For anyone out there that’s looking a way to expand their knowledge, and learn more about whatever, I encourage you to search for a group that will challenge you!

I have been looking for a group for several years to no avail… until now. I’ve used all of the apps that are supposed to connect you by keywords and interests, and have always been hit by a dead-end. I’ve tried to meet up with groups through various networking that are supposed to hit the interests, but they always fall short.

In most cases, the groups were such that they already had their own clicks and ways of doing things. That’s not how I roll. I always want to be open to everything (especially technology) and don’t want to be limited in scope. For many of the groups, I found myself doing board games and having conversations that were fun… but didn’t really hit the mark.

After years of searching, I finally found a group that will talk about anything technology related, and is open to absolutely anything that I want to bring to the table. I mentioned /etc/fstab just to get a feeling for what types of things we could talk about. From there, the converstaion turned into virtual machines, dockers, configurations, lock picking (where I learned the most tonight), and so many other things! We left the place we were meeting only because the place closed and we couldn’t get any more beers.

I have a feeling that I will learn so much from this group, and am extremely happy to be a part of it. It’s great people that were very willing to bring me into the fold and allow me to bring any knowledge that I had to make the group better.

It took several years to get to this point, and it was worth it. So if you’re reading this, and wondering what to do because you do all of your learning on your own… I absolutely say “Don’t give up!” Continue the search because you will find your group.

It’s late, but I’m going to go hack some more things, and then talk to people about it. I’ve never had that feeling of freedom that I’m getting from offering what I know in a humble way, and then expanding that knowledge through conversations with people who are genuinely curious about what I’ve been up to.

Go out there… find your people… and get better at everything you do!