Updated in April 2026: This post was rewritten from the original 2023 version for the new site. The original date has been preserved so it stays in the right place in the blog timeline.
Security+ was the first certification that made the rest of this path feel real.
Before taking it, certifications felt expensive, intimidating, and easy to overthink. I did not have a long history of taking professional exams, and I did not love the idea of paying for one only to fail it and have to do it again. At the time, that made the whole thing feel bigger than it probably should have.
Looking back, that was part of why Security+ mattered so much. It was not just an entry level cybersecurity certification. It was the exam that made the process feel beatable.
Why I took Security+
By the time I sat for Security+, I was already working in a SOC and had exposure to a lot of the concepts on the exam. That helped, but it did not remove the pressure. Knowing the material at a high level is different from proving it under exam conditions.
Security+ appealed to me because it offered a broad security baseline. It touches a little bit of everything: threats, access control, risk, cryptography, networking, compliance, incident response, and defensive thinking. That breadth is exactly why it is so common as an early certification. It gives people a structured way to organize the foundational knowledge that the field expects.
For me, that structure was useful. It turned a vague sense of familiarity into something more disciplined.
How I studied
The two resources that helped me most were Professor Messer and Professor Dion.
Professor Messer’s videos were especially useful because they were direct and efficient. They covered the exam objectives clearly without wasting time, which made them easy to trust as a backbone study resource.
Professor Dion’s practice exams were the real difference maker. I took all six of them, and more importantly, I reviewed why each answer was right or wrong. That part matters. Practice exams are not just for checking whether you can pass. They train you to think in the style the exam expects and help expose the places where your understanding is weaker than you think.
If I had to do the exam again on a short timeline, I would still lean heavily on practice tests. They were the fastest way to close gaps and build confidence.
The procrastination problem
One of the most useful parts of this experience had nothing to do with a technical domain.
I originally told myself I was going to take the exam much earlier. Then I dragged my feet. It is easy to procrastinate when the thing in front of you is difficult, expensive, and uncertain. You can always convince yourself that you need one more week, one more resource, or one more round of review.
That is exactly what happened here.
Eventually I realized I was not avoiding the exam because I was unprepared. I was avoiding it because I did not want to deal with the possibility of failure. Once I recognized that, the answer was simple. I booked the exam and forced the issue.
That turned out to be the right move.
Exam day
I took the exam in person at the USF testing center, and I was glad I did.
There is something valuable about showing up, sitting down, and getting it done in a controlled environment. For a first certification especially, I preferred that over worrying about online testing issues or proctoring problems at home. It removed a layer of friction and let me focus on the exam itself.
By the end of it, the biggest surprise was that it felt more manageable than I had built it up to be.
What Security+ actually gave me
The biggest value of Security+ was not the letters after the name. It was the mindset shift.
It taught me that certification exams are not mystical. They are just another kind of hard thing that can be broken down, studied, and passed. That sounds obvious, but it matters. Once you get through the first one, the rest of the path looks different. The fear drops. The process becomes familiar. You stop treating the exam like a wall and start treating it like a project.
That is what Security+ did for me.
It also helped organize a lot of foundational security knowledge into a cleaner mental model. Even if you have already worked around some of the concepts, there is value in seeing them grouped together in a formal way. Security+ gives you a broad base to build on.
Advice for anyone considering Security+
If you are thinking about taking Security+, my advice is simple.
Do not overcomplicate it.
Use a couple of solid resources. Be honest about your weak areas. Take practice exams seriously. Review your wrong answers until the reasoning clicks. Then book the exam and go take it.
Do not wait around for some magical feeling of complete readiness, because for a lot of people that never comes. At some point, the best move is to commit and execute.
Security+ is not the hardest certification in cybersecurity, but it is one of the most useful because it gets people moving. It gives you a foundation, a win, and a better sense of what professional study actually feels like.
Final thoughts
Security+ was the certification that made the rest feel reachable.
It gave me a structured baseline in cybersecurity, but more importantly, it got me past the mental barrier of taking the first serious cert exam. That alone made it worth it.
If you are early in your cybersecurity path and want a certification that helps you build both knowledge and momentum, Security+ is a good place to start.