So You Aren't the Smartest Person In the Room

Haven't written in a while... been busy with life.  I had an awesome opportunity.  I was invited to the NetWars Tournament of Champions in Berlin.  Problem was that that kind of trip was a bit expensive for me.  Mostly because of the flight.  Somehow I was lucky and it worked out that they needed a facilitator.  So, I did SANS training at a discounted price, and came to Berlin.

Being a facilitator for SANS EMEA is a bit more involved than the US one.  We had to run network cables for our rooms, set up the books and supplies in each room on the desks in a neat orderly fashion and put the bags on the seat backs, make sure that our instructors had a speaker set up to play music, a speaker set up for his wireless mic, a projector or a screen, we had to set up the cabling/network the rooms if we had a wired setup, and we had to set up the cabling/network for NetWars.  (I was glad that this seemed to be ok.  Few hiccups here and there, but better than expected.  I was so worried something would go wrong.)

I'm so glad that in the US, SANS has the AV team to help with setting up stuff.  I appreciate them; even more now.  Thanks for all you do, you unsung heroes.

I took SANS SEC617:  Wireless Pen Testing and Ethical Hacking - have I ever done this.  Nope.  Do I know much about wireless tech?  Nope.

The above isn't exactly what I intended to write about today, though.  Kind of worried about writing this - what people would think.  But I think others feel like this, so it might be helpful.

TLDR:  When you don't know everything, which pretty much includes everyone, do your best to help in the ways that you can.  That's good enough.  :) 

I'm not the smartest person in the room.  Not by a long shot.  Sometimes I wonder why I'm here.  As in why am I in information security?  Do I deserve to be here?  People always tell me, "It's imposter syndrome."  Saying it's imposter syndrome doesn't help take away the feeling.  Also, what if I'm right?  What if I'm not an imposter?  What if I really don't know all that much?  I know enough to know that I need to learn more.  I don't consider myself "expert" in anything.  People act like it's bad for me to doubt myself.  Is it really bad to feel this way considering it gives me a drive to learn more?

I was feeling overwhelmed this week because this class covers something I've never done before.  I also missed some of class because of my Facilitator duties.  (This happens from time to time, but that's why they give us OnDemand.)  So I was feeling a little down all week - very much doubting myself.  (Also, I know that this sounds stupid, but I've gotten cold sores for as long as I can remember, so I was feeling down by that as well.  I'm so embarrassed by them.  Sure, I can't help it that they come on, but they bother me.  I try my best to keep my hands away from my face, and to keep my hands clean because I wouldn't be able to deal with it if I accidentally infect someone.  There are antivirals and such, but I find that they don't help with mine.  I have no idea how to cover them either - I don't wear makeup or anything.  I know - stupid thing to be worried about, but that's me...)

Day 6 Challenge was today.  I'm choked big time.  Thankfully I had some really talented members on my team that picked up the slack.   I recovered my brain enough sometime in the day to answer a couple of flags.  Even when I was choking, I didn't give up.  I kept trying.  Maybe I couldn't help in the way that I wanted, but I found information in our books to help solve some of the puzzles and shared them with my team.  Sure, maybe they already knew that, but maybe not.  (We weren't talkative - if I have any advice for teams - talk it out.)  I tried to be helpful where I could.

The point I actually want to make.  It's ok not to be the smartest person in the room.  I can't quit or stop trying just because someone is smarter than me.  (Well, I can, but it wouldn't exactly be helpful to me or others.)  I have an example to set for my children.  How do I want them to react when they feel this way?  I want to be a good example for them.  Here's what I'm telling myself, so my children and maybe others can learn this from me.  There may always be people that are smarter than you are.  That's ok.  We all have strengths and weaknesses.  You're stronger when you help lift other people up, and you're not afraid to learn from ANYONE.  Yes, literally anyone.  That means not being afraid to ask for help when it's needed.  So, I'm not awesome at wireless pen testing, YET, but I can learn from those who are and get better, in exchange, maybe they could learn something from me, or maybe they just simply feel better about themselves for helping someone else out.  And I can't even say that I'm not good wireless pen testing because I've never actually tried until now.  Who says I can't learn it?  A one-week course isn't going to teach me all the ends/outs of wireless technology.  Don't give up before you've had the chance to put in a good effort.  (I'm amazed that I did actually learn stuff in class this week.  It was the implementation of those things that I was having trouble with.  But, I learned from that failure - probably more than if I would've been successful.  This is all that matters.  If you get into info sec, get used to failures - exploits - and WEP cracking - lolz - apparently - don't always work.) 

Even if I never get awesome at wireless pen testing, is that ok?  Yes, because I'm good at other things; like inspiring and encouraging others.  Maybe when they're feeling like they can't go on, one inspiring message keeps them going.   Even though I talk a lot about me;  it's not about me.  There are teams for a reason.  Where someone is weak, others can pick up the slack.  Even if someone is strong, even they don't know everything.  Everyone's ideas give the inspiration needed to solve the puzzles.

I know that this message seems a bit simple, but sometimes that's what people need.