Michael Abrash - "Do What You Love"

ríomhaire · Jun 8, 2012

The fourth entry of Michael Abrash's blog, Ramblings in Valve Time, answers a question many people have been asking him:

"What should I study in college/learn to do/work at to get hired at Valve/have a good career/have a good life?"

His, somewhat clichéd, answer is "do what you love".

There are no guarantees, especially in the short run, about where that will lead – but at least you’ll enjoy the trip, and it is likely to lead to exciting things. It is true, however, that it can take a while; consider my own long journey to being a full-time programmer.

In 1975, I was a freshman at Clark University with absolutely no idea what I wanted to do with my life. I was a Geography major, but only because I had taken an intro course and done well enough so that a professor had decided to mentor me. I did my Geography homework and papers the way I did all my homework and papers – under pressure and generally at the last minute; classwork was just what I had to do to stay in college. Then, as part of my major, I took Dick Howard’s FORTRAN course, and something interesting happened.

You can read the rest of Michael's adventures in programming here.

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Michael Abrash - "Do What You Love"

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Michael Abrash - "Do What You Love"

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