In 2019, I felt completely lost.
My plan since starting my A-levels was to do a degree in Politics and afterwards to do a Law conversion course. A few months before exam season hit, I knew that path wasn’t for me. The thought of going to university to study Politics and then to do Law gave me anxiety. I already applied to universities to study Politics and I had a very pigeonhole view of how my life and career was supposed to pan-out in the next couple of years so I didn’t have any alternatives in mind. All I knew was that I couldn’t continue on the path I set out for myself.
One of my family members suggested that I should do Computer Science. I knew nothing about programming or did ICT at school, but I had no idea for an alternative and it was better than nothing.
I dragged myself through my A-levels exams and got pretty okay grades. When results day rolled around, I didn’t know what to do. I got rejected from both of my university options but I had good enough grades to either apply somewhere else or to my insurance university through clearing. But I really didn’t know what to do.
I was able to produce some kind of plan within those 24 hours. My plan was to find an apprenticeship scheme for software engineering and also to have a deferred entry for Computer Science at a university as a backup.
I took a leap of faith and applied for a deferred entry for a Computer Science course at a university. It was really scary for me because I was officially leaving a field that I was familiar in and was focused on for so long for the unknown.
From July till October 2019, I worked 9–5 at my summer job. Once that ended, I was a lazy couch potato 🛋🥔 . I did deserve that break because I had not relaxed since my A-levels. It also helped with the fact that I still felt lost and it gave me time to think and breath. I talked to my cousin about how I was feeling and she suggested to write a list of projects (or goals) I want to complete in 2020 and in this blog I will review them and tell you about my progress on those projects.
Project 1: Employment
My goal was to find a boot camp or apprenticeship by the end of 2020. 🔎
I was able to find an apprenticeship scheme and have been working as a junior developer for the last 7 months (approximately). 👩🏾💻
Project 2: Programming
My goal was to learn HTML, CSS & Javascript by the end of 2020.📚
I did do an exam on HTML, CSS and vanilla Javascript and passed. I learnt a lot of the basic and fundamentals of Web Development so I think I did a pretty good job at completing this goal! 😊
Project 3: Learning a new language
My goal was to fix up my french skills by end of 2020.
Let’s just say this did not come into fruition… I did, however, learn some verlan from baguette twitter 🥖.
Project 4: Room Makeover
My goal was to fix up my room 🏡
I did fix up my room. It’s not up pinterest level but I am still working on decorating it. So I’d give this a 7/10. 🤏🏾
Overall, I think writing about your goals is important. Studies show you are statistically more likely to achieve those goals if you have written down. It also allows you to truly reflect on how much you have grown. We as humans tend to compare ourselves to others daily rather than our past selves to see how much we have progressed. I highly advise for anyone that is making any goals for this year to write them down.
But what I think is more important than writing goals that I want to end this post on is stop planning your life 10 to 15 years in advance! We all have been programmed by formal education that you are supposed to know what you want to do for the rest of your life from 16–18.
It’s okay to be in your twenties and not knowing what you want to do with your life or what career you want to get into it. You are young and you have time. The world is literally your oyster. You will find your purpose soon, I promise! x
