[hopth]

I made the decision to keep programming strictly as a hobby and go into a related field.

Some backstory - I started programming at a young age in the early 90s, I was building basic sites by reading from books before I even had internet access. That continued throughout my teenage years, coding almost daily on a range of software and languages.

When I eventually got to the decision on what to do for university/college I decided to go the business route and not CS. From a programming perspective I was confident (arrogant) my local educational institute couldn’t teach me much (I was already helping others on their coursework) but mainly I didn’t want the enjoyment I got from programming to be sapped away in a day to day job.

For me it was the right decision and instead I landed in product. I get to work with engineers and I’ll happily have technical conversations where necessary but for me I still get to enjoy programming as a hobby and I don’t think of it as work.