My rocky road to becoming a front-end developer
Tags: discuss
Published: 2022-04-16 04:00:04

Everybody's journey to becoming a developer is different, and who knows..mine might be similar to yours. 

(So, feel free to let me know how yours is going right in the comments below)

Mines goes a lil something like this... I started back in 2017, months before graduation I got introduced to coding (in java at the time). My math teacher thought it would be a great career for me because I was (so he claimed lol) really good at math (overall I think he saw I was good at problem-solving). 

So I gave it a try on Codecademy (not java, but web dev) building websites and seeing them live online excite me more than anything, so I went with front-end development (learning HTML, CSS, and Javascript). 

After a few weeks I decided this is what I wanted to do after graduation, I thought what a relief, it was either this or flip burgers :(, which wasn't something I wanted to do. 

(spoiler: I end up doing it anyway lol! ) 

I went to college for it, at the time they taught both web dev and design..didn't like the design, but still had to take class :( I realized the teacher was teaching very basic that I could have learned myself. 

So I dropped out after a year and taught myself (HTML, CSS, and Javascript) with courses on Udemy, Codecademy, The New Boston (my man Bucky Roberts!), and Traversy Media (Back in that time Brad really sounded like Mark Wahlberg :D!). 

(during the time I was in college, I was working at Wendy's too for income, couldn't stand it so I eventually quit and worked on web dev full time)

Then I joined Frontend Mentor community back when it just started (great community, check it out). I did a couple of static websites before diving into React, I was dying to build a web app because they were far more interesting. 

It wasn't too long after, I met someone that was working on a nonprofit startup project building a Job board (using React) site for developers. I was active on Twitter at the time building projects with React. 

So, he reached out to ask if I wanted to join his team. (There was another developer and designer on the team). Of course, I said yes, this was a real opportunity to work with a real team (the thing I've been missing!). 

I was excited, energetic, helpful, alert, alive!.. However, no one warned me about burn out :(. 

After two months I was drained, day in and out staring at the screen.. I didn't want to see or think about anything code-related...I was done...I backed out of the project..mental health wasn't great, so I took 6 months to a year off from coding. 

I tried playing around with mobile development & game development (I enjoyed) during that time..but it didn't last long. I started going into depression mode, I needed a job so I started working at FedEx(waaay better than Wendy's lol) I'm still working there, it's been 8 or 9 months so far :). 

Needless to say, my financial frustrations went away. I eased my way back into coding, and man.. it feels good no lie.

There are so many things I do differently now, like actually rest and not code for 8 to 10 hours straight (which is crazy, and led to my burnout). I find myself not rushing anymore to finish projects and half-ass learn things lol. 

I take my time and go with the flow of how I feel..period. I actually enjoy the learning process of things now. I'm a lot more productive now than I have ever been... it's amazing.

Yea that's pretty much how it went, and how it's going for me. I plan on writing more articles on what I'm working on/learning but we'll see how things go (don't want to get my hopes up, did that too many times.) 

I will say I'm using this [Road to front-end developement](https://roadmap.sh/frontend) guide to guide me on what to learn next and build from there, I'm pretty sure half of you probably seen this one already.

Nonetheless, I thought it would be helpful to share this past and present story of my web dev journey. Until next time : )