Hello everyone, I decided to drop a few words about how I decided to enter IT in order to increase motivation and self-confidence for those who are still hesitant or are already trying. It should be said that you need to firmly decide for yourself whether this business is suitable for you or not. Because on the way to this goal you will have many obstacles and you will ask yourself something like: “Maybe all this is not for me” or “I’m probably too stupid.” You have to come to terms with this and accept it. It will be difficult, but if you overcome all this, the profit will be tangible. I am now 27 years old. I entered the university several times =) The first time was back when the exams were taken (the last year before the full-scale implementation of the EIT). Despite the fact that I passed the exams at school very well, the gap between the school education program and what was required at the university took its toll (before those exams, the UPE nervously smokes on the sidelines). I went to preparatory courses. Finished and entered. Even though the faculty I ended up in was good, it somehow didn’t bring me any pleasure. I didn’t want to connect my life with nuts, gears and drawings. I left my first year and re-entered the contract wherever I wanted. I chose the direction taking into account the prospects that the profession could provide. The university information sources beautifully described what I would be able to do after graduation. And I, inspired by my bright future, set out to gnaw on the granite of science. Here at the time ma’am, “I’ve never been so wrong before.” They taught a bunch of unnecessary crap that was also a hundred years old. Of course, there were also interesting disciplines, such as C++ and databases. But it was not really possible to teach them, because it was necessary to earn money for housing and food. The situation, I must say, was not the best.
This is how my studies went and I understood that, in principle, God knows what it’s all about. During this time I changed a lot of jobs. He was a waiter, promoter, merchandiser, sales agent, etc. I gained knowledge in another highly specialized profession, which is very interesting and highly paid, but is practically unclaimed in our countries. So everything was spinning and spinning and at a certain moment I realized that I was starting to give in a little. When you're rushing around at work all day, trying to get to the university full-time to take a lab or a course, and then you come back in the evening and try to learn something else, you begin to understand that you won't last long and you need to think about something. And it so happened that there were people around me who either already worked in IT or tried to become programmers. And looking at them, I saw that they were interested in what they were doing and that it also brought corresponding results. The main factor for me, of course, was my soulmate, who always supported me in all matters. To be honest, I don’t know what I could have done without her. So. She had good abilities in studying the exact sciences and was drawn to programming and invited me to try myself in this direction. I must say that I never had any interest in this and thought that it was not for me at all. But I started trying. At first, of course, my head was completely confused, and it was difficult to force myself. I tried to learn C++, but it was hard to learn from textbooks. Motivation dropped to zero. Because of this, I took breaks. Then one day my girlfriend entered a course at a company that was recruiting people with the goal of teaching them programming in Java and employing them. We went to the interview together. That time I couldn't pass. Again, the factor of lack of time for preparation affected. I went back to work, periodically returning to study. I have already enrolled in the next intake (by the way, this is exactly how I decided to study Java). I repeat again that it was hellishly difficult. It’s already difficult to combine work and study at the university, and when I added courses, I practically stopped doing anything at all. Plus, problems arose in the family. I had to quit studying. Time has passed. I graduated from my bachelor's degree and finally realized that I would graduate from university with great prospects of becoming a specialist in everything and nothing. I went to the correspondence department for a master's degree. I can say with complete confidence that I have not lost anything. Our higher education gives nothing but the ability to dodge and the disappointment of losing a lot of time that could be spent usefully.The work became a little easier. Free time began to appear. But then I saw that it was necessary to make some kind of groundwork for a normal future. The current one gave nothing but frayed nerves. I started learning Java again. I tried to do this based on the book by Kathy Sierra and Bert Bates. Just like last time, it was difficult for me to learn anything. I wanted some kind of structure and complexity, but what I got was still jumping from one thing to another. And then my friend said that he was also trying his hand at programming and started learning using JavaRush. It must be said that at first I was very skeptical about this. A game that can teach a person programming? Looks like a money grab. Still, terrible progers learn from books and nothing else. But after some time poking and prodding through textbooks, I decided to try to follow the advice and take up JavaRush. And I must say, away we go. This was what I was looking for. Complexity and structure. All tasks were given immediately with practice. Everything I learned, I immediately applied and thus it was stored in my head. Coded right at work. Each solution to the problem brought pleasure as it provided a transition to the next level. Every article was motivating. When videos appeared during the learning process, I liked to make myself green tea, grab a Snickers and pause to watch. It really helped to clear my head and at the same time get a dose of motivation. Of course there were difficult moments. The job I was working at was not only not enjoyable, it was frankly sickening. The bosses demanded that I constantly work hard like a galley, and at the same time they constantly tried to bend my salary and ruin my nerves. I had to dodge to earn something. Plus, of course, the feeling that I was marking time while everyone was moving forward was depressing (and this is the worst thing). This naturally affected family life. My half, who at that time was already working as a developer, was worried about this. Such tension, of course, resulted in graters. In training, too, at times I came across tasks such that it seemed to me that I was stupid and that this was not my thing. But every time I overpowered myself and brought it to the end.
