It feels like a lifetime ago since I first got into programming and development. Looking back at all the years, I see mistakes I made that I could have, and should have, avoided.
Hopefully, in discussing these, I can help you steer clear of them.
Mistake #1: Learning completely on your own
The Situation: I am a strong believer in self-learning. There are many advantages over following a pre-set syllabus or being forced down a certain path or pace. You develop discipline as you determine your own unique journey.
There’s a danger, though.
The Problem: Complete solitude can confuse being “busy” with being “productive”. They’re not the same. You can be busy with a lot of things that don’t contribute to your growth. This can eventually kill your desire to grow.
One Solution: One way that you can avoid this mistake is by having a mentor. Look for someone who has the time to check in on you and hold you accountable to the journey you’ve set on.
This person can be an experienced developer. Someone who has a fair idea of what a dev. journey should look like. This is preferable but doesn’t have to be the case. Your mentor can also have absolutely no interest in development but is willing to check the plan you’ve set in place and holds you to it.
Another Solution: This is not an alternative solution and can work hand-in-hand with the first. Find someone who is going on a similar journey and be accountable to them also.
Mistake #2: Sticking to one perspective
The Situation: Learning on your own can often have you idolise someone and take their opinions and perspective as gospel. You end up as a carbon copy of them and realise that you could have chosen a different road had you known about other options.
The Problem: That will pigeon-hole you and keep you from experiencing other areas of development that you may benefit from and enjoy.
The Solution: As a developer, you want to expose yourself to as many technologies as you can, even if just a little at first, so you can decide how you would like to shape yourself as a developer.
Mistake #3: Not keeping up to date
The Situation: This was a big one for me. You can enjoy working with a certain programming language but forget to keep up to date with changes in newer versions of it. Languages, frameworks and libraries are constantly being updated and improved.
The Problem: Failing to stay up to date will have you build habits that utilise methodologies that may be outdated and deprecated. Worse, you don’t learn of new, usually better, ways to optimise your code.
The Solution: With every technology that you use, subscribe to trustworthy newsletters and follow appropriate Twitter accounts to always be in the know regarding them.
Mistake #4: Not being part of a community
The Situation: Of all the mistakes I’ve spoken about so far, I feel that this one hurt me the most. Being part of a development community helps you learn from others, helps you gauge your progress and keeps you exposed to all the many pathways that are available out there or are upcoming.
I failed to do that. Granted, it was much harder for me to be part of a community in 2001 but it wasn’t impossible.
The Problem: Not being part of a community means you can very easily fall behind. You feel out of place when no one else around you is into development so you keep to yourself. This leads to all the other mistakes I’ve already mentioned here.
Another problem this leads to is that you will have no one to ask for help. You feel like you’re the only one struggling or the only one who can’t solve a problem. You don’t know any different?
Without a community, you can be crippled for weeks, months or years, because that voice in your head is telling you that you’re not good enough.
The Solution: BE PART OF A COMMUNITY! Tech Twitter is a great place to start but don’t settle only for that. At least, don’t be satisfied by just the general group. Get close to some people and form a group. Join Discord servers, set up WhatsApp or Slack groups and talk about the struggles that you’re going through.
9 times out of 10, every other developer is going through what you’re have trouble with. Don’t believe me?
Every developer has looked at some of the simplest programming concepts and thought, “Why am I not getting this? It seems so straightforward but I am not getting it!”
Mistake #5: Not challenging yourself
The Situation: Whether you are learning from a book, at college or from a course on Udemy, generally you will be given a lot of theory and then a very minor challenge that supports the theory.
The Problem: This is problematic because usually the key is very close to the keyhole. In other words, you learn about a specific concept and then are asked to solve a question. You already know that the expected solution must use the concept you just learnt.
The Solution: Challenge yourself by looking at projects that already exist or think up of ones that don’t exist but can solve a real problem or even search online for challenging projects but don’t look at the answer and ignore the hints. Give yourself a few hours of brainstorming to see if you can solve it on your own, even by using only pseudocode.
Remember, ultimately, developers are problems solvers. We don’t just know a programming language. We solve real world problems by thinking out-of-the-box and by being innovative. If you can do that, you can pick up any programming language, learn the syntax and solve problems with that.
In Summary
You are not alone in this journey. There are so many people out there that want to help and share their experiences. Don’t be afraid to ask for it and don’t be afraid to put yourself out there.
Nobody is perfect. We’re all still learning and growing.
Humans are social beings. Make the most of it.