Susanna Codes

Practice  I swear this is the last one tonight and the last time I do this because I am exhausted. But I think I’ve cracked it. What is stopping me from reaching my full potential? Practise. Because the truth is you can write a million blog posts (737, to be precise) but it’s not a substitute for the coding. I keep on having to fix shitty venv issues but isn’t that all just practice. I keep on having to rebase but isn’t that all just practise. I don’t understand packages properly but won’t that be fixed with learning and practice. Because what I need is practice. And I need to think. I need to be clever. Will going to this event help me - or will it interfere with my practice and my coding time. Will I learn more from this or will I learn more from just working. Sometimes it’s easy to feel like I’m not going anywhere. But it’s precisely in doing the mundane stuff that I will learn. As Alex Warren said “day after day, we’ll make the mundane our masterpiece.” So I really have to do P...

Weaving A Thread Of Pain And Stories Sorry I’m on a roll and can’t stop now. I will regret this tomorrow. But there is a common theme. From the very first blog post I ever shared at my current job (that someone reached out to me in alarm about - not knowing my writing style - whoops sorry) - to the one I just wrote. There is a theme. The common theme is there. That common theme is fulfilling my full potential. Or rather not doing it. Every manager I have ever had has said to me the same thing: focus on the technical stuff. Don’t let yourself get distracted. Don’t let yourself get distracted by first aid courses and giving talks (my last tech talk was fun ok) and presenting company meetings. Something I have once tried to say is that everyone wants a piece of Susanna. I know that might sound arrogant. I don’t mean it like that - I mean it in the sense that yes I may seem nice open chatty friendly and all of that. But I am more than that. I am a super talented software engineer. I am a s...

Moonlight Sonata  The first time I fell in love was when I heard someone I knew playing the moonlight sonata by Beethoven. I wish I was lying but this is true. But I already knew the piece. My big sister used to play it at home. In my recent discoveries into Beethoven  I discarded it as being too obvious.  But now I guiltlessly listen to it. To my heart’s content. And it really does sound like moonlight on a lake. Have you ever seen moonlight on a lake? When I was 19 I went to the extreme rural part of Czechia. We walked at night round a huge lake. The moon was full. It was a dream. Magical beyond all words We walked in the middle of the road at night. All in one big group  And so I’m listening to the moonlight sonata late at night and writing blog posts again Which I said I wouldn’t do at this hour. And I’ve fucked up again today. Which is - I drank way too much caffeine. When I actually think about it - two hot chocolates and a bubble tea and a black tea - bubble t...

I've been fighting, I've been striving Once upon a time there was a girl. She was just living her life. Nothing big was going on just healing, working, striving and following a passion. That passion was renewable energy. I was just living my life, going somewhere, going nowhere, and following the wind farms. And then someone glitched my system. Or maybe a whole bunch of people did. The software engineer I met on the steps while I was feeling unwell who told me that you didn't need a computer science degree to be a software engineer. The manager who insisted to me that I tried coding. The senior manager who didn't promote me prompting me to apply for a product role. The product person who I was replacing who directed me to codecademy. The software engineer with over 40 years experience who told me that it was the most creative thing that he had ever done out of all the creative arts - and who told me that I would be a software engineer, for sure. Even when I argued with ...

And it's not because of you, that I turned out so dangerous I came back to work. It's so good to be back. I have already messed up once - I stayed late after work to help with an event. This was already a mistake.  I got really tired and struggled to get home and didn't rest properly and then felt tired the next day. I can see much better now how being over active in too much stuff can hold me back in my work. I remember we spoke with my manager before we both went on leave, about how much potential I have. I really need to focus on software engineering work. Technical problem solving. Helping the team. I need to be so careful of distractions. Distractions distract me more than they distract people. My working style is very unique. I have to be very, very deeply focused. The less I have going on the better. That doesn't mean to say outside of work - well let's see. I have a dance class tonight for the first time. (A new one in Brighton - have danced in London midwee...

