The Accidental Start: When Good Grades Lied to Me
I wasn’t born to be a software engineer.
In fact, my first “talent” was chemistry.
In high school, I had an incredible chemistry teacher—Mr. Hsu—who made everything so clear and engaging that my grades in chemistry soared way above my other subjects. I didn’t enjoy experiments all that much, but I excelled in the classes because he made the theory come alive.
So I did what many teens would do: I mistook skill for passion. And I chose to major in chemistry.
Four Years of Drifting
Throughout college, I pushed through lectures, labs, and exams. I checked all the boxes, submitted all the reports, and eventually earned my degree.
But deep down, I was running on autopilot.
During my senior year, my classmates were preparing for grad school and lab research. Meanwhile, I was realizing:
I didn’t want any of it. I wasn’t passionate about chemistry at all.
That moment of honesty hit me hard. I knew I needed to take a different path.
A New Direction: Half Logic, Half Instinct
Honestly, choosing Information Management was also a bit of a gamble.
I knew software engineering had solid job prospects and good salaries.
I didn’t know exactly what I wanted to do, but I had a feeling this career could give me the kind of life I imagined.
And one thing I knew for sure: "I’m a fast learner, and I’m not afraid to start over."
When I first started learning to code, I honestly had no idea what I was doing.
The syntax felt foreign, debugging was chaotic, and every new concept was a mini mountain to climb.
But by the end of my first semester, I teamed up with Stonk, Iris, and Angelica to build a little puzzle game called LakyCarcar.
That was the moment it clicked: I genuinely enjoyed this.
Coding stopped being just an assignment—it became something creative, challenging, and deeply satisfying.
I Genuinely Love Development
As I kept diving in, I realized something important:
I wasn’t just doing this for the paycheck.
I genuinely love building software.
Turning an idea into a working product, figuring out how to solve real problems with code, getting that “it works!” moment after hours of debugging—it’s addicting.
I love the creation. I love the problem-solving.
I love knowing my work can actually help someone.
I Found the Right Path
I won’t lie—sometimes I still feel anxious.
My college friends are about to graduate from chemistry grad school and head into full-time jobs, while I’m two years into a second degree. It’s easy to compare and doubt.
But here’s what I can say, at the end of my second year in Information Management:
I’m truly grateful I questioned my old path.
I’m even more grateful I had the courage to change it.
Because now, I know I’m heading in the right direction.