I'm a professional. I'm currently working on some side projects like storybot, a blog written only by AI or ai-guessr, wordle but with AI images.

I did some years of Game Development, but mainly it was a mix of having a first job where I had to "learn how to learn" and then working a lot on side projects.

I find that side projects is the main way to learn and experiment. In a corporate job you can't experiment (and break stuff so much) so someone that codes as a hobby has experienced way more situations that could work in a professional environment.