The title may have given it away, but I’ve been a Motley Crue fan since I was a young child, and I’m using it as motivation for the upcoming week. I’m attending the CIERS1 class, put on by Global Knowledge via the Cisco360 program, and there is a mixed bag of feelings as I approach this. I feel like I’ve struggled over the past three years to get a solid footing in my CCIE studies. Life seems to constantly get in the way, and I have made it a personal goal to at least have a CCIE lab attempt by the end of 2017. I want to have my CCIE by the time I’m 40, which is less than three years off. I think this is more than enough time, and I’ll probably shrink this time as I get going on this journey.

The class itself looks like a very intense bootcamp, a week-long immersion into the CCIE. I passed my written back in 2013, so I’ll need to refresh that as well, but this time along I’ve decided to simply study for the CCIE as a whole, rather than studying for the written and then studying for the lab. I’ve read stories from both approaches, and I think with the way my brain works, this one will be the best. The class days are 12-14 hours each, so while I’ll be visiting New York City for the first time, I have a feeling that I won’t get to do much sightseeing. All of this is fine with me, this has become beyond a career goal but a personal goal.

I have reached the determination that the CCIE is no longer about prestige or what it can do for my career in terms of money. It’s become a goal to get my number, regardless of whether it will further my career, I want to gain the knowledge and insight into networking that comes along with it. I’ve had many things happen in my personal life over the past 3 years, and if you see me at Cisco Live and want to chat about them, I’m a fairly open book, but I’ve been able to overcome a lot of things that were holding me back in life. I feel like I’m finally ready, and I really hope I’m not feeding myself a line of BS, but I know I can do this.

I’m hoping to blog my progress next week in my class, time permitting, as I’m looking forward to drinking from the firehose.