Finding My Spark By Embracing Little Opportunities

This is how I ended up helping set up a workshop for makers at my university, and what I learned there.

I was studying mechatronics, but my free time went to music and sound production: playing with sound effects and trying out any new equipment I could get my hands on. One day, walking through the library, I noticed a new room being set up behind glass walls. Inside were 3D printers, laser cutters, soldering tools, VR headsets and more. What caught my eye was a fretless keyboard sitting on a desk. I had seen it online not long before and decided it was way out of my budget.

So I asked if I could use it. They said they couldn't get it connected properly, but if I managed to, I could try it out. A few minutes later it was up and running. The team was impressed, and a little shocked at how fast that went.

They told me they were building a makerspace called the Collaboration Space, where students could experiment and build things. Proper labs were only open to master's students, so this one was meant for every student who wanted to work on a project of their own.

They were also planning a recording studio, and asked if I'd help pick the equipment and set it up. I had been dreaming about my ideal studio for a long time, so I didn't need to be asked twice. I put together a detailed list with an explanation for every item, budgets and an assembly plan. They liked the enthusiasm enough to offer me a part-time job with full responsibility for the studio, from building it to running it.

Of course I said yes. They were going to buy the equipment I had always wanted, and I could build the studio and use it however I liked. We assembled it together, and then I ran it, onboarding the new students who wanted in. The Collaboration Space took off too. Students came, and so did tutors, who started their own projects there.

Because I knew my way around the tools, I kept getting pulled into other people's projects, and eventually they asked me to give workshops. I ended up teaching 3D modeling and printing, soldering, sound synthesis and music production. The space turned into a hub for entrepreneurial projects, and we even started competitions where students pitched their ideas for small funds and benefits. I helped a lot of those projects from the very beginning, working with students to turn their concepts into something real, and I joined the committee that judged whether the proposals were feasible.

Looking back, all of it came from being curious about a new room in the library. I'm grateful I walked in, because a lot of how I think as an entrepreneur started there. It was a place to chase what I was into and push past what I already knew how to do.

Building the studio taught me project management, budgeting and actually getting things done, plus a fair amount of audio engineering. Running the workshops taught me how to teach. Helping other students put me in front of all kinds of fields outside my own, and borrowing from other fields is something I still lean on when I solve problems as a founder. The studio also trained the softer side of the job: managing, communicating and working with other people.

The biggest lesson, though, was about opportunities. They don't announce themselves, and they often look small or a bit odd at first. A keyboard nobody could connect turned into a studio, a job and a whole new world for me. You have to stay alert enough to notice them, and then actually grab them. The competitions and the startup energy around the space pushed the same way: be creative, be stubborn about problems, take calculated risks. Being surrounded by people who encouraged that was worth a lot.

I can still picture those late nights tinkering, troubleshooting and watching half-formed ideas start to work. Those days are over, but the lessons stuck. As a founder I'm still fine with not knowing how things will turn out, still curious, and still hungry to learn from fields I don't know yet.