Confront reality

My biggest failures early on were due to not knowing how to chip away, and my biggest successes have been from chipping away. Breaking a big goal in to parts and in the paraphrased words of Steve Jobs, knowing the dots will eventually connect.

I read this 3 or 4 hours ago and couldn't wait to come back to the comments but I guess I'm the only one that felt that way.

I really enjoyed reading the post today because I was having a tough challenge the last 5 days or so and it made me go back, rethink where I need to be next step and take a smaller piece first, then worry about the big execution later.

(not yellow, not narrow column, not tiny font, does mess up some UTF8/extended characters & quotation formatting, etc.)

"Reality is painful — it’s so much easier to keep doing stuff you know you’re good at or else to pick something so hard there’s no point at which it’s obvious you’re failing — but it’s impossible to get better without confronting it."

It is a measure of a good technology hire. I don't necessarily want someone who is an expert in one language, one technology or even one particular vertical. I want someone who consistently pushes to learn more. I would even provide the necessary tools/training and time for them to do so.

It is a problem with a lot of developers. They get into a comfort zone and stick it out.

Good interview question:

"Tell me about a time in which you were trying something new and it didn't exactly work out as you expected. What did you do next?"

I would chop up a big problem into beautifully simple tasks, but partway through executing them, I'd begin to worry about another task. Maybe it wasn't the best solution. Maybe it would be better this way, or if I changed dada-dada... I would take the simple solutions and mangle their limbs, building another big, complex, can't-fit-in-my-head problem, while still retaining the notion I was being effective.

I solved this problem (for me) by keeping a "complex problem" journal. I write roughly what the problem is and why it's a problem. I write how I'd know the problem is solved. Then I break it down into bits, writing a few sentences on how the bit connects to other bits. Sometimes it takes an hour, other times a day or a week. But once it's obvious, when my replies to any question are "yes, the sky is blue" and "it's because fire is hot", I need only reread the journal (often) to keep it fresh.

I accomplish this through delegation. If you leave your keys in a bowl near the door, you're prone to walk right past it, because you need to remember "my keys are in the bowl" every time. And you will remember it, but sometimes you won't. I leave my keys hanging on the door handle, so it's impossible to forget them -- they fall when I open the door. I don't rely on my faulty memory, I rely on my senses and the ability of the universe to trigger them.

It was a wonderful article, and I'm always thankful for whatever tests my assumptions and manner of doing. After all, the nicest thing anyone can do is knock you off your track.

Yeah that’s probably because you can’t get much therapy done in one hour; all the gives time for is the therapist to familiarize themselves with the problem. You need a minimum of 6 sessions to see an effect on a modest issue usually.

Yes the equivocation can be absurd. One example that has stuck with me due in part to it's brazen absurdity, was an expert something or other on some pbs news show saying

"I'm going to predict that [so and so] might happen."

I could only think, wow what a bold prognostication on your part.

---

As to the article in whole, I agree. I've always found the feedback aspect of deliberate practice to be a key part of the process.

Aaron meanders a bit, but I think his core points could be summed up as "You can't think your way out of all of your problems, and you shouldn't constantly dwell on the intangible."

As a side-note, It's somewhat funny to me that Aaron lists reddit almost as an afterthought in his bio.