I remember the first time seeing a computer, I was about eight years old. My father brought an IBM desktop home and my family would watch movies on it. I also remember spending a lot of time trying to figure out how to get the video games working on it. The fascination of that “magic” machine was still fresh and vivid in my memory to this day. Since my father worked as an electrical engineer at a local university when I was growing up, I was fortunate to have the opportunity to hang out with all kinds of computing gadgets at his. Honestly, I had a lot of fun. Moreover, I’ve also developed a strong appetite for playing with two languages partially because my mother was a bilingual teacher and she had shown me the beauty of languages.
When it comes to software development, certainly, the salary is decent, job prosperity is brighter, the market demand is high. Therefore, of course, I want to put myself in this box and put on a hat as being a software developer. But these are not the reasons that have gotten me into software development in the first place. So what are they? How and why I’ve made this decision? How come a guy like me who went to a university and later received a BA in accounting and finance ended up wanting to do software development? The truth is, it just so happen that the opportunity has opened itself up and I am ready for it.
First and foremost, my motivation came from within. Since 2013, I have had various types of jobs, from being a bookkeeper to a mortgage processor, from being a server at a restaurant to a traveling salesperson. Then in 2017, I started working at an Apple retail store selling gadgets to the general public while I was in school exploring career options I would be truly interested in pursuing. I took many classes for two years, learned a lot but eventually decided to stop because none of the career track I researched was an appeal to me whatsoever. I felt like I have exhausted all the primary resources and options offered by the school.
I was in limbo. Now what? I waited and waited, not knowing what to choose next. Then I started to thoroughly examine my career track in the past. The more I reflected on it, the more I realized that deep down, I have this strong desire to learn, to be challenged, to be creative and it was unfulfilled, how much these values matter to me everything I do.
Subsequently, I have become increasingly determined. Every day, I would push myself to continue the search to find somewhere I can put such a burning desire to use. It just so happen that someone at my work told me about coding. He was in school getting his computer science degree. Before that, he completed a coding boot camp. We had a fruitful discussion and I decided to give coding a shot. Immediately, I started with the free code camp. I did not know how much time I would need to put into it. Then the store where I worked was closed due to the outbreak of COVID-19. Shelter-in-place was enforced. All of sudden, I had all the time I could ever have. Long story short, within the following two months, I had consistently spent several hours a day, no exception, going through all the coding modules. In the end, I completed all of them and received a responsive web development certificate and a JavaScript algorithm and data structures certificate. I’ve learned a lot. It was hard but I felt greatly satisfied and rewarded. Along the journey, I also built several websites, developed a couple of simple games, watched countless video tutorials, and read a bunch of articles. I was hooked. It was at that point, I knew I’ve found that thing I have looked for.
Truth to be told, I’ve found many things in the computer science realm super interesting, such as IT infrastructure, cybersecurity, network, quantum computing, database, cloud computing, and many others. Coding might not be what I end up doing. But it is a good place to start. As long as I keep having a growth mindset and I know I do, the process of learning how to code is just a means to serve the bigger goal that I am called to fulfill.
