Hello, today I have a lot of review to go over, so I won’t be talking very much about Networking. Instead I want to tell you a few strategies that I use on a daily basis to stay motivated.

This blog is no easy task, I on average, have about an hour and a half of class, as well as editing notes, writing and editing each blog post, and answering the numerous questions that everyone has, as well as reading any and all of the input that you send in via e-mail, on Reddit, and on forum posts every day. This is a huge investment of time, but the benefits outweigh any sort of stress.

The first thing I want to talk to you about, is having your own circle of support. I’m sure all of you have heard this worded some way or another, but it’s extremely important that you have someone you can talk to about your passion and someone who encourages you to keep going. For me, that includes my girlfriend, who doesn’t understand anything about networking, but sits and listens while I babble on about how excited I am to be able to open the command prompt and understand everything I’m looking at! Then there’s my mother who I spout to about all the blog views I’m getting every day. Last, but not least I have all of you who read my blog maybe every day, or a couple of times a week which helps me get out all the meaty stuff to people who understand, and appreciate what I’m doing. This falls into the next portion I’d like to talk about.

Get involved. Getting involved in some sort of CCNA or Networking community can help so much. A vast majority of you come from Reddit, or other forums like Reddit. If you haven’t already, then I challenge you to look through the first two pages of your forum, or /r/ccna and answer every single question that you can. This can be used as a great exercise and beyond all else. Helping people is encouraging! It makes you feel good to know that you made someone else’s life that much easier! Also, you know something that they didn’t know yet! Which really gives you a great sense of progress.

Take a day off. If you’ve been working your mind too much, it’s great to take a day off to let everything sink in from your courses or studies. This can sometimes be even more beneficial than studying, you’re rewarding yourself for working so hard and you’re preventing burn-out. Burn out is when the stress starts to outweigh the benefit and you just end up dropping it all together. Again, this falls into your circle of support, if you’re having a hard time and struggling with stress, talk to someone, or ask the community different things they do to relieve their stress.

Set realistic goals. My goal right now is simply to be prepared to take, and have a date for my CCENT exam by day 45. It’s something I know I can achieve, by a time that I know I can defeat.

One last thing I’d like to mention, if you’re not sure about getting started with Networking. Just do it. Get started today, don’t wait until next week. If you want to learn a little about networking and get your CCENT, or if you want to learn everything you can about networking and aspire to receive your CCIE, the time to start is now. The sooner you start the sooner you’ll be on your way to receiving whatever certification it is that you want to achieve. So the CCENT takes about a month if you’re going at a steady pace? Well why not start now? You’ll have one day out of the way and you’ll finally be on your way to receiving your certification of choice.

You remember that challenge I gave you? I have some questions for you all. For those of you who have already embarked on your adventure. How do you stay motivated? What drove you to start on your adventure into Networking? What was the first thing you learned in networking that really made you excited? You can either reply on Reddit, or post a comment on this blog using the comment box below.

Get involved! Get motivated!

Thank you for reading,

-Trevor Sovetsky (CCNAdventure)