"We're not that much smarter than we used to be, even though we have much more information - and that means the real skill now is learning how to pick out the useful information from all this noise." -Nate SilverFrom a young boy, hiding under the covers with a flashlight, trying to find Waldo, or devouring "The Big Book of Random Facts", I have loved information. Over the years I have grown in being able to take information and apply it in ways that bring value to my life and others. For many years, my full-time job was listening to others' stories, finding ways to help them discover new ideas, and connecting those ideas to a lived experience. Over the last couple of years, challenges brought clarity to the needs of both my family and my community; I became more and more convinced that I needed to disconnect my income from my service. As I began to explore different career paths, I fell in love with coding. I loved being able to work to understand the specifics of a problem or need, to break that problem down into smaller problems, and to put into language exactly how that problem could be solved (and unlike solutions with people that are often proven out over months and years, the solution could be verified almost instantly).I loved both the work and flexibility offered by software engineering and its related fields, so I decided to transition careers. In preparing for the next chapter of my life I finished a software engineering program with App Academy that has prepared me to ask good questions to understand a problem or need, utilize both current knowledge and research to collaboratively plan a solution, and execute that solution in an agile way that allows for adaptation as more information is received.I am loving using Javascript, React, and Redux to build user experiences that are smooth and intuitive. Building backends with both Node.js and Python, taking advantage of Flask and Express, and understanding the power and limitations of an ORM when writing SQL queries have been a joy. But one of the greatest joys in all of this is seeing my children's eyes light up when they get to use the new thing that "daddy" built. (TLDR: I love new ideas, new skills, and my family)