This is why you are failing. And I did it too...

I feel I must say this for everybody out there starting a career, you need to understand the world around you, and that's not easy, the best you can do is meet with lot's of different people experienced in that field and try to get the whole picture, because nothing is like you are told.

Ever since I was a kid I've been told I needed to study a lot, I needed to get the best grades, because that would get me the best job, the best salary, and therefore the best life, in theory, in reality, nobody cares, you either get a certificate or not, nobody cares if you got an A+ average score, or B- or whatever, you can't imagine the amount of 'best students' those A graders that I know and they don't have a job and they don't understand why nobody wants to hire them or they have a crappy job and they are unable to find a job related to the things they have studied.

It's not a matter of how good you are at school, school is a playground, you need to learn you are expected to memorize a minimum amount of data to pass the test and keep going, that's it. In real life you need to solve real problems, you need a hand full of skills you won't be taught in school, you can either try to learn them by yourself, or try to learn them from others.

I fell into that lie, get good grades and everything would be alright, art is my main passion, more specifically, music and drawing, painting and sculpture, I spent over 10 years studying piano, I left college twice, I was decided to study an arts degree. But why did I left all of that? I learned how those worlds worked a bit too late, I would have saved so much time if I knew what I know now.

Let me explain a bit more, Art is subjective, and most of the people doesn't have knowledge or experience with it, that means the taste of most people is not the best, and that's what sells the most, and that's what companies that hire artists or musicians want to produce.

For example, in the case of music, I was told and believed when I started at the conservatory that I would learn piano and If I putted a lot of effort and got the best grades, I would be able to play concerts and whatever I wanted and live of it.

Lies, not intentional, but lies from people that doesn't know how that world works, when you study music at least in Spain there are a small amounts of paths that lead to success, you either spend 14 years studying the elementary, professional and higher degrees of music, plus the years it takes to study and pass the government examinations to be a public official, to end up working as a music teacher wherever the government sends you for a bit more than the minimum salary, or you have connections, you know some important people that can get you a good job playing concerts or something like that, that's why networking is way more important than degrees or grades.

I have 2 friends that studied with me, both awesome piano players, one was outstanding, he is still unemployed trying to make some money playing here and there, the other one, wasn't as good, but it came from a family of musicians and knew a bunch of people in the music world.

Guess who ended up living of playing concerts.

And the last successful way to live of music is making music that sells, sell your soul and criteria to do some trap, or whatever the trend is and do music that sells better than your competitors, now if this is the kind of music that you are passionate about, fine, go ahead and enjoy, otherwise it's a nightmare.

Now when you understand how the world works and what do you need to succeed you can decide better what your priorities are and what to focus on or not.

In my case, none of those options suited my desires, therefore I left that path after finishing my professional degree and I looked into something else. But this time I was decided to learn as much as possible and as soon as possible and comprehend how the world I was getting in works.

This is how I chose programming, I literally looked up on google, 'jobs with less unemployment' and there was cloud architect, cybersecurity, and JavaScript developer ??, I always been passionate about technology, but not as much as I'm with music, with music I couldn't go against my criteria and do some trap music, just to live of it, in technology, I don't care, you tell me you want a different code architecture or code styles, it's fine with me, I can do whatever you need or want. So easier to work with. My favorite field is cybersecurity, but the JavaScript bootcamp was cheaper ??, I started studying at college and saw the learning rhythm was kind of slow, so, I tried with bootcamps where in theory you are supposed to learn way faster, but it wasn't fast enough for me, so I ended up studying on my own, every day, since I woke up, until I went to bed, this I did for some months until I felt I had a good knowledge base, after that I combined the intense study with events and getting to know as much people as possible.

I realized there's a startup world were people are fighting for the technical guys, and saw it was difficult to find a job without experience, so I became a student again, on a bootcamp, because I wanted something to finish soon, I only wanted to be a student to get an internship, so as soon as a became a student officially and legally I jumped into LinkedIn and started applying for internships in startups. I got one in less than a week. And after that internship came the summer, nobody was hiring, but back after the summer in 2 months I got my dream job.

It took me one year and 2 months to find my dream job since I broke from the traditional mentality, otherwise it would've been much longer, I would focus in finishing a bachelor degree, then 5 years studying, then start looking for job on big companies, then not finding any because I wouldn't have experience and competition is high, that would have been a nightmare, I would have wasted so much time, again, like learning music or arts, but this time I focused trying to understand the real world. And it was worth it.

If you are struggling to succeed maybe it's not your fault the way you might think, you can be doing great, being a great student, being a great professional, but you don't understand how the world you are trying to get in works, that's where you are failing, and it's not your fault, nobody tells these things, I didn't knew it either. Learn the real game, get to know the game you are playing, so you can can cheat it and reach your goals faster. ??