how did you become interested in this trade

I became interested in technology through just being a teen. I was constantly on my computer, my cell phone, watching tv. It surround my entire way of life. After the basics of just using it I started to dive into how I could fix things if they broke or stopped working correctly.

That then turned into an interest of building and rebuilding computers. Which turned into an interest that I wanted to pursue as a job. To which I joined the military as an electronic technician, which I love because now I am faced with challenges and to be able to overcome obstacles and fix my gear is a great feeling. But then you thrive to become the expert you get to a point where you are the go to person, that everyone looks to for help and guidance. My job has also let me dable in the IT world, and I have been able to get my SEC+ cert.

Being able to be apart of this every growing trade, is an amazing feeling. The doors that are open to you if you just look are amazing.

My introduction to tech was a little more aimless than many of the stories I hear, but since my introduction, my interest has grown significantly the more that I've learned.

Where I grew up, there isn't much of a tech industry, and I didn't really know anyone who worked in tech. My high school didn't have programming classes, and I didn't know anyone who programmed. For me, technology was mainly just a tool to text friends, download music, and research things online.

When it came time to decide my major in college, I really had no idea what to do. My focus growing up was playing competitive soccer and hanging out with friends, and I hadn't given it much thought. I had always been good in Math though, so people told me I should be in engineering.

I did well in my engineering intro courses (basically Physics), but not as well in some of the other general required courses (e.g. English), so I ended up dropping out and working for a couple years. When I decided to return to college, I knew I wanted to continue engineering, but my transfer GPA was below 3.75, which limited my options. This is when I decided to study Computer and Electrical Engineering.

Ever since this decision, I have found technology to be more and more interesting. Learning how computers were developed and how the internet works is so incredible to me that I believe it is one of the greatest, if not the greatest, technological achievement of Humanity. We have built subatomic highways for electrons that travel hundreds of miles in a matter of seconds or milliseconds to return a series of 1's and 0's, ons and offs, that your computer translates to a video on your screen - that's incredible, and it's not even the half of it.

Building autonomous robotic cars and programming applications in school developed a lot of my interest in tech, but it's really been the hands-on projects I've done on my own that have made it a part of my identity. Building my own desktop computer, making websites for the small businesses of friends and family, and programming simple applications to automate processes can help you realize you can do anything with the help of the endless resources of the internet.

If you think you might be interested in tech or you're not sure, I recommend a hands on project, whether it's programming an application, building a robotic car, or something else. There are endless guides out there on the web, both written and human, to help you through each step, and what you'll learn from the experience will be more valuable than anything you can read.

When you work with technology and see what it can do for you firsthand, I think you'll see why people do it even when it's challenging.