“What is defeat? Nothing but education; nothing but the first step to something better.” – Bruce Lee
What should you do if you have no idea what to do in life.
You may be in a job you hate, or out of a job and now wondering what’s next.
You want to do something that you’ll love and make money from. You want to find something that excites you every day.
The biggest problem is you have no idea what to do! Where should you begin?
That’s how I felt for the better part of the last 10 years.
Took me until I was 34 to find something that I enjoy doing, make money from it, and willing to work hard for.
It hasn’t been a smooth road to get to this point. Lots of rough times. Lots of self doubt. Many sad nights.
I always felt like there was something that I could do that’d make me happy. Making money is important to me also. I don’t want a job just for the paycheck. If I’m going to be working, I want to enjoy it. No amount of money will make me happy at a miserable job.
I was always envious at the people who knew what they wanted. Maybe they realized at an early age, during college, or got a great first job out of college.
They could spend more time doing what they enjoy, instead of wondering.
Not me and not many others as well.
If I could go back and talk to my younger self who had no idea what he wanted to do in life, I’d tell him to take more risks. Try different things. Don’t worry about getting it wrong. Doing something is better than doing nothing.
Don’t be afraid to fail.
Trying something and realizing I didn’t like it eliminated that from my mind so I could focus on the next thing I was interested in.
But I thought I knew what I was going to do after college.
My Unused College Major
Raise your hand if you majored in something that is completely unrelated to what you’re doing now? I bet the majority of you.
I majored in sports management in college. Yeah I know you might be thinking, “What?”
I had no idea what I wanted to major in. I was a sophomore and finally had to decide. I figured I love sports so I’ll pick that. Maybe I can do something with sports after college.
My last year of college, I did a summer internship with the Tampa Bay Mutiny of Major League Soccer. I love soccer so I enjoyed that summer. But no permanent job was available afterwards.
Living in Jacksonville, Florida, opportunities were limited if I wanted to do something related to professional sports.
I kept trying to get an internship with the NFL Jacksonville Jaguars. During college and after college. No luck.
So I started to work at the family restaurant. I thought I would work there temporarily while I figured out what I wanted to do.
I enjoyed it at the beginning. I was making money.
I ended up buying a car and a house because that was the typical next stage in life after getting a job.
Needed a change in life, but to what?
After about five years on the job, I started to hate it. I dreaded going to work. I’d feel sick. But what else could I do?
I looked online, but all the jobs sounded so boring to me. I didn’t want to work in some office answering phones. I didn’t want to be selling cell phones. I didn’t want to work at a local sporting goods store where I could work my way up to manager.
What about making money online? I read success stories (not sure how many were true or fake now), but it sounded great to me.
I tried though, but failed at any online efforts.
It took another five years of trial and error to finally figure out what it was that I was good at that I enjoyed.
Five years of being lost, stuck, and miserable feels so much longer! It makes life feel like it’s not worth living at times.
But here I am a survivor of that time in my life and optimistic about my future.
It wasn’t all pretty though. It was like dating a bunch of girls. At first they seemed interesting, but turned out weird and lost my interest. I had to keep trying until I found a great one.
My attempts at a career change
— Sometime around five years ago, I can’t remember exactly, I responded to an ad on Monster.com about a marketing position. I remember it mentioned I could be my own boss in a couple years. I forgot what else it said, but intrigued me enough to apply.
And not much online ever caught my attention. I think I was pretty desperate for something different.
I showed up for an interview in a temporary looking office. There were a couple other people interviewing. I guessed my interview went well because they told me to come back the next day to go into the field.
The next day I went out with two guys about the same age as me. I had to dress up, which meant wearing a tie.
We were going to go door to door selling phone and cable packages. They would ask them what they were paying and offer to help them save money. It was a commission based job.
By lunch time, I already hated it. I had never sold door to door before, but quickly realized I’d rather kick my own ass than do this. But I still had to survive the afternoon. One of the longest days ever.
They liked me enough to offer me a job the next day. I declined of course.
What I learned: I hate door to door selling and don’t like forcing people to buy stuff. I don’t like doing the same thing every day at work.
— A couple years ago I got a part time job that sounded pretty cool at first. I found it online of course. I worked for a company that helped Canon check their printers in all the Best Buys in my area. I had to make sure they were displayed correctly, working correctly, check the stock, and compare competitors’ prices. It seemed cool at first. It was just part time and only took one or two days every two weeks.
