August 2025
Hi everybody! Welcome to my blog! My name is Matt, and as of August 2025, I’m in the middle of a career transition. I’ve spent about a decade in retail and sales, working across the automotive industry, a major telecommunications company, and now as a General Manager at a large kitchen retailer. I’m 29 years old and didn’t go to college—life had other plans. I became a dad at 19, which meant jumping straight into the workforce. Over the years, I’ve found a knack for turning almost any customer into a friend (or at least someone who thinks we’re best friends).
Even though I went straight into work, I’ve always been a technically inclined person. I grew up playing video games and loved figuring out computers and making them do things others couldn’t. While at the telecom company, I made a couple of attempts to go back to school. My first try was a disaster—general education classes just weren’t for me. I’ve always loved math, computers, and history, but reading and writing have never been my strong suit (ironic, I know).
My second attempt back in school introduced me to cybersecurity. The telecom company offered a certificate program through an online college, and I jumped in. I learned about network fundamentals, network hardware, architecture, and even some Python programming—my first real introduction to coding. I loved it! Suddenly, school was fun again.
Then life threw a curveball. I got an opportunity in kitchen sales that I couldn’t pass up. Leaving the telecom company also meant losing tuition reimbursement, and with my wife still in school, I was the sole income. So school had to wait. I found success in my new role (which was surprisingly tech-heavy thanks to CAD software) and eventually moved up from salesperson to assistant manager to managing my own location.
I should have been thrilled—and I was—but burnout, a long commute (about an hour each way), and the lack of work-life balance started affecting my home life and mental health. I realized it was time for a change. I initially considered front-end development because I enjoy building things, but something was missing—the thrill of cybersecurity kept calling.
That’s when I decided to dive back into learning, this time sharing my journey publicly. My goal is simple: show what I’m learning, explain concepts in an approachable way, and maybe help at least one person along the way.
I’ll be posting a couple of times a week, sharing the concepts I’m working on, what’s helping me, and what’s challenging. My next post will cover the single best thing I’ve done so far to jumpstart this journey—stay tuned for mid-next week!
You can also find me on X and Discord. I’d love to help build a supportive community for people like me who are trying to navigate this world on their own. You don’t have to go it alone. Good luck, keep learning, and talk soon!