Road to Knowledge
by Mario J Pillet
At age 17 I started working at a fast food restaurant making minimum wage. I never really thought about having a career in anything or doing anything other then Martial Arts. After high school I went to an art school in Orlando FL, were I spent a good year learning web animation. I then left and had no plan to go back. Not to that school or any other college. I met a girl and fell in love. I got a job as a retail sales person at a baggage company in Aventura FL, and was getting paid well. I was good at what I did but had this feeling that this wasn’t really something I wanted to do for the rest of my life. For two years I was miserable, both in my job and in my relationship. I finally started thinking about my future and what I really wanted. And the first thing I wanted was to start over. So I did. I quit my job and left my relationship. It was scary to feel alone and with no job but at the time I was living with my parents so I had no real problems other then my loans from the college I attended. My next step was to go back to college and this time into a major I would very much enjoy, Animation.
I start college and begin the road to knowledge. I’m there for three years and during that time I made great friends and learned so much. I became really good at everything the school taught me. At graduation I was awarded best digital portfolio in my class. I saw myself heading towards the top, working for the big boys in animation and game art. I saw myself making tons of money and living it up.
We’ll, that didn’t happen. Instead I ended up freelancing for a few months and then got a job at a kitchen equipment manufacture as their web developer. I spent a year there building websites and doing graphic work. They’re a big company so I learned a lot about business and politics. It was a good experience for me but still I was miserable. I am good at building websites and very much enjoy it, but I was just not happy working at that company. Maybe it’s because they had poor management in the art department or the constant talk about politics or the lack of benefits they provided to their employees. None the less, I left. I moved on to an advertising agency where I was also their web developer. After four months I came to a realization. Working for someone isn’t for me. I decided to focus more on a small business of my own specializing in multimedia and the Internet. My goal now is to use all that I have learned both from the good experiences in my life and the bad experiences to get myself to the top doing what I love. This now begins the road to my success.
I look back at everything I went through both good and bad and what I see is a road that was paved for me to get me to this point. I am a skilled artist with the knowledge of the world feeding me. I am not afraid of my new road ahead. I feel confident that I will get to where I need to be. I write this article to give me motivation to move forward in my decision and believe that just like there was a road paved for me to gain the knowledge I now have, there is a paved road in front of me guiding me to success.
