Last week you showed me where you code. This week I want to know how you ended up there in the first place, and whether you're planning to stay.
I'll go first. Grab a snack, mine has a plot twist 🍿
The gadget kid
I've loved computers and gadgets for as long as I can remember. If there was a new device in the house, I wanted to know how it worked. So growing up, getting into tech felt natural. Why wouldn't I spend my life doing the thing I loved? In high school, I chose ICT as my elective and joined the school robotics club. We even made it to a regional robotics competition and came third! At that point, my future felt pretty obvious.
Our third-place robot, built with LEGO Mindstorms. Sadly, LEGO has since discontinued Mindstorms, and I would have loved to keep using it for hobby projects.
Plot twist: I studied Development Planning
Then it was time for university, and life had other plans. Development Planning was my second choice, and my parents didn't want me leaving our city for my bachelor's. So that's where I ended up, spending four years studying something I had no real interest in.
If you've never heard of it, a lot of Development Planning is about how communities and cities grow: where roads, schools, hospitals and housing should go, and how to make places work better for the people living in them.
But tech found me anyway
Somewhere in the middle of that degree, we were introduced to GIS (Geographic Information Systems), and it was the coolest thing in the whole course for me. GIS is software that lets you put data on a map and analyse it. You stack layers like roads, rivers, buildings and population on top of each other, and suddenly you can answer real questions. Where is the best place to build a new school? Which areas are most likely to flood? Which neighbourhoods are too far from a hospital? For the first time in my degree, I was using technology to solve real problems, and I was hooked.
That led me down a rabbit hole into smart cities and smart buildings. A smart city uses sensors, data and connected devices to run things better, like traffic lights that adjust to real traffic, bins that tell the council when they're full, and buses that share their live location. Smart buildings do the same on a smaller scale, controlling lighting, heating and energy use based on who's actually in the room. It was the perfect mix of the two worlds I was stuck between.
Teaching myself on the side
So I started teaching myself. HTML, then CSS, then JavaScript. Lots of tutorials, lots of broken layouts, and lots of console errors I didn't understand yet. I built some cool things just because I could, and every time something worked, it reminded me how much I loved this.
The question that changed everything
As I got older, one question kept coming back to me: do I really want to spend the rest of my life doing a job I don't even like?
This time, nobody else was making the decision for me. So I made it myself and went for a Master's in Computer Science, a conversion course made for people coming from non-tech degrees.
So, am I staying?
Yes. If anything, the detour made me more sure. I know what it feels like to spend years on something you don't love, and I'm not going back. One day I'd love to bring my two worlds together and build tech for the buildings and cities I used to study.
I'm asking you because tech feels different right now. Junior roles feel harder to get, AI is changing what our jobs look like, and a lot of people are wondering if they should stay or try something else. I think those conversations are worth having out loud.
Now it's your turn
How did you end up in tech?
Are you planning to stay, or are you thinking about moving into something else?
If you've ever left tech or come back to it, what made you decide?
And if you're studying or working in something you don't love right now, let this be your sign that it's never too late to switch. I'd love to hear your stories. :)💜
Top comments (5)
After reading your story, it reminded me that we briefly mention about Lego Mindstorm back early in 2026 in the article on why I became a developer.
Why did you become a Developer?
I was about to write my story here, but realized that it was already answered lol. Might do a remaster later next year, but idk yet.
Thanks for sharing though :D
I remember that thread! I told you about the RISE software and you told me about your uncle building a Rubik’s cube solver with Lego Mindstorms. Funny enough, I still have Rubik’s cubes on my desk, so maybe I need a solver too 😂 And now that Mindstorms is discontinued, maybe it’s finally time I try Arduino like you suggested. You should definitely do the remaster, I’d love to read it.
Will prob actually do it on the DEV one year anniversary for me! Look forward to it and looking forward on the Arduino as well (if your planning on sharing ofc)
Yes, I’ll definitely share it! Once I finish my Masters next year, I’m planning to start playing around with Arduino as a hobby. Your one year anniversary on DEV is in January, right? That’s not far at all, I’ll be looking out for the remaster!
Yep! I am also planning on the DEVengers announcement as well along with that (I think it's on the same day as my one year).
Speaking of which, what do you think of joining us?
cc: @georgekobaidze @hemapriya_kanagala @dj29