I’m Loving Angels Instead Look, I’m really quite terrified about retuning to work on Tuesday. I’m feeling every emotion in the world at the moment. I have found so much of myself while I have been off work. I just don’t want to lose that again. I am done with trying to justify myself to people. My performance coach says I do that too much. I am a child of the trees. I am a child of the fairies. I am a child of the angels. I am a child of the stars. I was born to dance barefoot upon this earth. I was born to love the pylons and the wind farms. And most of all I was born to try and bring this back into tech somehow Your guess is as good as mine

Return To Work: Some new resolutions On Tuesday I am going back to work. I can’t wait. I’m really excited. I can’t wait to start building some AI again. AI has really missed me - and I have really, really missed AI. But I have some new resolutions. I will hydrate. I have been drinking a litre of lemon water every day first thing and even drinking two or three. This is the aim. I will finish on time. I will be out of there. 5, 5.30. I will remember that I am playing the long game. I will remember that I am running a long long marathon and that I need to be able to sustain over time. I will keep my room tidy. Yes, really. I am still mid declutter. But I have done a lot. Only a few more categories to go. When it’s all done and the stuff in the kitchen is done too then  I will keep my room tidy. I will really try to keep it clean.  With fewer possessions it should be easier to dust, hoover and wipe surfaces more often  I am getting an oil diffuser - and some oils especially o...

5 Wishes When I turned 17 I got a couple of books that would change my life. My sister got me The Magic Toyshop and a book of love poems. But my mum got me a book called 5 Wishes by Gay Hendricks. How I loved that book. And maybe I should try it out again some time.  But the truth is. I don’t think that I could. My seventeen year old mind was spoilt and I guess my ego kicked in. I wanted to be an actress. I wanted to sing. I wanted to dance. I wanted to fall in love. I wanted to write poetry. The trouble is I couldn’t decide. Unable to trust my first instincts, I changed my mind. But I finally settled on something in the end. And I can’t remember them although I’m almost certain either acting or writing featured. But I do remember my second wish. It was a term I couldn’t place. I just called it “Zen”. If I could rewrite that now I’d just call it “God”. I didn’t realise they were the same thing. I see God everything. God is in the devotional poetry I read by Shruti Bakshi. God is in...

Ra Ra Rasputin  The story of Rasputin was so pertinent to me growing up. I can’t even remember where it began. My little sister was obsessed with the movie “Anastasia” and so we watched that all the time with Rasputin cartoonified in there. I also had a favourite Lord of the Rings documentary which showed how Grima Wormtongue was based off of Rasputin. But also my Uncle loves Boney M. And so the song Rasputin became an instant favourite. And you can’t be depressed while listening to that song. It’s impossible. Just try. I’m writing this listening to Beethoven’s 7th symphony. The second part. It quickly captured my heart. On Tuesday I’m due to go back to work. I’ve had a lot of fears and doubts and nervousness about going back. I don’t want to make the same mistakes again. I want to have better boundaries both in and out of work. I want to rest more and sleep more. I want to keep hydrating myself like I have been on my break. Because I have been feeling so much better. My seizures h...

Breaking Hearts I’m sitting in the kitchen of my grandads house. This is where I started my career. I worked remotely for six months from his place during Covid. I had an immense passion for electricity and that was the only thing that got me through my first job. You see I was never expecting the challenges I encountered in the workplace. At uni I struggled but I managed to make it work for me and did really well. I got a distinction on my last degree. School and uni were hard but I had coping strategies.  Work was new and I had no coping strategies. Through six months of hell and two probation extensions (sound familiar?) I walked with the pylons.  I’m serious. I’m not kidding. I poured everything into that job. I bought fancy notebooks with my pay checks and I studied into them.  I even worked on my holidays. Again, sounds familiar? I have to ask myself why I have to do this in every new job at first. It just takes me longer to get the gist of things. Longer to get the...

How Not To Mess Up Like I Did Last Year My favourite author talked about the threads that run our lives. My thread is love: everything I do I do it out of love. My grandad and I are watching TV. He accidentally turned on a Shakespeare comedy sketch. How joyful. Then he switched over to the news. I spent years hooked on the news. Let me tell you. The news never tells you anything good. Much better to watch comedy Shakespeare. I’ve been reflecting on my last year. I don’t remember the last two weeks. I think I mostly just slept. Did whatever I needed to do to recover. It was really bad. I’m glad that I stopped when I did. It could’ve been so much worse. I did no end of stupid things. I almost didn’t take a single day off in 2024. I almost didn’t take a single weekend. I worked on many of my holidays. I didn’t take my evenings off - in the summer I never left the office before 9 pm and I never really got much summer sun. This is too depressing to write. So I’m done. But I’m having clear g...

