AWS Certified Solutions Architect⚓︎

Primer⚓︎

I haven't written in awhile and that one is on me. I meant to keep this up regularly, but I've been slacking with it to say the least. Who knew that having a family, a full time job and responsibilities would take up so much of my time! I'm going to do my best to update regularly going forward.

Validation⚓︎

Now that I've got that out of the way, the real reason for my post...

After ~6 months of studying, I finally took the AWS Certified Solutions Architect: Associate exam today and I PASSED! I'm incredibly excited about it and really proud of myself for sticking with it.

Here is my certificate and badge. I earned them, so why not show them off!

Hindsight⚓︎

There were more than a few occasions where I wasn't sure if I was going to be able to finish — the life altering COVID-19 pandemic, childcare, and above all, my own self-doubt. This was particularly apparent after I completed the Linux Academy training course. That in itself felt like such a huge accomplishment that the thought of pressing on for the real thing just felt like a real uphill climb. This felt even more apparent once I was reimbursed for the training course by my job; as if that was it.

I knew that I'd come this far, and I was willing to come a little further. This was around a month ago.

Growth⚓︎

Fast-forward to today, the day of the exam. I'd spent the last month taking practice exams every few days and just getting myself prepped for this. The self-doubt hit me hard the last few days. I had scheduled the exam a few weeks ago and after a few of the practice exams, I wasn't feeling all that confident.

At this point, it was getting a bit too late to back out, so I reconciled that if I didn't pass it on the first attempt, I'd take it again. Failing the exam was not the end of the world.

I've never been a good test taker, and that hasn't really changed. This exam was hard, no question about it. I had a few moments where I swore that my eyes glazed over from reading some of these questions. I made it though, and I'm immensely proud of myself for it.

Reflection⚓︎

I needed to do this because I'm hopeful it will help me in my career. I also needed to do this for me, as a validation of the skill-set I know that I have. It's one thing to work on my homelab and do things here and there, but it's another to learn all about cloud architecture.

I won't stop with just this exam. I plan on fulfilling the entire “Junior AWS Cloud Engineer — Entry Level” learning path on Linux Academy. As of the time of this writing, I'm 32% of the way through it.

I can do this, but for now, I feel good.