Beginning my UX Journey
I recently (it’s starting to move away from “recently”, but I am holding on tight to that word) graduated college with a degree in Psychology. Throughout school I LOVED learning about psych. It came naturally to me, I was intrinsically curious about the subject, and I enjoyed the research aspect. All that being said, I didn’t really want to work in the field. I knew my options would be limited out of college, and ultimately, if I wanted to move forward with research, I would need at least a master’s degree. I didn’t, and still don’t, think I was/am ready to take on more formal schooling.
So, when I graduated in December of 2019 and headed off to live with my girlfriend in a new town, I knew I needed some sort of job. I took the first opportunity that came to me; renting cars. Honestly, it was mainly a sales job. It wasn’t really a bad first gig out of college (aside from washing cars in freezing temps), but I knew it wasn’t my forever, or even my next year. At this point, I was googling away every day after work trying to understand what it was that I wanted to “do”. I was pretty sure I wanted to find a way to use my previous knowledge of psychology, but I was also yearning for something more creative. Eventually, after endless googling, UX came across my page.
Like many others, I had not heard of UX before, and at first it (who I am I kidding, it still does) intimidated me. I do not have a design background, and I was worried that was going to make things much harder (the verdict is still out), so I decided to let it go for the time being and continue on renting cars.
Well in 2020, the world had a different idea. I was out of a job by April and back to the drawing board. Thankfully for me, my wife (at that time fiancé) is a nurse, and it turns out they are pretty in demand. While I tried to find something to provide additional income for us, she held down the fort. Over the next year, I spent some time in a coffee shop and as a nanny. I liked my time at the coffee shop, and I LOVED the kiddos I nannied, but after not traveling or doing much over the last year, my partner and I wanted a little more. We decided to make some changes to advance both of our careers.
That brings us to the current day. My wife is now working at a hospital as a travel nurse and I came along as well. We currently are in Seattle, WA, which is a great fit for us. We decided that I would work on studying and learning UX, while she worked at the hospital and got more experience in Labor and Delivery. I was, and still am, so excited to pick back up this idea with less fear. This past year has really taught me to take advantage of the things I want to learn and pursue, as you never know when that won’t be an option anymore. So now while she goes to work or sleeps, I work on my UX courses. Along with many others, I am currently enrolled in the Google Certificate course through Coursera (I will be writing about my journey here as well). For now, this seems like a great program, and I am happy to finally be focused on pursuing something that really interests me.
I plan on sharing more of my story/journey here with others on this platform as I work my way through this awesome place.
If you can relate to anything mentioned above, or just want to chat, I would love to connect with you. Nice meeting you all!
