Embracing (and Enduring) the Suck
Coding bootcamps can be grueling. Officially, Maker Square runs from 9–6, Monday through Friday, but most students spend 2–3 more hours every evening working on projects, studying algorithms, or doing deep dives into the inner workings of Ruby and Javascript. Weekends offer long, uninterrupted hours to extend and polish the previous week’s project, with at least one day devoted to coding and preparing for the upcoming week. It can become a brutal grind, full of frustration born of the numerous failures and missteps that come with learning a new skill.
So it’s no surprise that this week some of my conversations with students and staff turned toward strategies for dealing with the ups and downs of learning to code. I managed to survive four years of a rigorous computer science program at Virginia Tech and, more recently, an extended, similarly grueling training program unique to my former employer. Four principles helped carry me through those periods of my life:
First, know that there will be pain. I’m sure there are “naturals” out there, individuals who are able to pick up new skills as easily as the rest of us pick up our dry cleaning. For the rest of us, learning anything of worth will involve pain of some form, typically in proportion to the value of the skill we seek to obtain. You will fall; you will fail along the way. That’s the nature of learning new things. You need to accept that going in, to know there will be days when you feel like you’re not making progress, that you’ll never learn everything you need to know. Knowing this doesn’t make it suck any less, but it does help put the suck into perspective. It’s the price of admission and part of the process: nothing more, nothing less. Treat it that way.
Second, remember why you’re here. You’ve started down this path for a reason. When the hard times come, you’ll need to remind yourself why you’re here. For me, returning to software engineering came down to two things. The first was recognizing that we all get one turn on the merry-go-round of life, and I wanted to spend mine creating. The second involved my children. I expect them to chase their dreams, to live a life free of the fear of failure. Who would I be if I didn’t do the same? Everyone has a different answer to the question, “Why?” Whatever yours is, remember and return to it when the hard times come.
Decide when you’re going to quit Seth Godin’s book The Dip proposes that we should all decide when we’re going to quit before we start down a new path in life. It seems strange to consider quitting before you even get started, but the only alternative is to make that decision once you’ve already come face-to-face with adversity. He proposes that adversity is inevitable, and we should prepare for it rather than react to it.
It’s our nature to avoid pain or, failing that, to quickly seek relief from it. When we begin to stumble or struggle, our brain frantically searches for the path of least resistance. It’s in that moment of adversity that we are the least rational. We are focused on the pain, not the promise of reward. Better to have already decided how much we are willing to endure to achieve our goals than to make that call at the moment of our most acute stress.
Many investment advisors advocate a similar technique. Volatility is inevitable, and it’s not uncommon for a stock’s price to drop just before it goes on an extended run. Prices can plunge at the slightest hint of bad news, or no news at all, and investors can begin to panic. Weathering the storm means staying focused on your original investment thesis, not today’s stock price.
Remember you’re not alone. It’s a bit trite, but it’s always worth reminding yourself that you’re not alone. Every single person that is where you want to be started out where you are. We often compare ourselves to those people, and find our talents, our experience, wanting. But just as often the only difference between us and them is time. They put in the time to develop the skills that got them where they are. They experienced the same pain, the same failures, the same triumphs. What you see is the finished product; what you experience is the work in progress.
What about you? What are your strategies for dealing with adversity, for persevering when others begin to turn back? Add your comments here, or reach out via Twitter @crhoton.
