Getting Promoted to Full Stack Software Engineer
Originally posted on LinkedIn on February 23, 2023
In two days, it'll mark exactly 20 months since my last day at Meta (Facebook). I left because I'd been dreaming for years about days where I wasn't in back-to-back meetings from start to finish. Where I could sit with hard problems and have the skills to solve them instead of sitting there hoping other people might. Where I might do "Deep Work" for hours at a time instead of getting pinged every 5 minutes by a different stakeholder.
Some people are built for that lifestyle and I put on a good show as if I was one of them, but deep-down was a nightly existential crisis. I had just turned 30 and knew that no matter how much money I was making, if I was doing the same thing in 10 years I would forever regret it.
I took everything I knew from years as a Life Coach and finally applied it to myself. Software Engineering emerged as the clear intersection of everything I enjoy by nature and everything I was looking for in lifestyle (especially because philosophizing about life wasn't guaranteed to pay bills š ).
Only one catch: to make the switch I'd have to grind harder than ever before, learn faster than I ever had, and find a company willing to believe my self-determination and endorse my dream.
I rolled up my sleeves to get to work and was fortunate to find a company willing to explore my potential. After a year and a half as a normal Software Engineer under an apprenticeship agreement, Iām happy to share that I got promoted to a Full Stack Software Engineer at Abilitie!
No more existential crises, no more non-stop back-to-backs. No more feeling like you're eating glass in order to get closer to your dreams, wondering all-the-while if you blew up your life for the wrong reasons.
Now's the fun part. Building on top of the reality that only existed in my dreams... until today.
As the common saying goes: we overestimate what we can do in 2 months, but underestimate what we might do in 2 years (or 5 or 10). If you've been waiting on a sign to shake up your life and follow your heart no matter the work and obstacles involved, trust me when I say it's worth it on the other side. #thisisyourlife
With sonder,
Ruben