The year was 2016 - was in Bangalore - Silicon Valley of India - procrastinating my hours away.

Somewhere deep down I was not content - knew I was better.

I was like millions of developers out there getting an average salary without any direction of what next.

1) Self help books

The first sense of direction I got were from Self help books.

Got hold of The Mastery Manual by Robin Sharma. That was my starting point - that book gave me a direction.

It made me make a roadmap of what I wanted to master. For the first time in my life I had clarity.

Started with Cracking the Coding Interview by Gayle Laakmann McDowell.

Used to get up early mornings at 5AM and put 2 hours into practice.

Evenings - post work - Used to put 2 hours into practice.

Weekends used to practice for around 8 Hours.

Did each and every problem. It took around 4 months to finish that book.

2) Practice

Practiced like a maniac on HackerRank - got to under 1000 ranking in Algorithms.

Next moved on to Design Patterns - Took around 2 months to get my head around it.

Next moved to Threads - Again took around 2 months to complete each and every problem with loads of practice.

Every day it was at least 4 hours of personal coding + 8 hours on weekends or sometimes more.

At the end of 2016 I was seeing problems in a different light - Felt I did not belong in the place I was working anymore.

3) Javascript

2017

With that skill - secured a place in a wonderful company with package much higher than my peers. This is where my interest veered towards Javascript.

The love-bug that bit me was Angular - yeah I am one of those guys who learnt a framework first and then Javascript.

However made sure to get my Javascript skills right. That again took around 6 months of undeviating practice and sacrificing all those beer bashes.

Started contributing to Github and at the end of 2017 - Had close to 40+ github projects - yup thats how much I coded. Currently its 85+.

2018

Added React and Vue - threw in docker and a younger Kubernetes then into my forte. Webcomponents - Microfrontends - CSS - Flexbox - yada - yada - yada - coded everyday - everything.

Was a pro at work by this time - the goto guy - led teams - attended and conducted numerous hackathons - won many.

There wasn't a day where I did not code or learnt something new. Udemy and Pluralsight were my best buddies.

It felt like I was on a roll and that something exquisite was about to happen.

4) LinkedIn

While I was in middle of this transformation - Deleted all my social media accounts (Facebook - Instagram - Quora).

The only account which was active was/is LinkedIn .

Had worked on creating a brand for myself.

All this led to something that I have experienced only in the movies.

2019

On a lazy morning - I see a message from a Recruiter from Toronto, Canada in my LinkedIn. He had reached out for a job opportunity with an all expense paid move coupled with a pay which was around 4 times of how much I was earning at the time. It was too good an offer to refuse - In fact at first I thought it is a scam - well it wasn't.

Interviewed - cleared and 3 months since the inception of that message - Was in a completely new country - again doing what I love - Coding.

In short - was able to turn my life around - Have inculcated amazing habits - Have a hunger to learn more and most importantly - I am at peace with myself.

Since 2016, have read close to 100 books and continue to read everyday - it provides clarity and a wide spectrum of views.

I do hope my story inspires you to go above and beyond in your life.

A word I believe in - Perseverance.

I still feel - its just the beginning.