A marathon, not short sprint

I wish by now I have something positive to write as a fitting part 2 to the post wrote last year, you know, happy ending or something like that. The sad fact is, after numerous try, despite seemingly getting closer each time; I am still here one year later, still looking every possible ways to work with rails or web development work, full-time, oh, actually even part-time (So ping me if you have any web development works, especially ruby or ruby on rails stuff)

I have Interviewed for 4-5 opportunities, learned a lot, and got to meet some local startup people, developers, etc *but* none of that lead to anything, so far.

My first ever rails freelance gig was developing a simple web apps for a client. It was cancelled like 3 weeks into development. The client decided to look for a local developer instead. He said it is not my problem just that he preferred to work with a developer from local. One year down the road, the site is still not up. I guess the client decided not to pursue with his idea anymore.

Then another freelance gig come knocking, I was required to sign a NDA even. I was so thrilled with the opportunity, their idea is cool, it is like another facebook in the making. The core teams were working on the main features, and I was told that I would involve real soon. Now it is almost a year later, nothing happen still, haven’t heard any news from the team, their site haven’t changed for months. Not sure if they still working on the project.

Finally a local startup opening for Rails, not freelance gig but a chance of full-time employment, wow! So off I go for interview, we overcome the usual stumbling block by cutting down my salary (of course, not before serious discussion with the stakeholder – my wife, always grateful for her understanding), I offer to work with them for a few weekends in advance, so both sides can see if we are a fit. Think you can guess the outcome by now. 2 weekends down, and I got a sorry message, it is not something to do with me, but their internal decision. That is what I’ve been told at least. They did offer to pay up for my time, though I rejected.

There are one or two more freelance opportunities in between, that didn’t materialized. The common theme here is, “It is not your problem really”. The project just got cancelled, or stagnant, or fading out, or because of some internal decision I was not hired. But I refuse to buy the “It is not your problem” statement. There is no benefit in believing it is just plain bad luck, there is no benefit in believing it is just some internal decision to not hire. That is like admit defeat and say, okay, there is nothing I can do with it now. I can only work on things that I can control, which is *me*. I haven’t made myself so good, that there is no excuse at all not to hire me, of course that is my problem.

Stay positive, working on my own projects, writing even more codes, reading even more codes. Keep doing all that. This is a marathon, not short sprint. Even if no one take a chance on me, the effort I put in will lead me to somewhere.

I have to believe in that, cause there aren’t any other options anyway. Ha.