Contrary to popular belief , that is NOT air your breathing. The 1999 Sci-Fi flick The Matrix, is ironically closer to an actual life lesson that you will ever get taught in school. You DON'T have to go to work for your Dad's company after high school, or go to some far off college (if you are even so lucky). There IS another way to live life, and comfortably I might add. It exists in 1's and 0's. Welcome to the 1st and possibly only lesson you will be taught on How To Live A Completely Digital Life (because no one can be shown what The Matrix is :) .
STEP #1: DRINK THE KOOL-AID.
The sooner you accept and adopt the realization that its OK to dance to your own tune", the easier it will be to hear the music. You have to believe in you before anyone else will.
STEP #2: LEARN TO CODE (A FREELANCER'S KUNG-FU)
It literally took me 10 minutes to learn HTML and CSS, and then another 15 minutes to learn the necessary core parts of PHP. What's important here is you learn HOW to learn programming. The rules, languages and their uses will forever evolve, but long as you know how to research and teach yourself (and good notation), you will be on your way. I promise.
STEP#3: TALK THE TALK
Once you have steps 1 and 2 down, you're gonna need to pick up "tech speak". Not to sound like a complete prick, but you have to "fake it until you make it". Do yourself a favor and catch up on the HBO series Silicon Valley. Side note, great show, really talented cast. Youtube Techcrunch, and DevTips (Travis is a really good teacher). Long story short, watch , comprehend, regurgitate it back where applicable (I'll include a list of some YouTube kung-fu below).
STEP#4: FAIL FAST, FAIL FORWARD, FAIL OFTEN
Now I know what you're thinking, "that sounds stupid, why would I aim to fail"? Well you're right, aiming to fail IS stupid, but lets look at what I said in detail;
Fail Fast, because the faster you arrive at the wrong answers (be it in coding or outlining the freelance contractual details of a project), you can get to the right answers. The feeling of knowing how to do your job lends a confidence like no other.
Fail Forward meaning, learn from your mistakes and apply the corrections. Never be doomed to repeat bad behavior.
Fail Often is meant to say, "get familiar with failing". You will do it often. But failure is the best teacher. Whether structuring the milestones and/or the developmental stages of a project, or simply trying to figure out where to put the ";" at the end of a line of code, fail often, so you can get to the right answers.
Longer story shorter, the way to live a digital life, is to work for yourself as a freelance developer. You are the boss. You are the workforce. You control your destiny. So try not to spill your Mai Tai or get sand in your laptop.
Cheers - Shane Trace
YouTube Kung-Fu List from #3
-DevTips
-LevelUp Tuts
-thenewboston
-Programming Studio
*Bonus Kung-Fu www.codeschool.com