So every two weeks I would have to drive to five of the local Best Buys to do this check. At home, I’d submit the info online.
It wasn’t hard at all. At the beginning, I liked it. It was fun to hang out at Best Buy. They sent a free wireless printer with lots of supplies for me to use. I also got a digital camera to take pictures during my visits.
After a few months of it, I started to dread the week I needed to go into Best Buy. That initial excitement quickly wore off. It got to be monotonous. I’d go in, do the same thing and then leave as soon as possible.
Around this time, the company was planning a conference in Los Angeles to talk about all the upcoming new Canon products. It’d be only for representatives around the country like me.
It would be an all expenses paid trip to Los Angeles. Sounded awesome, but I didn’t want to go. I knew already i wasn’t going to be at this job for much longer.
I finally decided to quit when I was told they wanted reps in this area to start going to Best Buy before it opened and train their employees how to use Canon products. That would have been even worse.
At the beginning, talking electronics and getting paid for it sounded great to me. But I had enough of it. It wasn’t for me.
So I quit.
Unfortunately, I had to return the printer and digital camera.
What I learned: I don’t like doing a job where I feel like a robot. Just like above, I don’t like doing the same thing every time.
— I applied for another job a long time ago I found online to organize semi-truck shipments. I don’t remember what drew me in. Whatever it was, I sent in my resume and even had a telephone interview.
I didn’t get the job, but now I’m glad I didn’t. I probably would have grew tired of it very quickly.
What I learned: I was really desperate and therefore blocked all rational thinking.
Making Money Online
I’ve always been interested in making money online.
Back in 2005, I created a sports blog where I wrote about my opinion on different sports topics. It was something I loved to do. I didn’t create it to make money, but I did get advertisers, like gambling and ticket companies, wanting to put text links on my blog.
That more than paid for my web hosting and then some. I ran that for a couple years, but grew bored it of it.
That’s where I got my first taste of making money online.
Around 2007, when I read “The 4 Hour Work” week, I got the desire again to make money online again so I could have the financial freedom I wanted with a location independent business.
I probably looked through all the get rich quick schemes online.
Here are some of my embarrassing attempts:
— I tried buying Google ads to drive traffic to my websites. What kind of websites? One was basic website where users answered a poll question. Either answer would send them to a page where it asked for their email address to enter them in a contest for a gift card. I got paid for each email submitted.
I created a bunch of these websites because there was a guy online who was teaching this. Create a bunch poll questions, buy traffic, get email addresses, and be rich.
One website asked a question about Twilight. The movie just came out and I tried to capitalize on the popularity. Another website asked a question about football and one was about Jennifer Aniston. I don’t remember why I chose her. I think she was in the news a lot that time.
I ended up spending as much money in Google ads as I was making or maybe I was slowly losing money. Either way, it ended up not being interesting enough to keep trying.
What I learned: Doing something just to make money isn’t for me. It wouldn’t motivate me enough to work hard.
— My next great money making idea was creating niche websites. I would create a website around one type of product and make a commission when someone bought using my referral link.
One was to promote a way for Nintendo DS users to download unlimited free games. I created a website talking about the product, despite never using it. I got traffic by buying Google ads.
I wasn’t doing too bad, but that just means making a couple hundred dollars a month in profit.
I had competition cause there was another website promoting the product and I believe it was converting well.
After awhile, it was harder and harder to get my Google ad to be seen. I also felt sleazy promoting this product. I had never even used it. I didn’t even own a DS.
Finally the offer got pulled, or my traffic died cause my ads weren’t showing anymore. My memory is kinda hazy.
What was even worse about this was I had no idea how the product worked. I just wanted to promote it to make money. I wrote as if it were a great product, but that was a lie.
Later on when the iPad first came out, I remember seeing a product very similar to the DS one. It promised unlimited books and movies. I bought it and it was a rip off! It just gave links to a bunch of websites, which can be easily found in Google.
I imagined that’s what this DS product was like.
What I learned: If I’m promoting or selling, I have to believe in the product. Selling something just to make money doesn’t make me feel good. Again, I was just focused on making money.
– I created a website about baby strollers. Definitely not one of my better ideas. I thought every family needs a baby stroller so parents would go online to read reviews. They would find my site and buy a stroller though my link. Cha-ching!