Losing the Earth for the Earth I’m going back to who I once was. That year during Covid was so defining for me. I lived in the woods or just on the edge of them. Luxembourg didn’t restrict entry to the woods I don’t think. And so I spent a year exploring and discovering nature and hugging trees. But of course I already had a huge bond with this place before this. I once went deep into the woods and swore to give my life to the earth. As I retrained as a software engineer I had no time for true contact with nature. And it’s been awful to be honest. But I have to believe I did it for the earth. Because I work in water and I have worked in renewable energy and I want to and have to believe that I am really really and really doing this for the earth even if I had to lose sight of her along the way temporarily

Reach for the sky but keep your feet on the ground Today I felt better than I have done in years. Absolute years.  Today, I felt peace. Now it’s one thing to write about nonduality and to know about nonduality and to have moments of ecstasy and inspiration and joy. But to be at peace is really something else. And I don’t know if I ever felt it before.  Or at least since I was a little child. Today was also the best I’ve felt in several weeks. I got signed off sick for seven days about two weeks ago. I didn’t feel like I would ever recover. I was so so so exhausted. But now on my annual leave I feel like I am recovering. Please don’t judge me. I don’t think anyone can ever understand what it’s like to try and regulate their nervous system at work while working as a neurodivergent person.  Let alone a neurodivergent trauma survivor. So nobody can judge. And as I mentioned weirdly last night Bach is really helping me to heal my nervous system. Can he topple Beethoven? Unlike...

The Cat That Taught Me Boundaries I am like a hurricane. I cannot control myself. I have so many ideas. They flow through me so fast. I’m so privileged. For so many years I thought my creativity was dead. Stuff happened and I died inside. Software engineering played a huge role in my creativity coming back. My love for software engineering is so deep and so profound. It spurred me on to do so much writing. And I struggled so much - finding my first job, getting laid off, passing my probation - that I was pushed to write deeper and write more. So much has arisen too. I’ve been singing all my life and writing songs all my life but both have taken off recently. And I’ve been dancing. My god I have been dancing. I have been dancing so so so much. So I saw this cat today. He was on the roof of a convertible. I being my very naughty self snuck up to it and tried to let it sniff my hand. It retreated. I was bothering it. I would’ve been hurt. I love cats. But this cat was my teacher. The cat ...

“The Language of the Angels” A former partner once told me that I would definitely have been a hobbit in the Lord of the rings. Slightly offended, I cannot fault him.  I mean I would rather have been an elf. But yes I do probably love the idea of a warm cosy home too much - although what were the rooms like in Rivendell? Boyfriends can be wrong you know. Maybe I was meant to be an elf after all - although he was the literal elf out of us. So tall and probably could’ve played an elf in one of the films had he been old enough. But that still doesn’t give him the right to discredit me from the elf realm! I just maybe won’t be wielding any swords in battle after all - not even like my heroine Eowyn would be. Eowyn chose softness and then she healed. Like me I suppose. Maybe. I hope. Healing Since we’re going here I want to talk about what I think is gonna help me when I return to work from my holiday and etc. Number one not writing posts at this time of night. Somebody confiscate my ph...

How Classical Music is Saving My Life I had a fancy music education. I did extremely hard music exams and sat in the least-ADHD friendly lessons in the world with the strictest scariest and Frenchest teachers. I learned in French - which, I was probably about 9 or 10 when I began to understand absolutely everything that was going on in French and so my foundations In music theory were often quite non existent - I only theoretically knew what I grasped in later years. I became an expert in copying people. While of course I could read music and I could play several instruments I was rubbish at sight reading and too ADHD to use my piano to learn my notes  I became a master of singing what others were singing. So I could still sing you one of my pieces from when I was 9 or 10 from memory. Always naughty and always in trouble my grades plummeted as my ADHD got worse with age (I didn’t know I had it - and it’s something that develops with age). I laughed at the jokes of the other naughty...

