Firefighter Gone Tech: 3 Things I Learned from My Career Change

I started my career 7 years ago by working full-time as an EMT while putting myself through college as a full-time student at UCLA. At the age of 24, I landed my “dream job” as a Firefighter/Paramedic. The years of sweat, blood, tears, and sleepless nights were all worth it. I made it. I was set for life…so I thought. I believed that spending 30 years in public service and entering into a healthy retirement and pension was the ultimate dream. However, an internal voice of wanting more out of my life got louder as I began my early career. This past January, I took the courage to listen to that internal voice and left stability, security, and a prestigious job for the unknown.
I was fortunate enough to join the Business Development team at Rainforest QA in March of 2017 (Shout out to the best SDR/BDR team that taught me everything from the dual monitor to the amazing GIFYs!). It’s been almost 6 months since starting my new career in tech sales, and I couldn’t have ever imagined the fun, and the rollercoaster of an experience it has been so far. Here are the 3 things I’ve learned so far in the last 6 months of my career change.

1) Change is scary, but JUST DO IT!
I admit it, I was scared S#*!less in January when I decided to pursue a career that I had no experience nor knowledge in. All I knew was being an emergency responder and technology was absolutely frightening to me. However, I’ve come to learn that usually the best things that have happened in my life began by getting out of my comfort zone. So, I said F*&K it and I just did it. I got a Linkedin this past January and messaged everyone and anyone in the tech space to pick their brains. I spoke with SDRs to authors to sales coaches to Founders & CEOs all around the world who were kind enough to give me their time. (Thank you again to everyone that took their time to help a stranger, y’all the real MVPs). I’ve come to see that most people (including myself) tend to build a glass ceiling for ourselves as we put a limit to our potential because of the fear of change and the unknown. Face it, you don’t want to be on y0ur death bed to look back and regret the things you didn’t get to do. Change is scary, but just do it!
2) Learn, Learn, and Learn.
The beauty of the human brain is that it has the ability to learn, grow, and adapt fairly quickly if you have the mindset to always be learning. Whether it be a new hobby, sport, school or career, “do what you gotta do” to learn and grow. I’ve learned that everything in my life has been a learning lesson, especially times of failure and disappointment. I’ve also realized that you can always learn something from somebody if you just take the time to listen. No matter if you’re black, white, green or blue, we all have a story to tell and lessons to learn from. It takes a little bit of humility and patience to understand that we as people don’t know everything, even though we might sometimes think we do. So, learn, learn, and learn.
3) Smile and have fun :)
It’s easy to look at situations in our lives as glass half empty. Negativity through complaining and having self pity is contagious and a disease that is easily spread internally and externally. Have you ever noticed that when you stub your toe when starting your morning causes a snow ball effect of having a “bad day”? That perceived negativity tends to spread through out every aspect of our lives internally while externally, people tend to feel your “bad day”. I’ve learned that seeing life glass half empty is exhausting and a waste of my mental and physical energy. It’s still a work in progress for me, but I try to to remind myself that life is too short not to smile and have fun.
If you’ve been considering about that “What If?” in your life, I encourage you to plunge in and just do it! Don’t look back in your life and regret not doing what you’ve always wanted to do. So go, do, and have fun while doing it.
What’s you story? Message me and let’s chat!
Cheers,
Alex