I knew nothing about baby strollers. I just thought it was a great idea. I spent time creating a website that looked good. For traffic, I bought Google Ads.
One day, I noticed my first sale! I forgot how much I made, but it was less than $50 for sure. Still I was happy about it.
I kept waiting and waiting for that next sale. It never came.
After a month or two, it wasn’t worth the money nor the effort and I stopped. It was stupid to pick baby strollers, but I guess I didn’t learn.
Other websites I tried selling one type of products were eye creams (don’t know what I was thinking) and identity theft protection.
What I learned: Again too focused on making money. Didn’t do market research. Maybe parents don’t like to buy strollers online.
— In early 2011, I decided to try niche sites. Websites around one particular topic. This time I would be making money from users clicking on Google Adsense ads.
I joined a course that would teach me how to make a bunch of these niche websites quickly, automatically update with content every day, send easy Google traffic, and make me lots of passive income!
Of course it sounded great.
I went through the course and created one site.
Like everything else I had tried, I soon lost interest in this one. After I made the first one, I didn’t want to do the work to make another one.
It wouldn’t be satisfying to me to be making money this way.
What I learned: I shouldn’t fall for get rich quick products.
Just wasn’t for me
I sucked at making money online these ways, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t people out there doing very well in the examples above.
It just wasn’t right for me. I wasn’t willing enough to learn more about it and keep trying. I couldn’t imagine being excited putting in the time and effort needed.
I don’t see them as failures now. At the time, I really wanted do it so I did. I tried it out and found out first hand, that I didn’t like it.
Since I had no idea what I wanted to do, trying different things was the best for me. Looking back now, I would have tried even more things.
There is no success without failure
Even when I started this blog and developing my first iPhone app, I wasn’t sure how it would turn out.
As you can see, I’ve tried and stopped so many different times. So this was just another attempt, but this time I felt different. Maybe cause I was determined to not stop taking action until I reached my goals.
It turned out to be beyond my wildest dreams. Photo 365 made a little over $30,000 in its first month. The blog has grown and has a really great community of readers.
What if I didn’t even try? What if I thought about my failures before?
I wouldn’t be here right now writing you this.
It took long time to get to this point. It sucks to feel lost and without a purpose.
Finally I found work I enjoy doing, but it took a long road of trying different things.
Knowing me, my interests will change. I will want to keep challenging myself and work on interesting projects. I’ll probably screw up along the way too. There’s no shame in failing. It’s worse to do nothing.
But for now, I’m loving what I’m doing.
If you’re stuck right now, and you want to make a change but don’t know where to start, I’d say start with what interests you. Just pick something.
Don’t try and do everything at once though. You’ll spread yourself too thin and feel overwhelmed. Give your attention to one thing that could have the most potential impact at this moment.
If you want to start your own business or make money online, but don’t know where to begin, just pick something.
You may end up not liking it, but you won’t be wasting your time.
You’ll waste more time sitting around thinking about what you want to do, then actually doing something.
Benny, I didn’t realize you were an internet marketing expert!
All those ideas I’m sure sounded promising at the time. At least you tried. Makes sense to believe in the product, use the product, or have experience with the product.
And the very best affiliate product is your own! I love my book, How To Engineer Your Layoff: Make A Small Fortune By Saying Goodbye because I’ve successfully negotiated a severance package for myself and for a dozen others. The book has been through 30+ revisions, and only have 4 months after launch am I slowly rolling it out to pertinent affiliates. When you have your own product, you do your best work!
Good luck in your new app endeavors. I flipped the switch with relevant affiliate products this year on my site and so far it’s been good b/c all the content written in the past had nothing to do with making money online!
Best,
Sam
I was an internet marketing wannabe for sure! When we’re desperate, almost anything will get our attention. 🙂
That’s the best when we create a product we believe in and know it’ll deliver lots of value. It’s much easier to sell and be proud to tell others about it! I know you busted your butt on it for sure. I bet when you get feedback from readers that you’ve helped, that’s gotta make it worth all the hard work.
This is a great post, and a great reminder that most “overnight successes” are the end result of years of hustle.
I really admire your perseverance. It takes a special mindset to keep going in the face of repeated failures, especially surrounded by the doubt and skepticism of family and friends. I’ve had my share of failed projects as well, but they’ve turned out to be priceless in terms of real-life education.
