My story so far
As per the title I am Stephane. Half greek, half french 24 years old web-developer living in London.
Grew up, went to school and studied (well..kinda since I never graduated) in Greece.
Why did I not graduate? It was definitely a choice. A choice I deeply regret.
Not because I had trouble finding a job, or careerwise.. but because I hurt the feelings of people who loved me by lying to them about it.
"Is graduating university worth it?" is a topic that seems to interest a lot of people these days, so I will give a more in-depth explanation of my point of view on a future blog.
How did I escape misery?
I was going through a phase of denial. Was not able to appreciate the beauty of Greece and just wanted to disappear. Go live in another country, where the majority of the discussions wouldn't be somehow related to the economic crisis. I did not want to pick up my studies, I wanted to create things in the real world.
I needed a lot of positivity and a challenging goal to achieve!
All this took place 3 years ago when I decided to make the impossible happen.
Escape!
Being a man with no university degree, no real expertise in any area, I decided that leaving Greece was a good idea.
The plan was simple but not easy:
- Find an easy to go destination, with available jobs of any kind
- Calculate the cost of living there for a month
- Gather all this money
- Book the tickets and go!
As I was brainstorming with a few friends of mine I figured that London was the best option. My, at the time, girlfriend was studying in London, so I could stay with her, plus in my mind, London has always been the European land of opportunity. The competition is incredibly high, but you will always be able to find a job if you are motivated for it. It was the perfect destination. After updating my CV, working a lot on my Linkedin profile, but especially preparing myself mentally the time came.
The day that I would start a new life, start following my dream and being a pro-active action taker in my life instead of letting it pass by had come. I was finally flying to London.
One month is more than enough for me to find a job, I was thinking.
I was wrong. Life in London is hard and you have to figure out how the system works, which can be tricky.
It's lonely, it's cold, it's rainy, you know no-one and you are 100% out of your comfort zone pretty much all the time.
I found myself approaching companies asking them to hire me as a developer, to essentially teach me how to code.
My skillset was not enough for what companies needed even for entry-level positions.
Time passed and the last week of the month came. I decided to be proactive and reach out as many recruiters as possible and fearlessly ask for a job. I even wrote that I was willing to work for free. I packed the whole week with interviews and was hoping for the best.
The week passed and I hadn't heard from any of the companies I went to.
Last day arrived. I had my stuff ready for my evening flight back to Greece when I received a call from a recruiter to have an interview the same day.
That company had a startup mentality but had gotten bigger due to its success. Not much of a chance of them hiring me I was thinking, having the momentum against me and self-confidence level to the ground after all my failures.
The impossible then happened! I went to the interview and smashed it!! The people who interviewed me liked me, I passed the technical assessment because of all the knowledge I gathered during the previous interviews and the moment I got out of the building the recruiter called me to congratulate me about getting accepted as an "Associate Front End Developer" at Nexmo.
I think that is the best day of my life so far!! Goal achieved! I had a job and was able to pay my expenses on my own in a tough foreign country!
That day, life taught me, no matter how cliché it is, to never give up and always fight for my dreams till the last second.
Having the same mentality, I made a lot of changes in my life since that day and I am here to share them with you!
I hope you enjoyed this article! Please follow/upvote/resteem
Can't guarantee success but I can assure you that we'll fight for it together!
Welcome To Steemit! You are really going to like it here. This is a unique place where there is no competition. Instead, we all work to build success by helping each other out. The best way to grow is to build Steem Power and vote to reward other authors.
This is a great place to network with other people from all over the world. If you continually post great content you will grow a following in no time and start making some nice author rewards.
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Spencer Coffman
My Latest Article: Prioritize Your Life
@spencercoffman thank you so much for posting the first reply to my first post in steemit. Invaluable advice that I will try to follow as much as possible. Have a great day!
You're welcome!
See My Latest Post
Hi, welcome to Steemit! College degree is not important if you are clever enough to start your own business. I hope you enjoy here:-)
Well... You don't even have to start your own business. You can work for a company as well provided that you have the skills they want. At least in the tech industry, most of the companies don't care about university degrees. They care about what you have done, what you have created, what you can do for them.
Don't get me wrong though. This applies mostly to the tech industry. If you want to become a lawyer or a doctor, unfortunately (or maybe fortunately) you need that degree.
Thank you for your comment @mikestrange . We'll have the chance to talk more about that in a future blog post!
Thanks and you are right for special jobs like doctor you need degree:-)
A BIG warm welcome to Steemit! I am sure you are going to absolutely enjoy the Steemit platform.👍 Please let me know if I can be of future help with Steemit. I truly hope Steemit exceeds all your expectations!👍
Thanks for your comment @daviddivergent ! I will definitely contact you as I am very new in this platform.
You are very welcome. I have just followed you on steemit so we can earn steem together. Have a great Tuesday 👍
Awesome story! Glad you went with what you desired instead of what others wanted.
Everything will always work out in our favor when we put all of our energy into what we see as the best choices at the moment. Just as we feel defeated and surrounded by a shroud of darkness the light will begin to shine from within us and pierce the veil of darkness that was. This is a natural cycle that we can learn to see and feel when it begins to occur so we can have the correct mentality to persevere through until we see the light.
Honoured to have you around @kor3 ! Your comment will be always welcome here.
Interesting
I will follow you to see your future posts!
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