I'm 37 , unemployed and took up 'coding' as a means to pull myself out of what by U.S. standards is poverty. No healthcare and I live basically in a hole in the wall of this ladies trailer. I don't know how you can become 'better' but if you ever want advice for dealing with sever hopelessness I can help. First be grateful that you hierarchy of needs are met. Presumably you have health insurance thus if you have say, a rotting tooth in the back of your face like I do...you could probably get it checked out before it infects the rest of your system. After being grateful, the next thing to do is realize that nobody gives a flying fuck what you do and the world is cold. This will allow you to truly realize the opportunities you have as your dispose and put your gratitude on overdrive when any anomalies of concern do seem to present themselves. Next, exploit every resource you have to 'get better'. The computational power of a mac mini is actually quite a lot in the context of the computer market over the last 20 years. Don't look at as programming, look at it as turning nothing into something. If you want to 'get better' first find out exactly what you are not good at! Are you a great programmer but are shitty at being "creative"? Are you creative but can't seem to express it through code as much as you would like? Are you bad at reading other peoples code? etc etc etc. Blatant honesty about what exactly your weak points are can force you to zero in an fix it but first you might have to conduct a self-imposed research project to even figure this info out. Anyway, don't take this post too seriously, I'm a nice guy really. I just felt being a bit brash and off the cuff for a moment. I'm sure you'll continue to achieve. bye bye