Thanks for posting.
Thanks for reading and leaving a comment! I just want others to know that overnight success is an illusion. In just about any. Nothing happens overnight despite what people are trying to sell you.
That’a long trip of failures, and it’s good that you learned from them, I think you learned the hard way, I already know that you can’t sell well if you don’t believe in your product, that’s why companies hire training specialists so they motivate employees and make them love the product they sell… Actually if you don’t love something you can never make others love it, you might not be convinced a lot with the product or its price, but you should always find a feature that you appreciate in the product, and base your marketing around it.
Great points Dan! Thanks for your comment!
Awesome post man!
It felt like I was reading my own thoughts 🙂
I can completely relate to what you wrote and what you felt and the only difference is that i’m still looking… Can’t say I’ve found what I was looking for but I will keep trying until i’ll find it.
Just finished a 6 months trip that took me around the world and now i’m looking for the next thing to do which will be more than just making money.
Great success story on the app. In anything we do it is so easy for us to just give up on things quickly especially in today’s instant gratification type society. I think there are a lot of us in your position with jobs or former jobs we hated and college majors that we do not use. Mine was a Marine Biology cause I love to fish, guess we were on the same thought process on that one, Ha. But really, failures are tough to deal with unless you can convince yourself your just one step closer to success each time.
Hey Josh. Thanks for the comment. Failures are tough to deal with for sure, but we just need to look at them in a better way. I did fail at each of those things, but I’m kinda glad I did because I doubt I’d be happy being stuck doing any one of those things. But at the time, it was frustrating. And your major sounds about as useful as mine. 🙂
yup, totally my approach too! I learn best from figuring out and eliminating what I DON’T want instead of what I do. I do know that niche websites has never appealed to me no matter how many times I tried to read up on it and pay attention… it’s just, as you said, doing something just to make money and I don’t think I could ever resonate with it. I still have yet to get into this though but what DOES seem appealing to me is e-books and kindle books! It seems like its starting to become the new thing too. I’ve always wanted to write books.
Hope you will write a book! It’s so easy to get published on Kindle now. It’s really cool. Next year one of my goals will be to write a book.
Trying and eliminating is definitely great for someone who has a lot of interests, but doesn’t know what to focus on. Before I wanted to create a bunch of niche websites all making money for me, but once I started doing it, I realized I didn’t like it that much.
But hope you do write that book!
Benny, can’t lie, I *giggled* through this — love it, not at you at some similarities! I think you’ve just told the story of many people who are on the ‘make it online’ track. Now, confession (cause they are always good!) Yours was Baby Strollers – learning all this online stuff — mine was Golf Balls ( I hate golf!) and why balls? And then when I was getting into the ‘swing’ (sorry) of it, Scuba Diving — and that is why I was giggling. You know what though, I wouldn’t (20/20 vision) have done it any other way. :-)) Dawn xx Thanks and have a great day.
Thanks for sharing Dawn! I’m glad to hear I wasn’t the only crazy one to create a website about what I don’t even really know. That is funny though. I know more about golf balls than baby strollers. Why didn’t I try that instead? LOL. Thanks for reading and leaving a comment. I’m glad I could make you laugh cause we both are a little bit crazy. 🙂
Benny you got me with the title, but the post is equally as amazing! I’m always a big fan of bloggers sharing their journey, and I find it very comforting to know that you have tried so much and continue to be optimistic!
My failure was a little different, my failure included successfully getting what I had always wanted out of life, and then realizing it wasn’t what I truly wanted. That failure brought me to the path I’m now..a path of self awareness, self guidance, optimism etc.
This path continues to inspire me to no end. Currently I’m trying to get a clothing line off the ground, as you say, it’s better to just try something than not do anything at all !
Great Stuff man !!
Thanks Jeremy! I know I’m not the only one that’s tried so many different things to figure out what I might enjoy doing. But also I wanted to open up because I know there are people reading who feel stuck and have no idea what to do. They want to do something, but don’t know what they are passionate about. It’s better to try than to do nothing and hope for a change.
Good luck w/ your clothing line! I hope it rocks for you!
Benny- Love the post. I think everyone goes through those stages. There are so many people who stay stuck to a job they hate. Some get a career by choice but it seems a lot are by consequence. I was talking to a friend the other day and asked him where he thinks he will be in five years. He told me he did not have time for those kind of thoughts. People put more time in planning their vacations than they do in a plan fro their future and happiness. They all forget that they have a choice.
