First Step: Cybersecurity and Computer Programming

“I took the first step by speaking my dreams and fears to you. There is nothing that exists about this idea except for the idea itself.  But this is how ideas become reality.  You have to take that first step.  You have to speak your dream into existence. … If I can do all this, then imagine what you can do.  What dreams have you been too afraid to try?  What voices have kept you from reaching your potential?  What voices have closed your sense of wonder?  If you’re alive, if you’re breathing, we need you.  We need your vision.  Remember the very word “impossible” actually spells, “I’m possible.”  You can do anything through Christ who strengthens you.”

-Jeremy Cowart

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In an honest self-assessment, I have come to the emphatic conclusion that I lack what it takes to make it in the increasingly Globalizing World 3.0, and fear 4.0 is on the way or has come, while I’m trying to catch up with the skills in the world of 2.0.  I’ve been reading a book called The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the 21st Century, by Thomas L. Friedman.  It is a somewhat slow yet riveting read that has consistently challenged my thinking about the future of humanity, America and the middle class–the rest of the world too, but not so much.  It is simultaneously difficult to read because it tempts me to have hope in the Free Market system; thereby capitalism, and higher education, while also frighteningly blunt about the dire need of middle class Americans to enhance their skills in order to remain marketable, relevant and competitive with the world.  And by the world, I mean China and India!

Here is an excerpt:

“The demand and payoff for skilled, educated workers who can adapt to rapid technological change, respond to international competition, and claim new middle jobs is greater than ever today.  ‘In 1979, median compensation for college graduates was 38% higher than for high school graduates.  Last year, that difference was 75%’ (BusinessWeek, February 9, 2007). Therefore, of the many things we need to do, in my view the most important is to identify the new middle jobs that will be less vulnerable to the downward wage pressures of outsourcing, automation, and technological change and to identify the particular skills and education they will demand–so that more workers can reap the benefits.  In the United States, new middle jobs are coming into being all the time; that is why we don’t have large scale unemployment, despite the flattening of the world.  But to acquire and hold one of these new middle jobs you need certain skills that are suited to the flat world–skills that can make you (at least temporarily) special, specialized, or anchored, and therefore (at least temporarily) untouchable and more likely to reap rising wages.”

This excerpt is among the many alarming parts of Friedman’s book, which serves the reader a macroscopic play-by-play in the form of the 5W’s for present-day life, family, and work in America through the eyes of adaptive businesses, developing countries and evolving markets.  Following the 2008 subprime mortgage bubble “boom,” all of sudden having a job and money became more difficult to obtain and secure for even the college educated. Then terms started floating about within professional environments, such as data, accountability, quantitative, qualitative, assessment, observation, career path, tracking, evaluation, self-development, professional development, and common core. (I am not referring only to the actual Common Core Standards, but a phrase that has been picked up as buzz word in the realm of professional development, even in the United States Army).

Inadequacy doesn’t even begin to describe the amalgam of thoughts and emotions I feel while absorbing this reality check of our rapidly changing global economic landscape, simply because of one technological paradigm:  the internet.  I see the great many benefits it has singularly enabled humanity leverage almost exponential knowledge expansion and sharing, while also enduring the cumbersome shifting for opportunity–in which I now must climb courageously, one rung at a time. And of course, I certainly feel fear, and a bit of the failure-to-launch vibe due to having been forced to reside with my single parent for years to make ends meet while working as a public school teacher.  I’m 33-years old and soon to be 34 and my math, science, and history knowledge is extremely rusty.  What is an old Millenial to I do?

Well, I will not succumb to the deluge of fear and complexity before me.  God has given me the vision, and placed opportunity before me. So then, there is a path that he is clearing with adequate challenge to refine, redeem and strengthen what has been lost, and supply what must be learned anew.

Both of my present careers are demanding more of my time and focus, on the premise that I am fully committed to them equally.  But the simple truth is that I am not fully committed to them equally, as that is practically impossible.  Although I am heartily desirous to be, but only along the slim base of pragmatic survival, as opposed to passion for what I do for a living. Furthermore, I am grossly unfulfilled because of various inhibiting factors because of mandates for professional growth within both that have locked me into stultifying disinterest.  I work in positions I honestly and truly do not want–an Army logistician and 1st grade teacher.  Yes, I said it.  I dislike logistics and teaching.  It’s not in my bones, my heart nor my head. To be clear, I like serving the country and help children learn, but not the way either occupation wants me to do it.  Please do not confuse this of childish obstinance.  I’m just recognizing that I unwittingly took a wrong turn down career paths where people eat folks like me for dinner.  In other words, I am out of my element.

(Okay. Horse beaten.)

Meanwhile, time is ticking away and I have heard nothing but slamming doors.  I think I’ve gotten the hint.  It is time to change.  It is time to leave. More to the point, it is well past time to get engaged and change my career!  And in my case, the lesser is serving the greater, which is to say, my Army Reserve career provides benefits and incentives that aid career change from teaching–my primary means of income–to computer programming, cybersecurity and computer science.

As of two weeks ago I began enrollment with American Military University, and started an online non-degree program to brush me up on my coding skills through Udacity.  While I have prior training in HTML, CSS and Javascript, those skills have waned.  But no worries here.  My intrinsic motivation has been reignited to self-educate.  It has been exciting in the pursuit and act of learning in itself.  And the joy of pursuit is almost as important, if not more, than merely reaching the goal or end-state of starting a new well-paying job in cybersecurity and programming of some form.  This feeling and drive is vital in fact, because it indicates to me that I have found my a passion in which I would like to work, and not compartmentalize it into a casual hobby, like that of my photography, filmmaking and video editing–and I am okay with these art forms being my hobby. The investment into the non-degree is out-of-pocket, while my AMU program is getting covered by Uncle Sam, or da gov’ment.

So I am happy with where I am headed.  I have a sense of direction and hope.  But the most critical player in all of this is hearing God shut doors, change circumstances of life, whispers of wisdom in my day-to-day conversations with people, and direction through my quiet time with him, in order to know what to do next.  God is not a one-trick pony, nor can he be placed into a box, or summarized by a formula, although granted he has provided a pattern for recognizing his will in our lives.

“And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. ” -Romans 8:28 (NIV)

and he also says…

“I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” Philippians 4:13 (NKJV)

I asked for this and he has said yes, and is making good on it.  Thank you Lord Jesus!  I do not deserve this!  But thank you for grace and mercy!

To close out this post, I would like to share the story of Jeremy Cowart, who has made good on his talents and skills.