T-SQL Tuesday #149: Best SQL advice I would give to my younger self!

Thank you camilahenrique for hosting April month of T-SQL Tuesday. You can find the invitation here.

I give a big thank you to my younger self for changing my career from a pharmacist to a SQL DBA. I always loved computers since my childhood. You may ask, why did you choose to do pharmacy then? It’s a long story! I was just an innocent kid fulfilling my father’s dreams. By the time I realize pharmacy is not for me, I graduated as a pharmacist. I came to the united states to finally pursue my dreams and change my career. I joined as a master’s student in computer technology at one of the great universities in the united states. That was a major life-changing moment for me since I do not have much computer knowledge before. One of my core subjects was SQL. That’s when I was introduced to SQL and SQL Server. I can tell you with my whole heart that at that moment I know the decision I made was right. Though it was very tough in the beginning to catch up with the speed of other students, I learned T-SQL basics and from there, my computer journey started. I was stressed out in many situations and started slow. I thought I would never be able to make it to graduation. No matter how much I learned, I made mistakes and was never perfect. I spent late hours learning basics so I would at least pass the exam. It was a roller coaster ride for my master’s degree but I finally made it to the graduation 🙂

If I can give one piece of advice to my younger self, I would say learning is a continuous process and we all are perfectly imperfect. Failure happens only when you stop willing to learn. There will never be a perfect moment to start learning anything. No matter what you learned in the past or what degree you pursued in the past, that doesn’t have to define your future goals. Anyone can learn anything if we have a heart, and the will to work hard at it.

Learning the basics of T-SQL is really important before moving into complex T-SQL coding skills. I would like to share my favorite youtube channel that helped me when I started my T-SQL journey. If you are starting with T-SQL learning, follow this series from Kudvenkat.

I am looking forward to read all posts for this T-SQL Tuesday and learning from SQL Family!

Thanks for reading!