I have been a teacher for a little more than 10 years, but I haven't got into how and why I started changing my path to web development so I will go over that in this post, I hope this is not a long one and if it is sorry beforehand and I hope this can help someone out there considering changing careers.

I have been always attracted to tech, I took a web dev class while in school but it was something really basic and I can't even remember what we use at that time, the only thing I can remember is the feeling of building and seeing something work on the browser (we didn't get to learn how to deploy at all). I know I enjoyed it but again I was working towards my teaching career and I thought that the web was something exclusive for those with a Computer Science degree like my brother was at that moment. So, I leave that alone in the past.

To resume, after 2 years of teaching in the U.S. I was looking for ways to do something on the side and my brother told me "HEY! do this to see if you like it". It was an easy, simple, and engaging free tutorial from General Assembly. I can tell that from minute one of solving little challenges in the tutorial/course I ABSOLUTELY LOVED IT!

From that day I couldn't stop, I finished and eager to learn more, after doing some research, I found FreeCodeCamp and decided to start with it, and again I loved it and moved along with the course and loved it. The problem came while I finished the first course of web development. I thought great I know this, now what? and nothing seemed to answer that question.

Later on I continued questioning the same, now what can I do with this. Then a good friend needed a website and I said you know what I know how to do it, I can do yours. After researching we got her the hosting provider and domain. Now, one more time NOW WHAT? I didn't learn how to deploy, how to use a text editor, or even worse, the hosting provider installed WordPress... What???? all this time learning HTML & CSS and what is this???? So, nowadays I can say that impostor syndrome came, visited, and stayed with me for a while. I froze and couldn't move forward at all.

I was ashamed and frustrated for not being able to help my friend at the moment. So, after a few months, this same friend sent me another free course given by a local college in Memphis, TN. there were two courses, one web development from 0 to deploy and I was like OHHHH this is what I was missing, and the other one was WordPress... Ding ding, I absolutely need this. Everything started to make way more sense.

I recovered that feeling of excitement and that was the best thing that could happen. I loved it and reinforce things learned previously, it was a simple HTML & CSS course. But, how powerful when it showed how to deploy a site, MIND-BLOWING!

Then, I wanted to complement my knowledge and learned WordPress so I could help my friend. I completed that course as well and great. Now, the question again... What's next? After a while tumbling between web design, WordPress, and Web Development... Something happened, I discovered something absolutely NEW to me. I found podcasts talking about people who were self-taught web developers and got extreme career changes from different fields without a degree.

I recovered that feeling of excitement and that was the best thing that could happen. I loved it and reinforce things learned previously, it was a simple HTML & CSS course. But, how powerful when it showed how to deploy a site, MIND-BLOWING!

What? Really? It was hard to believe but the more I looked for the more people I found and got me thinking, analyzing things, setting new goals and challenges, by the way until this point I was on my own with no support or accountability from anyone else in the same journey that I was getting into so that was the missing part (if you haven’t joined communities please DO IT now). Then, once I was starting to take it more seriously and having the hope given by others, my sister who is overseas started to ask me hey, how is this going I need to change my career and explore if this is for me. So I shared the podcasts I was listening to as well as FreeCodeCamp and started having that accountability partner that I was also missing.

That alone changed everything!!!! Now I had someone virtually starting the same journey, following my steps, and learning from me. That made me realize that I actually knew more than I thought and helped me move forward quickly!

If you are still here, thanks for getting this far and here is my recommendation if your starting or considering getting into web development:

1. START LEARNING: It doesn't matter what platform or resource but start learning NOW!
2. START BUILDING: as you learn, start creating and building things even little things.
3. JOIN COMMUNITIES: find a community and start following, learning, asking, and contributing.
4. ACCOUNTABILITY: find accountability partners/community. A great place to start is 100daysofcode.
5. TEACH OTHERS: learning together is great, but teaching is POWERFUL. You will reinforce concepts and realize how much you are learning if you teach. Nobody to teach? Use youtube!
6. MENTORS: find mentors that guide you, answer questions, teach you even through videos that you really get it and feel related to (soon I will post my most influential developers).