Fortune favors the bold and those who take action. That’s why I love this blog and the people who read it. You all inspire. Thanks
Hey Paul! I love one sentence you added because it’s so true. People put more time in planning their vacations than they do for their future. Vacations are fun. I’m on a vacation right now, but they’re only temporary. We have to fill in the rest of our lives and we can’t just let life happen to us. Take action like you said.
Thanks for your comment. Really enjoyed it!
Awesome & inspiring post Benny! I’m still trying to figure things out.. Like you I went to college & got a degree that has nothing to do with the type of work I do today. I hate going in to my 6-3 job everyday and doing the same thing! It bores me to death! I really just want to find a way out, work for myself, & be free to move as I wish.
Hey Aaron! 6-3 is tough. I’m not a morning person so I know I couldn’t wake up that early. Keep persevering! If I can do, I know others including yourself can do it.
Benny,
You had me on the edge of my seat this time the whole way to the end of the story.
You’re story will resonate with so many people who probably see themselves as a failure. I know i felt the same way despite the fact that i was making good money it felt so empty to be chasing money.
When I majored from college I chose Economics and hated it. my first job out of college was an accounting clerk. I kept changing my job title every 2 to3 years because i would get bored after a while. It was just another stepping stone to the next job until the thrill wore off.
I went from ap clerk, foreign exchange hedge anayst, treasurey andalyst, financial anallyst, marketing analyts, banner ad optimization manager, research manager. And then i started dabbling in ebay, and my own ecommerce shop and now my blog.
Success is like a numbers game. Every once in a while someone hits it out of the park on their first try but the majority of us have to fail a bunch of times until we hit that sweet spot.
ps
my resume looks like a person who has schizophrenia. Not at all like one person. SIGH!.
That’s a huge compliment Annie. Thanks!
Wow had no idea you had so many different jobs. And they all have fancy sounding titles, but I know you didn’t feel happy doing those jobs.
I think success is like dating. Sometimes you have to date a bunch of weird and ugly people to find that one great person. Hope your dating life wasn’t as schizo as your professional life. 🙂
I’ve done that too. Date a bunch of weird ugly people. LOL..
Hah, what an awesome story Benny! What separates your happy-ending journey from most people’s is that you were willing to cut your losses and go start over trying something new. This is a tough thing to do! I think most people are more inclined to just stick it out until something drops from the heavens :).
Thanks Deacon! A bit embarrassing to talk about my failed attempts, but realized there’s no shame in screwing up. It makes us wiser and stronger.
This post reminds me so much of what I used to do about 3-4 years ago as well.
I tried all sorts of ‘internet marketing schemes’, from PPC to Niche websites to PPV, all with varying degrees of success.
PPV worked out pretty well for a while but I just had no passion in constantly building ‘scammy’ landing pages and promoting frankly, absolutely horrible products.
As you mentioned, you’re not going to be motivated to work for long if you don’t believe in what you’re doing!
Shane, I completely agree with you. I didn’t want to build scammy landing pages to get emails or sell a shady product. I only thought about money at first, but realized later this sucks LOL. It’s better to wake up every day doing work we’re proud of.
Really interesting to hear this part of your story in more detail! The great thing about it though is that if you didn’t go through every one of those failures you probably wouldn’t have ended up in the position you are now. People seem to forget that especially in business, one thing leads to another – there is no shortcut.
Thomas
No I wouldn’t be in this position now most likely. I suppose everything happens for a reason and each screw up helped me in some way. For example, though I failed with the website about baby strollers, I got practice customizing WordPress themes. That helped when I wanted to customized my blog. Hope you’re doing well!
Hwy Benny, that was quite painful reading as it reminded me so much of my initial career failures after leaving school. You’re right, we need to fail along the way and there will come a time for all of us (or it should) that we’re able to to call those failures ‘experience’. I can now, but it was pretty confusing at the time.
Thanks for sharing. I know I’m not the only one that has had a bumpy road. It definitely is confusing and frustrating when things are bad. We feel hopeless, but I hope someone reads this and inspires them to keep on moving forward.
Man, our stories are SO similar, especially with the MMO affiliate think, focusing too much on the money, and hating it.
