From Zero to Developer: My Journey into the World of Code

Introduction

Hi, I’m Alejandro, a 26-year-old software engineer, and this is my journey (so far).

Right now (new Date() JS joke here), I’m living a great life doing what I love (sometimes 😜). But it wasn’t always this way. Four years ago, I made the decision to leave college and start working as a programmer. Five years ago, I was considering leaving college altogether to pursue a career in gastronomy. And even further back, I dreamed of becoming a doctor. Life has a funny way of taking unexpected turns, doesn’t it?

In this post, I’ll share how I went from being unsure about my future to building a career I’m passionate about—and the lessons I learned along the way.

The beginning

How did I start?

My first “Oh boy, this is what I love!” moment came when I was 17, studying programming in high school. The topics of the class were Visual Basic, Excel, and C++. I loved the feeling of solving problems and seeing my code actually do something—exactly what I wanted it to do. But what I loved even more was that my friends paid me to do their projects for them. (Hey, it was my first taste of freelancing!)

After high school, I went to college to study computer science. Back then, my goal was to get a PhD (naive me, right?). But reality hit hard. Being a software engineer was much harder than I thought. Looking back, it makes sense—in high school, the most complex thing I had to build was a calculator. But in college, I was learning things like Dijkstra’s algorithm. My younger self thought I’d spend my life making calculators in C++. Little did I know, there was a whole world of complexity waiting for me.

Imposter Syndrome and the (First)Turning Point

At that time, I met one of my best friends—Imposter Syndrome. This little f*er made me (and sometimes still does) think that coding wasn’t my thing, that I wasn’t smart enough, and that I didn’t work hard enough to pass my classes. It got so bad that I started thinking about leaving college altogether and pursuing something else, like gastronomy. I began skipping classes, missing exams, and as a result, I failed some subjects—like data structures.

That period was awful. I cried a lot. I was scared of the future and felt like I was stuck in a never-ending loop of failure. But one day, something changed. I decided to take matters into my own hands. I went to the library, picked up a book on data structures and algorithms in C++, and started reading and practicing on my own. Slowly but surely, something clicked in my head. I began to understand the concepts that had once seemed impossible. My grades improved, I passed the subjects I had previously failed, and for the first time, I started to see the light at the end of the tunnel.

Second Turning Point

After that awful period, I went through another one—lol—but this time, it was lighter. The main problem was that I had no idea how to use my super strong, almighty, powerful programming skills in real life. All I knew was C++, so once again, the idea of becoming a chef started creeping back into my mind.

After a few (and by "a few," I mean a lot) of days researching, I came across a Facebook ad for a bootcamp called DevF. It focused on web development, and at first, it seemed amazing—until I saw the price. So, I took the subjects from their syllabus and started learning on my own.

At the beginning, it was all a mess. Concepts like Node.js, CSS, JS, HTML, MongoDB, MySQL, middleware, JWT, Express, deploy, branches—a whole lot of WTF to be honest. I was overwhelmed. I didn’t know where to start, which path to take, or how to put everything together.

One day, while searching for courses on Udemy, I found Juan Pablo De la Torre Valdez. This guy saved my life (not literally, but you get it). The courses I bought from him gave me much-needed clarity. I started building a simple page with HTML, CSS, and JS, and suddenly, frontend development started making sense. I began to understand the technologies, how they connected, and what role each played.

But there was still a missing piece—the backend. I knew absolutely nothing about it. So, I made a bold decision: I enrolled in the DevF bootcamp. To afford it, I sold my one-week-old PS4 (painful, but worth it).

The bootcamp gave me the final clarity I needed. I finally understood how frontend and backend worked together. And at that moment, I knew—software engineering was what I wanted to do for the rest of my life.

A few months (and a lot of learning) later, I made another big decision: I dropped out of college to focus on my first programming jobs. Spoiler alert: they were absolute trash. But that's a story for another post.

Advice for Others

I have some advice for anyone starting this amazing career. These tips come from my own experience—they worked for me and still do:

1. Repeat, repeat, repeat, repeat...

   I can’t even count how many to-do lists I built. One with MongoDB, one with MySQL, one with Python, one with Node.js, one with Vue, one with React, one with PHP, one with Laravel… you get the idea. I made tons of login pages, CRUDs, and React/Vue/Angular components.

   The key? Practice. A lot.
   Don’t think that just because you did something once, you’re an expert. There’s always room to learn and improve.

2. Don’t be afraid to ask

   Back in college, I was struggling with data structures, and one guy approached me and helped me with my homework. He showed me what I was doing wrong and saved me a ton of time.

   People always have different perspectives—take advantage of that. Asking for help is not a weakness, it’s a shortcut to learning.

3. Have someone to talk to

   I’ll never forget the people who supported me during my toughest moments. Thanks to them, I became the professional I am today. Having people who understand your struggles and can offer guidance makes a huge difference.

4. Have a Plan B

   I dropped out of college, but only after I had a job lined up. If you’re going to take a big risk, make sure you have a backup plan.

5. Never stop learning

   You don’t know what you don’t know. Keep exploring, keep building, and keep improving. The tech world moves fast—stay curious and stay hungry.

6. Have fun

   Life is a balance.