It wasn’t the hardest exam of my life. But it still managed to scare me.

I took my first certification — the Databricks Certified Data Engineer Associate — back in October 2024. It wasn’t the hardest thing I’ve ever done, but somehow it still made me nervous.

I’d been using Databricks almost daily for years, but I wanted something to prove (mostly to myself) that I really knew what I was doing. Maybe it was about confidence. Maybe it was finally putting a stamp on all that hands-on work.

My technical preparation had really happened over those last 5 years, but I still wasn’t confident I’d pass the exam. So I decided to focus more on the theoretical side.

At the company I worked for at the time, I had access to Databricks Academy, and that helped a lot. I built a learning path with a bunch of courses recommended directly by Databricks.

So here’s how I broke it down: first, I started with the accreditation — the Databricks Accredited Lakehouse Platform Fundamentals. This one focuses on whether you can explain the components of the platform and how they fit together.

The difference between these two certifications is pretty big: the accredited exam is free and non-proctored, while the certification exam is paid and proctored. For this cert specifically, the price was $200 USD. That might not sound like much, but converted here in Brazil, it was about R$1,200. Honestly, that price was one of the main reasons I felt nervous — imagine paying nearly R$1,200 and then failing? It’s scary to “waste” your money like that, you know?

After the accreditation assessment (which I passed), I took a break for a few weeks, then started studying for the certification itself. I used the material from Databricks Academy, plus this series of videos that helped me a lot: Databricks Certification Preparation.

It took me almost five months to finish the Databricks Academy courses and watch all the videos from that series I mentioned earlier. At the time, I mostly just felt scared — what if I didn’t pass? The money was a big issue. But on the other hand, if I did pass, the company I worked for back then would reimburse me.

Along with the fear about the cost, I still doubted whether I’d actually be able to pull it off. After a few weeks stuck in that uncertainty, I remember it was a Friday when I finally decided: enough. I scheduled the exam for the very next day — just to break that cycle of hesitation.

I prepped my whole environment: made sure no one would disturb me, kept all tech distractions far away, and found the quietest spot I could.

The exam itself was actually very straightforward. I had 90 minutes to answer 45 multiple-choice questions, though in reality it was 50 questions — because 5 of them were experimental, used to test for next year’s exam updates. (But of course, I didn’t know which ones were real and which were just tests.)

The best part? You get the result right after finishing. And surprisingly, I passed without any problems.

Now, almost 10 months since earning this “title,” I can honestly say nothing big has changed. But it did make me feel more confident and secure in my own knowledge. It also helped me see a possible path for more certifications that might, little by little, keep making me more comfortable with myself.

Looking back, it wasn’t the money or the exam that really mattered — it was finally trusting that I know more than I give myself credit for.

And for now, that’s more than enough.