Dear ladies, I hope you are doing great. First of all, wish you a very happy women's day. Keep shining, not just today but every coming day in your life.

Having said that, I really appreciate the effort of dev.to for celebrating all the incredible women out there via #shecoded.

This is the first time, I am participating in this and I am really excited to hear your story as well. So, go ahead and share your story of #shecoded :)

My #shecoded Journey

It's been almost 8 years since I started coding professionally in my first job and still thriving in 2022.

The journey was not an easy one and there has been ups and downs. However, one thing that stayed constant was, my attitude to not give up and to keep going no matter what.

I have worn many hats during this journey as developer, solutions architect, DevOps professional, content creator, speaker and a proud mother.

But, one thing that I absolutely love is coding. And, no matter which hat I am wearing, I still find time to code and get my dose of happiness.

Where It All Started?

Once upon a time in a remote village in India, I was having conversation with my childhood friend. She was telling me fascinating story of her city school where she got to learn computer and all the awesome things she was doing with that.

Something in me triggered that day and I wanted to go in computer world to know them inside out and play with them tirelessly. Back then very few people had even heard of computers in villages, forget about working with it. So I knew things are not gonna be easy. Years passed and I got into an engineering college in computer science and engineering.

Hence, my journey towards computer started officially ...

I still remember the day, I was in my C programming lab, looking here and there to see how this magic thing(computer) turns on(Well, it was the first time I touched a computer). I had no idea of what CPU is, and I will find a button somewhere there to turn it on.

I pressed the button after looking at how people were doing. To be honest, as the computer started, it literally ignited my fire to learn more about computers and how to make amazing things happen using it.

I wrote my first 'Hello World' with the help of my lab instructor and Preeti Coded !!! . Needless to say, I have never stopped coding ever since :)

My Recent Achievements

1. Recently, I have been selected as an AWS Community Builder by AWS. You can read more about this program here.

1. Reached more than 120k readers last year on my blog https://cloudkatha.com where I create cloud computing related content.

2. Spoken at GDG Berlin event about Cloud Computing.

3. Expanded my horizon from only Java Development to Node and Python

4. Gave a tech talk on Cloud Computing With Anuradha on her YouTube channel.

5. Published a blog post on official website of AWS and it was well appreciated by AWS.

I would like to thank

1. My parents, who sent me to study outside village as first girl from there. The battle with respect to people, finance and everything else was not easy on them. However, they decided not to give-up on my dreams and made me who I am today.
2. My husband and in laws, who treated me equally in every aspect of life. They truly helped me in stepping up the little ladder of success I wanted for myself
3. Each and everyone who said "I can't do it just because I am a girl". Trust me, they have added the fuel to the fire.
4. All the amazing people who stood by me, supported me and encouraged to spread my wings and fly higher.
5. World Wide Web and all the amazing content creator who helps me every single in in solving problems and being there for me.

Shoutout to All the Amazing Women Out There

We are stronger than we think. Let's believe in ourselves and we'll conquer the world. Let's lift each other up and make this world a better place.

Once again, Happy International women's day to all of us 👸

Be you, because you are the best :)

Signing Off,
Preeti