[jrsmith1279]

I did this after giving up on ever having a career in I.T. and being fed up with my 8 year job at Wal-Mart. I already had some knowledge of PHP, JavaScript, ..etc and I got most of my work from oDesk.com. I took a couple of weeks to go over some training at Lynda.com before I started taking on work since I was mostly self-taught. I found that not already being an expert in Web Design/Development meant that it took me longer to do the jobs that people wanted done and I ended up spending more time on projects than it should have taken. I obviously couldn't bill the client more for my lack of knowledge so I ended up working 12 to 14 hour days and made about the same as what I made when I left Wal-Mart.

I'm definitely not discouraging you, but if you've already got a job I'd test the waters with some freelance work before quitting. In my case, quitting my job at Wal-Mart and doing freelance web design/development actually landed me a career in the I.T. field and 3 years later I'm on the verge of making a 6-figure salary doing what I love to do.

[Shankem]

I wouldn't quit my job, I'm just working as an intern currently and I learn on my job as well, but I was looking to learn more and different topics outside of my job. It's a limited term internship and I'll be going back to school next September. I only started learning to program in University, and I'm pretty happy I was able to get a job considering I started knowing nothing a few years ago. However, now that I've come this far I'm not really satisfied with my current level of knowledge and I don't think I will be unless I push myself to learn more outside of work and school.

Thanks for the reply, it's good to hear from people who have worked hard to teach themselves.