Changes
“Ch-ch-changes” — not my favourite David Bowie song by far, but it’s certainly the most relevant to describe my 2020. While the rest of the world were busy trying to adapt to a changing world, I made some changes of my own.
How I ended up at a coding boot-camp— When I first started playing with the idea of making the move from the UK to sunny Stockholm, the main concern was surrounding vocation. At the time I was working in IT in a job I liked, with people I loved, but my role wasn’t the most universal. With the tech scene so prominent in Stockholm I couldn’t help but regret the decision to give up on a web design career 10 years earlier.
In 2011, I managed to get a job as a web management assistant for an open access publishing company in London. The plan was to practice my newly learned, self-taught HTML skills, before becoming a fully fledged frontend developer. But after managing to “wing” my way through 12 month’s of basic HTML, CSS editorial changes, my confidence was low. Mainly caused by a big gap in knowledge and a lack of self belief. Not fully understanding CSS and intimidated by even the most simplest JavaScript, I turned to the world of IT support in the hope I could make a career out of it.
It was only when I heard that an ex-colleague of my girlfriend’s had quit her job in fashion to complete a 6-month coding boot-camp that my interest re-piqued. I had been thinking about coding a lot around this time, and what could of been. And hearing this news made me feel jealous. Jealous that it wasn’t me, jealous that I wasn’t bold enough to make that kind of change, and jealous that I wasn’t starting/re-starting an exciting new journey.
Fast forward to 9th August 2020, and it was me making the changes. For someone who had always been afraid of change, leaving my job, my family, my country never seemed like a move I was ever likely to make. But here I was, stepping on to the plane excited about the challenge ahead. I had some unfinished business with coding, and it felt different this time. This time I was older, wiser and I wasn’t an Absolute Beginner. I knew that it was going to be tough but I had the belief that I could do it this time.
One of the great things about programming is that there is always something new to learn. Whether it’s learning a new language or taking up a new framework, and this excites me. And thanks to recent events I no longer fear change, now I embrace it.
With us now at the end of week 12, we are at the halfway stage. There is still a long way to go and a lot of tough days ahead. But with February’s graduation date now somewhere on the horizon, thoughts are turning to the next step. And that feeling of being Under Pressure is increasing every week. I, along with my fellow classmates are getting little more excited and hoping that in 12 weeks time everything will be Hunky Dory!
