4:00 AM, a pandemic, and three CFA exams. This is my story!

How I passed all three CFA levels while working full time in finance — and what I learned along the way.

My alarm goes off at 4:00 AM.

It did, every morning, for years. Before the city woke up, before emails arrived, before the day made its demands — I was at my desk with the CFA curriculum open and a coffee going cold beside me. It was quiet. It was mine. And on the hardest mornings, it was the only hour of the day that felt entirely in my control.

This is the story of how I passed all three CFA levels alongside a full time job in finance. It took four and a half years, a lot of early mornings, and more weekend study sessions than I can count. It wasn’t always graceful. But it was entirely worth it.

Keep going, girl. You don’t know it yet — but you’re really going to nail it.

Level I — Mid 2020. The world had stopped. I decided to start.

I began studying for CFA Level I in the middle of 2020. The world was in lockdown. Most people were waiting — for things to open up, for life to return to normal, for some sign of what came next. I decided to use the stillness differently.

I remember one evening during revisions, sitting at my desk in the quiet of the lockdown, and feeling this wave of emotion wash over me. Not stress — something closer to pride. I had been showing up, day after day, studying seriously through one of the strangest periods any of us had lived through. And in that moment, I felt brave. Genuinely brave. The kind of brave you don’t recognize in yourself until you’re already in the middle of it.

I passed Level I in February 2021. Less than a year after I’d started, in the middle of a pandemic, while working full time. It was the first proof that this was possible.

Level II — The hardest thing I have ever done.

Everyone who has sat Level II will tell you the same thing. It is a different beast entirely. The depth, the volume, the way every topic builds relentlessly on the last — it is not like Level I. There were weekends where I barely moved from my desk. There were mornings at 4AM where the material felt genuinely impenetrable.

I passed Level II in May 2023. I won’t pretend the journey was smooth. What I will say is this: the 4AM mornings never stopped, and neither did I.

Level III — The one that changed how I see everything.

Level III was different. Where Level II had been relentless and demanding, Level 3 felt like the curriculum finally trusting you with the whole picture. The constructed response format — the essays that most candidates dread — felt intuitive to me. I’d spent years thinking in structured frameworks. Translating that into rubric-style answers felt like coming home.

But it was the Private Wealth Management material that stayed with me long after the exam was over. Reading through the different risks and planning scenarios for a young couple — watching them move through the stages of family life, accumulating, protecting, eventually drawing down — I felt something click into place. This wasn’t abstract theory. These were real people, real decisions, real stakes. Understanding how to think about their financial lives at every stage felt like the most important thing I had ever studied.

That’s when I knew this was the field I was meant to be in.

I passed Level III in August 2024. I became CFA charterholder in January 2025.

I witnessed a young couple live through to old age, stage by stage, in the pages of the curriculum. That’s when finance stopped being abstract and became something I felt called to do.

The journey at a glance

Mid 2020	Began studying for CFA Level I — during COVID lockdown, 4AM mornings, full time job
Feb 2021	Passed CFA Level I
May 2023	Passed CFA Level II — the hardest level
Aug 2024	Passed CFA Level III — the most meaningful
Jan 2025	Became a CFA Charterholder

Why I built The Brunette Analyst

I built this because I know what the 4AM alarm feels like. I know what it is to revise on a Sunday when everyone else has switched off. I know the specific anxiety of the essay section, the relief of a passing score, and the weight of those four and a half years finally resolving into three letters after your name.

CFA Level III candidates deserve better feedback than they’re currently getting. The essay questions are not mysterious — the rubric is learnable, the marks are there to be taken. You just need someone to show you exactly where they are.

That’s what I’m here to do.

If you’re on this journey right now — keep going. You don’t know it yet, but you’re really going to nail it.