Nothing is instant. My Journey in overcoming my Weakness as a Software Engineer
I’m currently a Software Engineer in one of the fast growing startup in my country.
I’m an open source contributors.
I’m a writer in Medium and freecodecamp.
I also published my own Mobile Application with my own back-end server.
Some people might look up into me and think that i’m an ideal Software Engineer, that i am always like this, able to do everything like I am born with the talent to do so.
In reality, I am not everything that people actually sees. Even now, everything I am doing is all for the sake of growing myself.
I am not a smart person. I used to score pretty bad during my university life. And i don’t have a good long term memory.
I am not a fast learner. Some people might only need to be explained once to fully understand something, meanwhile i might need two or three explanations.
I was not even a good writer. I always struggled doing those assignments which asked you to write a story in 1000 words kind of thing.
Also especially, I am not a confident person. I have a huge Impostor Syndrome.
Fortunately, I am able to compensate through all those things that i lack of and able to get myself back up every time i am feeling down.
Still, nothing comes instantly. Everything comes with progress. It takes times and dedication to overcome it all.
In this part below, i will share several things that enable me to progress through in overcoming my own weak points.
1. Make Learning your habit
Some people tend to read books everyday, some people watch video or listening into tech podcast for learning or even taking online courses.
As for me, i tend to lose focus on long reads and stopping halfway on online courses. But i found reading short tech articles on Medium or freecodecamp effective for me.
Finding the best way for you to learn is the first step into learning.
Make it to become your habit, whether it’s having a 5 minutes of read everyday in your morning toilet, or even a read before your bed.
As for me, i always commute with public transportation and i tend to spend my time finding a good 5 to 10 minutes article for me to read.
Learning keeps me updated everyday. Having an early start on some people help me keep myself together so i will not get left behind on track.
Learning is a lifetime journey for us.
2. Make Coding your habit (too)
Yes, it does sounds crazy. When you are doing it, a lot of people will think that you need to get a life.
Why did i say that? Because I am the living evidence of that case!
But for me it’s a part of getting myself better. It keep me from being rusty and also it helps a lot when I am trying to learn new things, since on hands execution really helps me a lot for getting into things easily.
Making it into a habit obviously is not an easy thing, for god sake it is coding! It’s full of weird magic and unknown realms.
Things aside, you need to find some parts of it that you like about.
As for me i love the challenge and exploration of new things where it is never ending in coding.
Liking it sure is not entirely enough to make it a habit. What really helped me back then is doing 100 days of code. It helps me getting into a habit of opening a computer everyday and at least look into some codes.
3. Sharing is Caring
When you are learning so much, there is always the time to give back.
This helps very much in boosting your confidence. It’s also one of the better way for you to learn as sharing will help to fill any knowledge gap in thing you are trying to share.
There are plenty of ways in which you can try to share your thought, writing blog or article is one of the way (as i am doing it now). Doing a technical talk, or even a simple mentoring to your peers is also one.
Also, remember those stack-overflow questions you are copy-pasting? It is now the time for you to give back into society and share your own though also.
4. Look into open-source project
Github is full of interesting things.
Try to take your time exploring and you might find a lot of interesting things, some being complicated super-library, some are not even code, only list of open-source API which you can use, even some joke repositories are there for laugh.
Contributing can even start from making an issue on a repository. Every big things always start small.
5. Impostor Syndrome? Learn from it!
Have you ever felt like you are a fake? Feel scared that everybody will figure out that you are just a scam, like you don’t actually belong here?
Yup, that’s what impostor syndrome is.
Most people certainly have felt this before, especially in fast growing field of technology.
In reality, this is very common and it is actually a good sign if you are having it. This means you are in a place where you know enough that you do not know enough things.
The thing about impostor syndrome is, don’t let it overwhelm you with negativity. Let it drive you and become a motivation for you to grow and be better.
Now, even after all that, you might wonder if I have successfully dealt with all my weakness.
If i already accomplished enough?
If it’s already time for me to stop?
The answer is big NO.
You never stop in growing yourself, the moment you stop growing yourself, you will start dying inside. The world is vast and knowledge is never enough.
Success is a long journey ahead, nothing is ever instant.
Focus more on the progress rather than your destination and your path will feel lighter.
Keep up your consistency and you will sure reach your destination.
Even then, always remember to give yourself a break when the time comes.
Thanks for reading through my article!I do hope that my article will be useful for you! I will be very happy if it does! :)
“It does not matter how slowly you go so long as you do not stop” ~ Confucius