Thus, I reached level 25 of JavaRush. At that time, my friend who recommended these courses to me was already working and recommended that I start cutting my own small educational projects. At that time, there were difficulties with finances and my next monthly subscription had just ended. I decided to follow his advice (by the way, I regret a little that I was not able to complete my studies). I started studying the Spring framework, without which development in Java is now almost unthinkable. I began to deepen my knowledge of HTML and CSS. Well, I actually started building a small Web application. My first application did not provide any benefit other than my mastering new technologies. Its essence was only to assemble an object from a list of different components and quality levels. It would seem elementary. But it was she who allowed me to learn the basics and gave me confidence that I could already apply my skills in practice. Along the way, I started monitoring the job market. There were actually a lot of them, and zero. The point is that in my city the IT sector is very developed and Java developers are always needed. But most of them are required at the middle level and above. Rare vacancies for a junior required either one year of experience or the ability to work with a bunch of technologies that I didn’t know. This was due to the fact that the market was oversaturated with novice developers and the knowledge threshold for entry was constantly increasing accordingly. In Lviv, for example, you could sometimes see vacancies where only Java Core was required. Despite this, I began sending out resumes, simultaneously filing educational projects and studying new technologies that were offered to beginners on the pages of DOU. Created a linkedin account and filled it with my few skills. Naturally there were no answers. Who needs a beginner specialist, whose training still needs to be poured into time, money and human resources. No one. But I didn’t give up and persistently sent my resume even to places where middle positions were required. Time passed. And of course I felt despair. It seemed like nothing would work out. But then I received an offer to complete a test task (by the way, it came from where the middle was required). When I opened it, it was both a moment of fear and a moment of happiness. I saw that the task was quite doable. It was necessary to create an application in which the user could create an object with an ID, name and numerical value. Required the use of Spring (Boot, IoC, REST, MVC, Security), Hibernate, MySQL, JUnit. For the user interface it was suggested to use Thymeleaf. Of this, at that time I more or less knew only Spring IoC, MVC and MySQL. Five days were allotted for everything. I started to master it. I haven't slept for a long time. Plus, right in the middle of this period we had to fly to visit relatives. I tried my best, and on the last day I could barely understand anything, since I hadn’t slept for a very long time. I sent the task. After a short wait, I received an answer that the task had been checked and I would be taken into account. Naturally, this is the standard polite answer. I understood perfectly well that it was unlikely that I would complete the task well the first time. But that was already something. This opportunity allowed me to learn a lot of new things. Even though I didn't receive an offer, I was still grateful for the opportunity to try out.
I continued to study. I signed up for the autumn programming school, which is held annually by a well-known company in our city. With the knowledge I already had, I easily passed the selection test. The essence of the school was to familiarize students with languages and development tools. Plus, those who wished could form groups to which a curator was attached and they were given the task of completing one or another project. This, in theory, gave a chance to be noticed and get a job. Here I learned that not only knowledge of technology is important, but also teamwork. During the learning process, I saw what I was missing and a little before it was all over, I started creating an application that very vaguely resembled a simplified Pinterest. Along the way, I asked my friend to mentor me. As time went on, I saw that I was doing better and better. With every new step I felt that this was mine. I really enjoyed what I did. I literally licked every detail of my application. This is especially true at the front. Its development took me more time than the backend. Because you can’t guess with the proportions and everything looks like UH. A little more time passed and I saw that enrollment was again underway for courses that I had enrolled in twice. I decided to submit my resume again. Everything was beautifully designed and painted (in English, of course). In response, I was invited back for an interview. When they answered me, there was a week left before it. During this time, I literally devoured information sources that offered answers to questions that might be asked. By the way, the Quizfull resource also helped me a lot here. A lot of syntax became clear. Even though I had to work as a compiler there, it was actually very useful and everything I learned there was useful at the interview, which I felt I passed well. In principle, this seemed to be confirmed later. I took the course. During the training process, applicants were required to attend lectures and do homework. Along the way, all applicants were divided into teams and they were given an educational project, which was the whole essence of the training. When we were offered the topic of an educational project, the whole team thought that we couldn’t handle it. The curators frankly said that the topic is extraordinary and, by and large, one of the most difficult of all time. There were a lot of technologies that we had not explored. But nevertheless, we decided that we should try and, in the worst case scenario, it would be a very good experience. Here I must say that I was very lucky with the team I ended up with. All the guys understood the importance of training and wanted to get a job. And in my opinion, that’s the only reason we were able to complete the project. Every time we got stuck, we all got together and pushed through the situation. It was frankly pleasant to work in such an environment. Of course, all this time was accompanied by great excitement. I even remember going on vacation with my family and our friends during the May holidays and thinking that I would be able to take a break. Not so =) Everything went out of my head except what was necessary during the learning process. It was impossible to forget for a minute. But this is even for the better =) And here this story comes to an end. During the period when we were finishing work on the project, I was offered an interview before the end of training. Despite great anxiety, I passed it and received my first offer. I don’t think I need to say that my joy knew no bounds. I finally achieved my goal and moved to a new level. At the moment I have been working for the eighth month. And every day I am convinced that this is mine and I like what I do. Naturally, even more motivation is given by the fact that my work is decently paid and the company makes sure that I feel comfortable while working. You can rarely see something like this in our country. Naturally, even now there are difficult moments and sometimes you have to sacrifice sleep and work at night. Whether it's good or not, I like it. Plus it never goes unnoticed by management. Over the past seven years, I have really enjoyed what I do. Naturally, this had a positive impact on all aspects of my life. As a result, I can say that despite all the difficulties and obstacles, everyone can achieve what they want. You just need to not deviate from the intended path, make every effort and not give up when failures occur. Sorry for writing so much. I hope this helps someone in difficult times. It helped me. All the best and thanks to the JavaRush team. You helped me a lot =) UPD Continuation, a few years later 👉 The path of a switcher to IT v2.0
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