I can relate, as I started my career at 16, setting up a small ISP from scratch without any prior knowledge of computer networking and doing the work remotely, part-time since recently when the company was acquired by a larger ISP. They had about 2000 subscribers when they sold it.
Besides that, I've worked full time on Linux administration at a large scale and in the last years on cloud architecture. When starting university, my colleagues were all envious of me because I was working on interesting stuff and because I had a steady income, but I don't know if the sacrifice of not having a life during high-school was worth it.
Some advice to my younger self:
- enjoy your young, no-care-in-the-world years and experiment as much as possible outside work and jobs; this will come in handy later on because you will end up working with people
- try finding a bachelor and master that can deepen your knowledge on the subject; for various reasons I've picked telecom and now I regret not picking CS for my current day-to-day job. I made the right choice by picking a networking master's
- if in or near Europe and if you like traveling, search for Erasmus+ exchanges during high-school and university years
- there are lots of certifications that can give you insight on the industry you're on. For example, I've only learned about Cisco certifications years after working in the networking field. Why? One constraint was budget and I initially implemented everything using Linux and cheap switches.
- don't get hired full-time early (this I'm glad I didn't do), because there will be plenty of time to climb corporate ladders. A few of the university colleagues are now on a higher corporate level than me, but should I care?
TL;DR enjoy your young years and don't sweat it too much by working during university; you're way ahead of everyone else and will easily land a job when the time will come.
"and will easily land a job when the time will come."
Well, that's the thing. I don't want to leave out any opportunities, just because I was lazy in my young years. There are many insanely good people out there and I heard companies more look at years of experience and certifications, instead of public "achievements" like HackerOne, etc.
I would try to avoid this FOMO mindset, it leads to burnout/possibly depression in like 5-10 years. I would focus on a) finding out what problems you are most interested in working on and b) having some fun while you're young and don't worry about being "lazy" (you're obviously in no danger of that).
I think it's best when you're young to not be focused/specialized too soon, but cast a wide net - maybe find a couple of projects that you're interested in doing that are somewhat interdisciplinary. College is good for this as well. Good luck!
Besides that, I've worked full time on Linux administration at a large scale and in the last years on cloud architecture. When starting university, my colleagues were all envious of me because I was working on interesting stuff and because I had a steady income, but I don't know if the sacrifice of not having a life during high-school was worth it.
Some advice to my younger self: - enjoy your young, no-care-in-the-world years and experiment as much as possible outside work and jobs; this will come in handy later on because you will end up working with people - try finding a bachelor and master that can deepen your knowledge on the subject; for various reasons I've picked telecom and now I regret not picking CS for my current day-to-day job. I made the right choice by picking a networking master's - if in or near Europe and if you like traveling, search for Erasmus+ exchanges during high-school and university years - there are lots of certifications that can give you insight on the industry you're on. For example, I've only learned about Cisco certifications years after working in the networking field. Why? One constraint was budget and I initially implemented everything using Linux and cheap switches. - don't get hired full-time early (this I'm glad I didn't do), because there will be plenty of time to climb corporate ladders. A few of the university colleagues are now on a higher corporate level than me, but should I care?
TL;DR enjoy your young years and don't sweat it too much by working during university; you're way ahead of everyone else and will easily land a job when the time will come.