This is a good question and it is going to depend on your learning style. That being said, I feel like this quote encapsulates some wisdom that I've used:
“If you want to learn something, read about it.
If you want to understand something, write about it.
If you want to master something, teach it.”
- Yogi Bhajan
My technique involves reading the technical book and then writing down the most important parts of what I've learned. This is useful for reference later, if I need a quick refresher.
Another useful technique is the third part of this quote, finding some way to teach and explain the concepts you are using. Often times the best audience is a smart but non-technical person. Can you find a way to explain the concept you are learning in a way so that your audience understands?
Typically this involves a lot of simplifying and I think this simplification can frustrate the engineer part of our brains that cries out "But it isn't simple!" Try to fight this urge to reject simplification because it can become easier to work with concepts as simple discrete components. Think of Newtonian mechanics, it was a nice simple explanatory framework for how things work (good enough) until we needed to add electromagnetism and quantum mechanics to explain natural phenomena that didn't abide by the framework.
Edit:
Oh and lastly, and most people have already mentioned this, build something useful with the concepts you are learning.
Great teamwork and culture, tons of smart and friendly people, interesting technical problems (I think computer networking is interesting ¯\_(ツ)_/¯), opportunities for growth, and good work-life balance.
One thing to note is that much of this might be because I got lucky and joined the team that was part of the OpenDNS acquisition.
Correct. Cisco stock growth is not only limited by the hw business since 2000, but Huawei ate their lunch on growth, which is the kiss of death for a tech company. See Nortel.
(Zoom was started with 40 Webex (Cisco) engineers. lol.)
Also Cisco salaries are really low for SV, like 30% less - totally non-FAANG. I've pointed that out to Cisco recruiters, and they almost cried on the phone begging me to go to the next interview step anyway.
I interpret your response to suggest that taking risks comes with consequences and that most of the time those consequences are negative.
My question was meant to ask (in a round-about way) why collectively we don't subsidize risk-taking (especially when the risk-takers have a track record of producing neat things)?
For anyone who wishes to explore some of the ideas presented in this article about wilderness, I would recommend Michael Pollan's essay "The Idea of a Garden".
I read Pollan's essay as part of a discussion about wilderness ethics and it has stuck with me for years. It can be found in his book, Second Nature.
If you are still reading this comment, I would also recommend Desert Solitaire by Edward Abbey. It takes a more irascible approach to some of the ideas of wilderness ethics, but is is a damn-good, swashbuckling time.
Some poetry serves the "higher" meaning of discussing political ideas like Claudia Rankine's Citizen: An American Lyric.
Some poetry is made to make you laugh like Billy Collins' Another Reason Why I Don't Keep A Gun in the House.
Some poetry is purposefully inscrutable and difficult because the author wants you to work to understand them. A good example of this might be r-p-o-p-h-e-s-s-a-g-r by E.E. Cummings.
Each of these examples is meaningful in its own different way. I think trying to decide what has meaning is hard because you might automatically discard a work of art that is "just for fun". Isn't play meaningful?
This book[1] compares poetry to music. There are many genres and styles of music, and it is likely that you don't like all genres. Enjoying poetry is about trying to find the "genre" of poetry that moves you.
[1] Don't Read Poetry: A Book About How to Read Poems - Stephanie Burt
