Gotcha. Yea, I know Bose is always an option. Not that I wouldn't go with them because they do make quality products, but I am trying to find what else is out there too.
I constantly see studies and opinions for both sides of this coin. I was never much of a coffee drinker, but now I am. I still think in moderation when you need a boost it is better than anything.
However, the points made in this article I can definitely related to.
For both a great lesson and hilarious yet, a very applicable list of ideas.
I've been saying this for years. Obviously, we all want to progress in our careers, learn new things, and become the best we can be. Having a vision for where you want to end up is extremely important for getting there, otherwise a dream is just a pipe dream.
BUT, if you can wake up every day and do things like are stated above, you are going to be wildly happier in even the worst of situations and in turn, make others around you happier, even if this is only a small stop along the long road.
Just the other day, I wanted to try the new Dunkin Donuts breakfast burrito. If you've seen the commercial where the two guys are sitting down with goggles on because it is "exploding with flavor". I sat down in our kitchen, with goggles on at 8:30am when everyone was coming into the office. It made me laugh and a ton of others.
In a similar position as you, only a year younger. I hear of these 16 year old interns all the time and with a 10 year difference, I am constantly worried I am too far behind the curve. I have no formal CS "schooling" but I love to learn and learning comes naturally to me, so I've picked up quite a bit. To solidify my knowledge, I am thinking of going to one of the bootcamps and make my way into the industry.
That being said, as someone below mentions, I am TERRIFIED that even though I spend most of my free time coding, it will be far less enjoyable as a full-time career. But, on the flip side, I really do enjoy creating and building things with code.
I hate testing, I rather not work with someone else's code, etc. I love building. I would just have to set myself up to work for companies that are in the building stage where I am constantly working on something new. I think that can certainly be done.
Here is what it comes down to for me and why I am heading in this direction and why it is never too late:
- I have dreams that involve technology (building things, running my own company)
- If my dreams fail, what profession is going to set my up for long-term success and is going to be sustainable for the next 30 years. And I rather do it now at ~28 than regret not doing it in another 5 years. (Engineering)
- I want to work in an industry that is moving the world forward with extremely intelligent people. (Goes back to, my job means nothing.)
- And most importantly, there are examples and inspirations all over the world that show why it is never to late and that you can do what you put your mind to. The human mind and body is an unbelievable specimen. It will be hard, but you just have to decide. Just decide and go do it. Don't waste time because life is pathetically short. And you can be whoever you want to be.
It is your choice to wake up with a smile on your face everyday and to put a smile on other's faces. We all have to work to live, but what you do outside of your profession and how you have fun with your profession is what it is all about.
Coming from someone who had no formal "schooling" in CS and really not a clue where to start, my biggest piece of advice is:
Literally read everything you can get your hands on. When you come across something you don't understand, look it up, because 9/10 times it leads you to something better than where you started.
I would now consider myself a fairly experienced amateur, although it took me much longer than expected to get up to speed. It took me a long time to get on the right track, if you will, and by that I mean getting a base understanding of programming in general and then on top of that, figuring out what exactly I should be learning and in what order to eventually pursue a career in Web-based Development/Engineering.
I had no one close to me in the space that I could get advice from either. So I really am a raw use case.
That being said, I think what would have helped me the most is finding a resource that addressed all of my short comings:
- If I want a job, what is hot in the industry, where is it trending? (Answer: JS and Mobile)
- If I am interested in pursuing X, what is the first language I should take a look at, or at least some framework buzzwords (i.e. Web: Rails is/was hot, APIs are driving the future, JS is very hot. So, Ruby, JS, maybe Python).
- Where should I look for go to resources / where can I ask questions (SO, HN, etc.)
The biggest problem I ran into is that even after I slowing found the answers to these questions, I still didn't know how to get started other than buying a book. However, I found that the majority of books don't "tell a story" and the majority of online resources (blogs, etc.) are not geared towards absolute beginners.
I not only needed to understand the basic such as syntax, but I needed to understand how things fit together at a high level and the best way I found of doing so, was having a resource walk me through the baby steps of building a real-world application, from start to finish, tying in the larger picture as the end of each chapter.
I mean, you have to understand that someone who is brand new doesn't even know how the backend and frontend relate to each other.
Basically, for beginners, even those resources that are "targeted" at beginners, assume too much.
I guess that is something to chew on, but what it comes down to is that I wish I had a resource that told the high level picture better and guided me in the right direction from day 1, as far as "Where do I start if I want to learn web development, and why I am starting there?" And give me a few good resources to get me going.