Learning Forever

When I was in high school I would get frustrated with some of my teachers. They would make us work so hard, even with very little notice and surprise tests. I look back at most of those teachers with sadness. They had the chance to shape and inspire our class, but all that mattered was to give us more homework and make sure we would be good parrots. Regurgitating information was more important than understanding. But I'll give them one thing, they forced me to learn to study hard.

This was incredibly helpful when I started college. Classes were tough from day 1 but I was used to that. I wasn't scared by the sheer amount of books to read and theorems to learn. The whole time I had this nagging feeling that I wasn't doing "learning" right. I kept going though and eventually completed my Master's. Not long after that I finally entered the workforce. Now that the pressure of learning was off I rejoiced. I felt uneasy every day I wasn't learning something new. This forced me to go out of my way to keep learning regularly. The game had changed, I wasn't learning to pass a test, I was learning out of interest and will to grow.

Turns out this industry (software engineering) helps the ones who are used to learning. Have you ever felt overwhelmed by everything that's going on around you? That's normal and you can't expect to know all the things. Some you should pursue on your own, some you will pick up only when needed, and finally (hopefully) your day job will encourage you to learn a few things here and there. To succeed and continue growing, learning is an inevitable part of it. This is the reason why last year I spent most of my reading time on the meta. Learning how to learn.

Many things stayed with me (yet another blog post I hope to find the time to write), but what kept coming back was that there's no substitute for dedicated and deliberate work. You need to put in the time, how you optimize that is all up to you and how you learn. Things evolve so rapidly that if you don't build and maintain that learning muscle you'll fall behind. People who pursue learning as a life-long mission will thrive even when times are hard. They'll be able to be on the right side of "The Big Divide" (I hint at what I mean here in The Web 35 Years Later).

Thoughts

Embrace a journey of learning. Don't hesitate to stop for a bit to understand how you can learn effectively. In a fast-paced industry such as tech, it's challenging to understand where you should spend your energy learning. You don't have to do this alone though. I share my findings with the team at MongoDB and lean on them for clarity or to learn much quicker. Invest first in fundamentals that will last you forever without chasing the latest and greatest all the time. You'll inevitably burn out otherwise.