I've come to find that we go much farther when we work together with other people, rather than our own. And one of the key things I've discovered related to finding your calling is finding those who have already made the journey, or a similar one, and ask them for their advice!
There's no point in re-inventing the wheel, so why waste your time? Finding a good mentor is huge when developing skills in the area you want to work in! The problem is, how do you find a mentor, someone you can freely ask questions and receive actionable steps from?
Sharing what you already know and doing it in such a way that shows that you are someone who wants to develop their skills, I think, is the most important. Without sharing that you're a learner, people won't waste their time with you. The thing is, you have to be specific enough about what you're talking about to generate responses from other people. If you ask general obvious questions, you are stupid or trying to play stupid, and most people will pass you by.
But if you share a difficult experience with an open-ended problem, I've had many people reply with lengthy responses and follow up with messages giving more advice, which quickly turns into a mini mentorship, with direct coaching and advice for specific areas. It's quite fascinating to see the responses I get on my posts, even when I don't ask a question. There are people out there hungry to share their experience, and it doesn't take much to find people willing to take you under their wing!
Key takeaways:
1) Find a mentor in your field of interest; you'll go much farther with a teacher
2) Share open-ended problems, but don't ask dumb ones
3) You can find many "mini-mentors" for specific areas that you want to learn
| What I Know Now 1