture ever-more nuanced needs in our clients.
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