Nobody told me that university can be so brutal

a self discovery story about a student studying engineering

I did not know that the real world can hit you harder than a freight train dropping towards you at terminal velocity. For the past year, I felt like the sky was falling over me for reasons I believed were out of my control. I blamed everything on external factors; the fact that it was not my fault because I was in a tough engineering program or the belief that my second employer placed a ridiculously high expectations on my abilities. I am writing this post because I was wrong in blaming everything externally and it will be a reminder to myself that it is never too late to pivot.

Stage 1 — Falling

From year one, I was struggling in my university courses. Concepts were not clicking as quickly as they would in high school. My grades suffered a dramatic drop. The fatal error I had while progressing through school at the time was convincing myself that because I was at a reputable university, it was okay to just try and pass. I believed that the content was more difficult than similar programs at other universities and that I would still come up above average in the workforce. I was so wrong.

The gaps in knowledge that I had accumulated started to manifest itself when I headed into my second internship (At my university we alternate between 4 months of school and 4 months of internship). My role was a software developer at a startup in Ottawa, Canada. As I began to ramp up and start development on more challenging problems, I found my problem solving ability waiver and fail when I needed it most. Problems that should only take a couple hours for a full time software developer extended to days. It was partly because of my inexperience, but I also believe the slower problem solving ability was because I generally skipped over the most difficult questions on the exams. After all, I just wanted to pass.

At the end of the term, the evaluation I received from my employer did not meet my expectations. I stared at the score for hours. It was a catastrophic catalyst that would define the next 4 months of my life.

Stage 2 — The Bottom

Each day felt like the world was going in slow motion.

I stopped believing in myself and my abilities. I stopped believing in my capability to attain my engineering degree. It felt like everybody else in my program was successful and only I was not. My self esteem fell drastically. Motivation became non-existent. Personal relationships started to deteriorate and propelled me further towards depression.

Any advice or support from my friends had somewhat helped, but the impact was minimal. You start to ignore any external stimuli and begin to isolate all of your feelings and self contain them in locked up thoughts. I never thought that I would be hit with this silent disease of the mind.

My evaluation ate at me. My academic performance ate at me. My life ate me inside out. Every time something negative occurred, I would sink deeper into sadness which further degraded performance. I had to get out of this vicious cycle but I did not know how.

Applications for internships for the next term were coming up. I had one last ounce of strength in me. I knew that my previous evaluation would show up on my applications through the job system at my university so I decided to write a cover letter for each and every single job I applied to. I knew if this last effort did not work out, I would end up devastated. I frantically customized each one depending on the job description and submitted them in. There were 46 cover letters submitted in total.

On the employer system we have at my university, you cannot tell if you get the job or not until a specified date. While waiting for that date to come, you have to check on the page everyday to see if you get an interview so an employer can submit their choices on that date. “Status — Not Selected” is what you see on the page when you do not get an interview. Oh man, was I demoralized. By the end, I had a couple interviews, but they did not go as well as I hoped. All the energy inside me was completely drained away.

When the day arrived that told you whether or not you could potentially be employed or not came, I looked at the page and kept refreshing it. I kept refreshing it 5 minutes before it would update… 2 minutes… 1 minute… the page updated.

And then I woke up.

Stage 3 —Lessons and Uptrend

I was able to choose whether to have a software designer position at arguably the largest telecom company in the world, or take a more business oriented position at a large financial services firm.

I did not expect what had appeared on the page. All of the negative feelings I had started to dissipate slowly but surely. It was the first positive feeling I had in 8 months. This was a chance for me to try again and start over.

Over the next day or two, hope started to fill in the spaces in my mind that had been vacant. I started to map out a long term plan with short term goals. The first short term goal was to choose which job I wanted to take. The second one was to pass the term. Long term, I made it a goal to attain my degree and learn as much as possible in the mean time. (I know long term is greater than 2.5 years, but baby steps had to be taken at the time)

What job did I eventually end up with?

At the time, I leaned towards the financial services company from the bad taste in my mouth from my previous internship. I still enjoyed software development though and could not decide. In the end, I decided to rank both options as 1 and let the university system decide for me.

I ended up with the business position which is where I am now at the moment.

The past couple months have been quite eventful and eye opening. There has been so much to learn working in a completely different industry. I am taking everything in and feeling incredibly grateful for this opportunity. My communication skills have increased by magnitudes (by a factor of… 2.4?) along with my networking skills. My vocabulary has now expanded to include business and financial jargon that I otherwise would not have had the chance to come across.

I am juggling multiple projects at the same time and having a blast doing it. My confidence and work ethic is reaching stabilized levels. It also shows in my social involvement this term, for I am having one of the best times of my life. All this said however, I have realized that this career is not where I want to be in five years.

I learned a couple lessons from this experience.

1. Do not compare yourself to other people

Focus on your personal and professional growth. I touched on this topic only briefly in this post, where I looked at my peers and wish I could have been more like them. This is the wrong way to approach any learning environment. Find what makes you happy. It may take time, however you’ll find it if you seize every opportunity that you are presented with.

2. You cannot take shotgun and ride out the reputation of your university

What I mean by this is that you cannot loaf through a highly reputable school and be successful in the workplace and your career. You still have to work hard for it. Someone once told me you start becoming an adult when you stop talking about your alma mater and focus instead on results.

3. The real world is hard, but not impossible

Do not be discouraged in your first internship or job if you feel overwhelmed. Everybody has to start somewhere and inexperience will become experience. Learn from your mistakes and reflect on what you are doing wrong. Make goals to fix them or attain new skills.

Do not let failure define who you are.

Closing Thoughts

I miss software.

I miss being able to create things, often with immediate feedback. I miss being stuck on a problem, going to sleep, and then the next morning figuring out the solution in a beautiful eureka! moment. I miss my terminal. This is why I am pivoting again back to software. I want to take this positive momentum I gained from these past few months to go back into the industry I am passionate about.

I am back on hacker news. I am back discussing sweet new technologies. I am back on github, browsing other people’s projects to see what cool things they can develop in this industry where anyone can sit down and learn to code. My learning mentality is back, and I am ready to go into the hardest term in my program with open arms.

Nobody told me that university can also be so rewarding.