Inspiring stuff my friend, shared with Everlution FB age as well. Look forward to chatting soon.
I think these big IM gurus make their big bucks from people like us! I know I’ve bought a couple products because I got hooked on these crazy promises. There’s definitely no shortcuts when it comes to success. Look forward to chatting soon!
So true Benny, there are no shortcuts! The great thing I’ve found about ongoing failure is that you kind of become an expert at it. You don’t live in nearly as much fear as those who’ve never walked through it again and again. Or rather, maybe we have as much fear/anxiety, but we know how to work WITH it and keep on going. Fabulous post – I’m not surprised it resonated so well with this entrepreneurial community!
Thank you! And really do people really remember our failures if we are finally successful? Highly unlikely. Messing up is good, but only if you learn from it. So then it’s not failure but education for life.
Love, love, love the chronicle of failed internet marketing experiences! So many people talk only about their success and never about the dead ends and the lessons learned.
Although I’m still on my first online venture, I’ve taken a couple of missteps along the way – for example, paying for traffic straight to a sales page and playing the numbers game (if 2% convert I can make $_____) just does NOT seem to work very well. I really don’t know who the heck are these people who supposedly buy on the first click.
I tried this with my 2nd product and got zero sales from such “cold” prospects. However, when I launched the exact same product to my e-mail list, I got dozens of sales and feedback saying people loved it!
Anyway, like you said regarding your app, my current online just FEELS different from everything I’ve done before. I’ve got a gut feeling it’s going to succeed big-time in the long term, because I’m passionate about developing awesome-quality stuff and my followers are enjoying it. Each thing I launch gets better and better, so I have no doubts that this is going to be really lucrative in a few years!
Thank you! Yes I finally wanted to open up and share my embarrassing attempts at making money online. 🙂 Cold prospects definitely are hard to convert. I think I read somewhere that you need make contact w/ your prospects like seven times before they’ll consider buying. So it’s no surprise your list loved it versus cold prospects. If you want to try and convert cold prospects, think about offering a freebie like a pdf, mp3 training, or videos. Much more effective than just sending them to a sales page.
But I’m sure you’re going to keep working on and improving each day so in a few years you’ll achieve what you want!
Benny,
Really inspiring! It’s nice to read about someone who went through multiple failures only to pick himself up again.
I’m sure this story resonates with a lot of people who are eager to make an income online.
As far as success goes, it’s always about trial and error, fine tuning what you do and at the end of the day, there’s just no short cut to it… That’s why whatever easy money-making scheme don’t work.
Thanks for sharing this.
I was a semi-successful internet marketer for awhile…that baby stroller niche was a good one…(I had a site on that too at one point, lol). I’ve had some very successful sites, I’ve had sites that were total flops…but with each one comes more and more experience 🙂 I agree doing something now, even if you fail, is way better than doing nothing at all.
Hey Chelle, I think you probably knew more than me about baby strollers since I knew zero about it. LOL. I think it’s important to try because often times the first thing we do isn’t what we end up doing in the long one. Thanks for your comment!
I had the same experience with buying traffic. I was in Dog Training niche (everybody has a dog training blog at that time). I spent about $20 for the first few days and made one sale. That’s about $40 in profit, so I kept going without knowing what I was really doing. 1 month later almost $200 gone and no sale 🙁
Yeah it’s tough to buy traffic. It’s hit and miss sometimes.
Hey Benny,
I was sitting reading this on the bus on the way home yesterday mate and was glued. You reminded me a lot of myself tbh. Thanks for the great advice about letting things go that maybe have reached their used by dates. Great advice at the right time.
Matt
Hey Matt, great to hear from you! Glad I could make your bus ride a bit better. 🙂
Great and success story on the app. In anything we do it is so easy for us to just give up on things quickly especially in today instant gratification type society, I think there are a lot of us in your position with jobs or former jobs we hated and college majors that we do not use.
Your articles are always motivating me. Not only because of your Bruce Lee amazing quotes, but the articles overall. I always believed “Failure is a step closer to success” I don’t know whose quote is it, but it’s an absolute truth. Thanks for the useful article.
I read this a while ago.
Just wanted to say thanks for writing this.
Started to find myself getting a little bummed out from all the jobs and schooling I did in the past with nothing to show for it. But now I realized they are all valuable experiences to help me find my way.