Why I Decided To Become A Software Engineer.
My entire life I have always loved to be challenged, busy, and to solve problems. As a kid in school, subjects like math, chemistry and physics were my favorite. Math came so naturally to me and I was infatuated with science. I was absolutely sure that one day I would be going to college for a physics or math degree. Of course in life, things don’t always go as we plan.
When I was 15 I tested out of high school, and my mom decided we should pick up and travel. I was planning on starting college online while we travel, but my mom decided it was a good idea to hop on a sail boat… (insert travel lust mother), which doesn't exactly work well with online schooling. So at 15 years old, I sailed with my mom, three 70 year old men, and an anesthesiologist. We started in San Diego and went down to Baja, Mexico. Long story short, we ended up in the city of Colima. In Colima, Mexico, we settled and explored the country. Jumping from one hostel to a couch surfing situation, and so on and so on. I gained so much from the experiences I had during this time traveling.
A little while later while in Colima, I was scouted on Instagram by my mother agent to start modeling in NYC. All of the sudden at 16 years old, I was signed to a modeling agency, moving by myself to NYC and starting a whole new chapter of my life. After years of traveling with my mom, I decided to move to New York City on my own. Fast forward to now, 3 years later, living in NYC, recently traveled to Italy for 5 months (pre-pandemic) and my life has been anything but normal as a young woman. I will say, everything I had experienced during this time, being so young and alone, while working in such a crazy industry, has truly made me who I am today.
I am so thankful for the things and places I got to experience. The fashion industry simply put, just didn’t challenge me enough. The industry itself focused so much on my physical appearance that I didn’t get what I needed out of it. I knew that something was always missing. I like to be challenged, I like to solve problems.; I knew that one day I would leave the fashion industry and strive towards a career in something different.
I eventually ended up making a few friends who were programmers, one of them being a software engineer. I was considering going back to college, and talked to them about options and what they would do if they were me. Of course they said I should learn to be a programmer, and told me about these bootcamps that I could do. From time to time I had considered looking into learning code, but I wasn’t sure if it was something I would enjoy doing.
After talking to some of my friends about this, I decided to give it a go. I started to teach myself some different languages first, to see if it was even something I would be willing to go into. I found that I really enjoy programming. It challenges my brain, and sure, it can be extremely frustrating and time consuming. But the feeling I get when I figure out even just the smallest of problems, is its own kind of euphoria.
After almost 4 months of teaching myself, I decided I would love to start a career in this field. I talked further with some of my friends that could help me take the right steps to starting my career, which eventually led me to Flatiron. I am so thrilled to be doing this bootcamp, and to be starting this new chapter in my life. This is my story of why I decided to become a software engineer.