Affection One of my single favourite songs when I was younger was “Affection” by Cigarettes After Sex. It’s still one of my favourites to play and sing. And that’s it. My life has been this whole huge and unexpected journey I didn’t expect to go on. Most of the stuff I was dealt was stuff I never asked for but of course I don’t believe in this stuff anymore. I believe in being dealt whatever we need to awaken. There are still so many questions I have. Like why am I so bad at dealing with certain things. Why do I fall into some certain patterns and repeat those again and again. But the truth is that there is nobody there to repeat them. And we will repeat them until we realise that. But I see God everywhere. I see patterns everywhere. When we are in the deepest darkest hell there is someone who is witnessing that hell. Who is the one who is witnessing that hell? Look closely. There are so many things that I wish  I did so much better. But who is the one who is doing the wishing? And...

Not Everything In This Magical World Is Quite What It Seems I don’t want to make any sudden decisions but this feels right to me.  I have been getting rid of things, letting things go. I’ve noticed myself buying this again. I feel when my declutter is complete it will be easier to not buy things. Because then I will know how good it feels with less stuff. Then I won’t want to buy any more unless it’s really needed. I dream of Tibet. How many books, how many oracle cards do you need to go to Tibet? But mostly it was stuff I didn’t want. Rubbish.  Clothes I didn’t want. Stuff I didn’t want. Which is a great metaphor for trauma survivors. Look, I think this blog needs to stop here. Not in a bad way. But I think I need to move on. I need a new identity. No longer the angsty software engineer learning how to code. No longer elated on a love of coding - can’t promise that haha. No longer struggling to pass probation or find a new job. This feels like closing down a business. What I ...

Kaos Chaos is the home of all art. Destruction is the home of all art. Art is not nice, clean.  Art is a mess. Art is destructive. And art cannot stay the same. It has to evolve. And I know that it is time for this blog to evolve too. And I have to rethink how I do things. I want to keep my writing reasonably professional. And it’s getting harder and harder to do that. The deeper and deeper I sink into God the more and more it is hard to separate my personal posts from nonduality. But I also have started my own new blog where I write about nonduality. Although I have to admit I don’t like writing about nonduality for the sake of it. When it comes through then it’s great but I don’t like forcing it. My biggest fear is imposing on my colleagues. More and more of my posts are God posts. I don’t know if people at work on the feed might be upset by them or perturbed by them.  But I want to share my water and occasional technical blog posts. So what to do? I have started a new water...

The First Rays Of Dawn After A Long, Cold Night If I could say one thing to the world, it would be this: “there is no light at the end of the tunnel. You are the light.” My friend recently sent me a WhatsApp message when I told him I was seeking: “the light is seeking the source of light.” Rebirth. Easter is the time of year when we celebrate our rebirth. But there is only one true rebirth. And that is the rebirth to who we really are. The spiritual rebirth.  As I go on with this blog and with life I can no longer hide who I am.  I can no longer hide my love for the world. I can no longer hide my passion and my ecstasy. I don’t want to be Susanna the cute little software engineer anymore. I want to be who I am. Who I really am. Gods consciousness. Gods infinite being. Gods bliss. This is who we all are and what we all are without exception. This leaves some questions around my blog. Do I split it up? I already have at least three other blogs I regularly write on. Starting a ma...

The Angels Up In The Clouds, Are Jealous Knowing We Found [Something I Love So Much As Water AI] Today marks the end of my sick leave and the beginning of my annual leave. About 7 days of each in total if you count the bank holidays too. I should probably be more subtle.  I don't do subtle. I desperately needed the break and I am so grateful to my performance coach for highlighting it to me. The past few days have been so essential to me not just to recovering from the probation.  But also to healing some deeper trauma and more personal stuff that I have been carrying for a long long time. I cannot even tell you how much this break meant to me. And I have made massive progress with decluttering my room. There's still more to be done; the clothes and books are done and the notebooks are mostly done. But need to do everything else, tea boxes, jewellery, cleaning products, sentimental items, health stuff... and so much more.  Cables. Teddy bears. It is unlikely that I w...

