Timely thread. I've hated school since about 3rd grade, but because of parental and general societal pressure, I went all the way and graduated with a Bachelor's degree in CS in December 2006. That was despite dropping out of both high school and college for a semester each.
Last fall I came to England to get a Master's degree because I was convinced I didn't want to be a programmer anymore, which is what I've been doing professionally since '01. I figured I'd become a project manager or a management consultant (one of the good, non-sleazy, wonderful ones). During the course of the program it became apparent that my previous troubles with school are probably not figments of my slackitude; school really makes me sick. More than that, I found that programming is most definitely as close to a calling as I have.
So anyway, why did I call this thread timely? I'm about 3 weeks away from finishing, and my project is in shambles. Last night I decided to quit making myself ill. I'm not going to finish.
I am going to succeed anyway, on my own terms, doing things I like in the way I like to do them.
(Sorry if this is all jumbled. I'm still recovering from my stress-induced near-death.)
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