One rejection can change your life, career or business.

This was something I never thought could happen to me.

Until I got rejected from 10 engineering schools and I lost hope.

I lost the one thing that could keep me going forward.

Here is my story:

👇

Let’s go 4 years back in time (2018):

round Timex analog clock at 2:33 — Photo by Sonja Langford on Unsplash

I am 17 in my last year of high school.

I am hoping to get in an engineering school next year to be a civil engineer.

It seemed like an interesting field to me at the time.

That’s what my dad have told me. He dreamed about being a civil engineer but he couldn’t make it.

He kept telling me how much money I could make and how happy I’d be.

But not everything we dream about in life can happen.

I graduated from high school but with not enough grades that would get me into an engineering school. I started getting so scared.

But I applied anyways.

And I GOT REJECTED.

I was like “Oh My God I am screwed! What should I do now?”

One last thing that I had left is university. I didn’t want to go there because in my country engineering schools are of better quality than universities. But I had no choice.

So I got in. Computer Science major.

I am a CS student now. How exciting!! 😒

Is this even for me? What am I getting into?

question mark neon signage — Photo by Emily Morter on Unsplash

Coding is for nerds and weirdos. Not for me.

I was never passionate about it. I never thought I’d have a career in coding: writing totally stupid nonsense on the keyboard.

I must admit that I had some sort of curiosity to know how a robot can walk or speak. How a drone can fly by only using a controller.

But to work in tech? I’d NEVER do that.

I started questioning everything about what I am currently doing and my future. It’s like everything that I dreamed about just disappeared.

I was completely lost.

Why am I here? What am I gonna do after? Where would I be in 5 or 10 years from now?

But I found out later that civil engineering wasn’t even MY dream. It never was. It was my DAD’s. I was born to do something else.

I just needed to know what is it.

Steve Jobs was my guide…

persons left hand on purple and pink light — Photo by Elia Pellegrini on Unsplash

Back in 2018/2019 I was reading a lot, two books per month on average.

I discovered Steve Jobs’ biography by Walter Isaacson.

This dude impressed me. I couldn’t believe it.

His story is incredible.

Adopted, poor, went through a lot in his life.

He was also rejected from his own company but he never let that stop him.

UNBELIEVABLE!

Reading the book has changed so many things for me: my mindset, my ambitions and goals in life.

How you can touch people’s hearts by making tech products. This is so impressive.

I want to work in tech.

This is MY WORLD…

But I need to change things in my environment first.

DONE? Alright let’s keep going…

“I am not born to be stuck in a hamster wheel”

The environment I live in (parents, family, classmates…) has a really limited mindset.

This is how a good life looks to them:

1) You graduate from high school

2) You go to university or engineering school

3) You work hard to get good marks

4) You get your degree

5) You get a full-time job in a cubicle.

In that order.

Same old job, same routine, same tasks.

Day after day
Week after week
Year after year

I can’t do that. That’s not the life I want to live. I am not born for that.

I am not born to be stuck in a hamster wheel.

I am a human being and as a human being I have dreams and ambitions that I want to achieve. Maybe I can’t achieve them all but I wanna achieve as much as humanly possible.

The goal is to have a better life than my dad’s and give my future kids a better life than mine.

I am 100% sure knowing how to code would help me with that. There is literally no limits to what I can build, I can even have my own business.

There has never been a better time to get into tech.

But I can’t do that alone. I need some support and somebody to push me forward.

I can never get that from my parents. I don’t have friends in real life because I cut my relationship with all of them - I wanted to grow, they didn’t.

So I looked somewhere else.

Using social media to my advantage

silhouette photo of six persons on top of mountain — Photo by Chang Duong on Unsplash

Social media especially Twitter is a really great place if you know how to use it and who to surround yourself with.

I got the chance to meet so many incredible people also building projects, running businesses and achieving goals.

INCREDIBLE!

How about me? Why not joining them?

That’s how I discovered the Building in public universe for the first time.

You won’t know the benefits of building in public until you start doing it by yourself.

I never thought about sharing my work on social media before.

I was used to work in private on projects that I would add to my portfolio and resume to get a job. That was my end goal.

BUT… I needed to change my goal. Getting a job wasn’t motivating enough for me. I was abandoning projects midway through.

Before joining the #buildinpublic community, no one knew what I was doing.

When I started interacting with other creators and also trying to build projects in public myself I could see how much potential there is.

And that’s how I built my first project - MovyDick.

I really loved what I was building but with my limited coding skills I thought so many times about giving up. Twitter people never let me.

After launching MovyDick I took some time off then I came back, built the V2.0, launched it then started working on Youtalgo.

All that because of MY NEW FAMILY.

I never felt such excitement and enthusiasm for anything before.

I was born to do that and nothing else.

Reply to this right now and tell me about you.

Even if you think it’s boring… I want to hear about it.

Not feeling comfortable sharing your story? No worries.

Just hit “reply” and say “Hey!” (I love meeting cool people)

Talk Soon,

Amine

Just An Introvert Speaking

How I got into coding by mistake