What started all of this.

The spark that started my life changing.

My story and what I hope to achieve

I don’t want this to be some sappy essay about “oh woe is me, I’m pity farming, etc.” I think I just want to document how I feel now, and hope/believe in the idea that I will continue and strive for the change I desire.

Undergrad: My life at LSU

The Bad

I really struggled a lot in college with CS… no friends (which means no support group, no one to learn from), and no foundational knowledge of the material. I remember when I first started, I had (unknowingly) one of the worst professors in the Dept, let alone, probably the University.

I remember one of the labs, he came up to me and was kinda hovering and reading my code. He just pauses, and goes:

“You should probably change majors.”

That was the moment I probably had the imposter syndrome planted into me. It was just a really isolating and hard time.

The Good

I think it all changed around Sophomore year. I met my friends who are probably some of the best people I know to this day. I just had a big falling out with another friend group for no apparent reason, and I was back at this spot of being alone. This, coupled with COVID, changed me into a bit of a more reclusive, introverted person.

But it was nice meeting these guys. My desire to just make a meaningful connection was enough (I hope) for them to like me. We hit it off really quick, and now my life takes a 180. We’re hanging out, going to the gym, and doing everything together.

The best part? These guys are cracked. Two of them were valedictorians; the other two were top 15 of their class. Me? 😭 Average dude. I had a goal—a physical thing or concept to catch up to.

It had its ups and downs. When you’re trying to catch up to someone, sometimes you notice the gaps between you, and it always got to me. Not in an envious way, but a “dude you’ll never catch up” kind of way.

But overall, I learned so much just being around them. I wouldn’t trade that timeline for anything.

The Ugly (?)

I think the ugliest turn of events happened during my junior year. I got hired as an intern at a start-up in early 2022. I had just quit my other IT job where I loved my boss and the environment, but I didn’t love the work. I knew leaving was taking a chance on myself.

Amidst all of it, I applied for summer internships thinking I could just come back in the Fall…

Boy, was I wrong.

I reach out and ask them if I can step away for a summer internship and retain my position. They hit me with an ultimatum:

Option A: Deny the internship and keep my spot.
Option B: Go to the other company, and my spot at the startup isn’t guaranteed.

I chose Option A. I denied the other company to keep my “stable” job. Then, I got let go four months later.

I was destroyed. Junior year internships are pivotal for return offers, and I felt like I just lost my chance.

Post-grad

I was blessed enough to land a full-time offer as an Application Developer specializing in Frontend technologies. I flunked the technical, but did well on the behavioral—I guess I got that charisma, yknowwhatimsayin. 😎

I’m grateful they took a chance on me, but I feel like I’m stagnating. I really want to grow while I’m young. You have to take a chance on yourself at some point.

The Goal Now

As of writing this, I’m going back to school! I’m entering the Georgia Tech OMSCS program, specializing in either AI or ML.

Why OMSCS?

Affordability: It should end up being under $10k total.
Prestige: Georgia Tech is consistently a Top 5 CS school.
Rigor: The program has been refined since 2012 to match its in-person counterpart.

The Branching Timelines:

The Research Path: Get my Master’s and some research done. If it goes well, I’d consider a PhD at a dream school (CMU, Stanford, MIT, UC Berkeley, Georgia Tech). I’d like to research either CS/Finance or CS/Biology, probably centered around ML or AI.
The Big Tech Pipeline: Targets include Microsoft, Google, Anthropic, and Apple. I know some of these companies do research fellowships too, so it’d be cool to intertwine the two paths.
Quant Dev: A rising interest. The idea of refining trading strategies and probability practice just seems more interesting than the traditional LeetCode grind. CS/Finance path too which has always been an interest of mine.

What I’m Doing Now

I’ve been grinding Python recently. It’s simpler syntax-wise, and I’m working through the Neetcode 150 (lifetime sub 👍).

The bottleneck isn’t the theory—it’s the translation. To fix this, I sit down for 30-40 minutes a day, turn on OBS, and record myself failing.

It took me 3 days to solve Top K Frequent Elements just because I didn’t know how to reference a dictionary key. I knew HOW to solve it, but putting code to IDE was the missing link.

So, I grind LeetCode, stay optimistic for research, and try my best.

I’m surrounded by dazzling friends who are smarter than me, and sometimes I get blinded by that. But I remind myself:

If those guys are so far ahead of you, do you have the time to slow down? You need to make leaps while they can walk. They put in their time; now it’s your turn.