From Tax Accountant to Social Media Strategist- Be Whatever You Want

This is the story of how I went from getting 2 degrees from business school in 4 years, landing a job on Wall Street with Goldman Sachs straight out of college from a college they definitely DO NOT recruit from, and giving it all up to chase my own dreams.

I went to school at Texas A&M Kingsville. No not the Aggies that you see play on Saturdays in the SEC. This is a much smaller school in deep South Texas, that's also much more affordable.

I initially went to school for engineering because it was what I chose when I was 16 years old during parent/counselor days in my junior year of high school.

I honestly had no idea what I wanted to do other than win District in football my senior year and typical senior high school kid stuff. But I felt pressured to make a decision.

I was taking a graphic design course in high school that year and when I said graphic design and it really interested me. I was basically laughed at and told "Theres no money or future in that. Pick a real career".

Having come from a household of scientists and engineers, and having good marks in my students, I said "Idk, I guess I'll go for engineering". Honestly, I just wanted to get out of that room and go back to doing my thing.

Fast forward to college. I went to the school I did because it was affordable and they gave me scholarship and grant money which covered most of my school expenses.

It's unheard of nowadays, but I was able to graduate without any student loans and had my entire last year of school paid for because of scholarships (you're welcome mom and dad).

I landed an internship with Goldman Sachs after my junior year of college in Salt Lake City and after a successful internship, was offered a full time role upon completion of my senior year in May 2012 but had to move to Utah permanently.

Fast forward to May 2014. I was unhappy, feeling like another cog in the machine. But I spent a lot of time on my own while living in SLC and my gut told me I needed to move to San Antonio. I don't know why I was drawn to San Antonio but I ultimately quit my job, moved with nothing permanent lined up, and just hoped for the best.

I got a job in insurance because I was advised again by outsiders that "it was the perfect business opportunity". Spoiler: it wasn't.

Then I went back to finance and did that a few years, still unhappy after 2 and a half more years of advising people how to properly manage their finances.

Meanwhile, I took a course on how to run social media advertisements and spent a lot of late nights learning how to build a website through the University of YouTube.

But I loved it.

So I quit my job in 2018 and said I'm going to do this for myself. Oh and I had just gotten married too.

Another spoiler alert: I quickly crashed and burned and had to get a job, this time at a grocery store working in the curbside grocery delivery department.

I felt like I had hit rock bottom. How did I go from working at Goldman Sachs to bagging groceries? What did I do wrong?

I kept on learning and refining my digital media skills though. I was determined that the hard work was going to pay off eventually and bagging groceries certainly humbles you and everything that comes with working in a grocery store, particularly a red one with 3 letters in the name in Texas, they work you hard.

Eventually I found a job with a digital agency that built websites and managed social media. BINGO!

I applied for a social media coordinator job with them and was denied.

But they called me back about a week later saying they had an opening as a project manager in their web development side.

I took the job, relying only on my YouTube knowledge and was thrown into the fire immediately. I had to learn quick or else I'd get the boot.

Thankfully, I had great teachers and mentors there until disaster struck the company, followed by a global fucking pandemic. What are the odds?

I found a new job working for another web development agency where I continued to sharpen my skills and got really good at getting websites built.

So I decided, I'm going to do this on my own so that I can have the freedom and flexibility to work whenever I wanted to. Plus I have dad duties that have exponentially grown over the past 3 years that really took a lot of my time.

All the while, I was growing a social media presence that was rapidly growing at a pace I never dreamt of.

Fast forward to today. I'm getting brand deals (albeit small ones but better than 0 when I started). People ask me to coach them.

I've only built one website since I went off on my own. But social media, that's been poppin.

While I still want to build websites, social media is what the market is telling me they need my help with. And sure enough, I'm making consistent money on my own to pay the bills.

Now it's time to grow. It's no longer enough to just manage other people's social media profiles. I want to build my own empire. My own media company that highlights my culture, my life, and puts a humorous spin on being a Texas Mexican.

But what Selena's dad said is true. There are times when I need to be more American than the Americans and more Mexican than the Mexicans.

I can't tell you how many times I've been told to go back to Mexico while simultaneously being called a no sabo kid (look it up if you don't know what those are).

But my resolve is clear. I know what I want. And while I've been chipping away at this since 2018 when I left finance altogether, pretty soon I won't be exchanging my time for money and finally making a living my way 100%. Not just partially, but completely.

I'm so close, I can taste it. But the journey is not yet complete.

And even though we're in July of 2023, I'm already looking at 2024. I shot out of a cannon this year. Now it's time to fly.

So the moral of the story- don't listen to everyone else and do what they think you're supposed to do. Listen to yourself, put in the work, and do what YOU want to do.

The road will suck at first, but if you keep at it, you will eventually get to where you want to be if you keep at it, humble yourself, and roll with the punches.