“If you have fallen to the ground, use it as a lever to raise yourself up again” If there’s anyone who knows about laying on the floor it’s me.  I think I hold some kind of a Guiness World Record. Somebody once said to me “you fall to the floor… but every time you fall you pick yourself up!” I thought back then that that person was so stupid and so annoying. Of course I got up. What choice did I have? But I think there was a deeper meaning there of perseverance. One that I refused to accept at the time. Look I am dancing around a lot of difficult topics here. I am dancing over the shame and the pain of the last twelve months. How hard it was. How much I didn’t feel like I deserved to be here. How hard I had to fight to get my voice and my talents heard. The constant battle of trying to prove myself while knowing it takes about 9 months for the job to click for me. It was so exhausting and traumatic and I never want to go through it again. My biggest fear is not progressing. If I wa...

Rivers Flowing Tears Til Your Destinies Dissolve This is kind of like a part two to my last blog post. Titles are from a song called Closer by Screaming Trees.  That whole album is phenomenal. Right so I was talking about how I took a year out ten years ago. And now I am only taking a few weeks out and half of it was holiday anyway. But it still feels like a lot. And it still feels a bit traumatic for me. Like a weird blast from the past. But in my blog post I listed lots of beautiful and healing things that happened as a result of dropping out of Uni. And so I’m sure beautiful and healing things will happen as a result of this break now. Because by God I need healing like never before. My heart is so open and vulnerable and tender and ready to be loved. Ready and waiting to be loved. Because I just need love so much right now. I need love like I’ve needed it never before. Love for all things and everyone around me. Love for everything in the world. But here’s a quote from my medit...

Thunder In Your Ears Until You Can’t Hear This At All Why am I writing so much at the moment? Because I have a lot to process and understand. Indeed, it is only when I stop that I really begin to process it all. “The end and the beginning are the same. It’s all the same.” I would be lying to you if I didn’t feel a bit triggered right now though. It’s been 10 years since I dropped out of university. And being asked to take a break by someone who is helping me out is exactly what happened back then.  Of course it was much worse then.  I was out for about 16 months. I had been hanging on for so long. I did everything to save my uni degree. Pulled everything out of the bag. Did things I thought I would never do. But I still couldn’t make it work. Now, was dropping out of university just before my 21st birthday a disaster? No it was an amazing epic success. I came back and got three degrees in the end. I got diagnosed with ADHD which was a lifesaver. I got so much help with so much...

Yesterday, I heard God say, “It’s in your blood” All the new quotes are from Lana del Rey’s new song. From the very beginning of my software engineering career I knew what kind of software engineer I wanted to be. Soft, gentle. The clue’s in the name. I wanted to be a “soft, soft software engineer.” That goes against the whole industry right. Softness and gentleness are the antithesis of the software engineering industry right? Not quite. I have been moved by the softness and the gentleness of so many people along the way. The beautiful love and the kindness of a current mentor. The love and the kindness that a former mentor treated me with as he helped me to bridge the gaps that would’ve made succeeding in my job impossible otherwise. The male mentor in my first job who told me that he also got imposter syndrome, making me feel less alone. Softness, and gentleness. The softness of my current manager when he looks after me sometimes. The softness and gentleness and kindness of my last ...

Life Hacks to Simplify My Life It’s not that kind of blog but my spirit animal is a deer. Hundred percent. Now the one thing I remember about this is that deer navigate their life with grace and ease. Safe to say the last few years has been anything but graceful and easy although I do admire the incredible strength and dignity with which I have handled everything. Now one thing I have in mind is life hacks. With AuDHD the world can be almost impossible. Never mind with seizures etc. So as I’m taking some time off to rest and recover I am thinking even more about life hacks. Most I am already doing or well underway. Here are my thoughts.  All of this is with the aim of successfully continuing with my beautiful software engineering career of course. So here we go Here’s some of them: Cannot easily tidy a bedroom, struggle to clean if there are things in the way - own as little stuff as possible, have as much clear empty space as possible to make it easier to clean - “it is the empty ...

I like to fly, I build AI - part 2 When everything falls apart then I feel grateful for my job. Not just my job but my passion. So many times.  Things have fallen apart but my gratitude and my love remains.  Last summer I spent a night in the hospital. I get seizures, these things can happen. I just realised how grateful I am to have a job I love so much. How lucky I am I have a job I love so much. No one could pick me up; no one could come out to me; I was alone all night until the first bus home could take me back. But they made me two gluten free jam sandwiches. And most of all they made me realise how lucky I was  Because in what can be a very difficult life sometimes no one, no one, expects me to be an AI engineer. And that is always the plot twist that I love. One or two years before I burned my hands and ended up in hospital. The same one. It was awful. My flatmates back then were horrible and they wouldn’t take me seriously. The neighbour helped me call 111 but wo...

Secret Confessions of an AI Engineer and a No. 1 Beethoven Fan Learning to love Beethoven is like learning a new language.  But as I lie there in bed and listen to him all my brain can think is: “he’s breaking all the rules of music.” Music shouldn’t even exist like Beethoven can make it exist. It shouldn’t even happen like Beethoven can make it happen. After years of being told that nobody got the universe like Beethoven did I started to listen to Beethoven. Really listen. Not in the background. Not while coding (although some of my best code has been written while listening to Beethoven coincidentally). But I lie in the dark and I listen. Instead of going on YouTube shorts, the single most draining thing in the world, I listen. I listen as he breaks every rule of music. I listen as he does things with music that shouldn’t be possible. I realise I’ve cheated myself out of listening to the best music around up until now. On Saturday I caved and went to see a Beethoven concert amids...

“But yesterday, I heard God say, you were born to be the one…” Hey there. Still off work. Still tired. Lana del Rey released a new song. Thank God. My soul needed it so much.  I’m thinking a lot about everything. Thinking about where I went wrong. I just want to release. I want to release all the crap that is in my room. I’ve been trying to fully declutter since I was 21. I give away so much. I donate so much. But then I never quite finish. I never get to the click. And then I buy more. I don’t know what technique to use. There are so many techniques. The Marie Kondo method. I like to do kinaesthetic tests too. I like to pretend I’m packing up during the pandemic again and I have to make really quick decisions about what to keep and what to leave behind. That was no fun. But it was efficient. I just can’t release it. There’s so much stuff I can’t let go of. I don’t know how to. I don’t know how to. I suppose that’s a good metaphor for life. We accumulate stuff and we hold on to it....

Withstanding All The Time, Changes and Seasons - Quite Literally  To know me is to know that “Yosemite” by Lana del Rey is my software engineering song. I always thought that my love for software engineering was “withstanding all the time, changes and seasons.” But - just like with getting an AI in utilities job - I couldn’t imagine how quickly the test of this would come. I have of course got a million thoughts in my head. I was told not to think about work while I was off and I agree. But if writing and thinking about things can help me to come back stronger then that's okay I think. I want to talk about someone who really inspires me.  And that is Taylor Swift. Taylor Swift built her empire by being herself. She succeeded, built a following, created her art, became a billionaire - all through being herself. Is there anything better than to just succeed by being yourself? And having a good time along the way? I have to admit - the issue isn't my work. I love my work. And I a...

We’ll Make The Mundane… Our Masterpiece, Part 2 I am off work and probably not meant to be writing this but I think it will be impossible not to write for a day or two… as like a fan I need to stop my whirring as I finally settle. And stopping always gives us time to reflect. And to say: I really love my job. I don’t think that anyone gets this.  The reason I did this and did everything I did last year is because I love my job so so much. The reason I didn’t stop for two seconds after getting laid off (BIG MISTAKE) was because I knew I couldn’t stop with either renewable energy or software engineering. This is because I love the Earth so so much. This is what I do for the Earth. Everything I do I do it for the Earth. This is why I couldn’t lose this job I have now. The story is public info: joined, battled on, had a ten month probation. Now I have period of sick leave as well as a holiday. I am just so tired. I would not ever want to do what I did last year again. Not even for anyt...

Non-Duality Im about to take some time off. Not sure how much yet. Some sick leave and some holiday. I’m pretty sure I need to tone it down a bit. But just how long will be confirmed. So before I totally crash I want to say: you’ve probably seen my posts and wondered what I’m talking about and I just want to clarify that I am not religious  I just love the non dual understanding And that is the understanding that we are all one All people and all things are all one There are no things and there are no people There is only gods presence And if you truly go down to your own experience then you will truly realise that this is true There is no time and there is no space There is only love Thank you