Learning

I’ve spent exactly zero hours reading React documentation cover-to-cover. Zero hours on comprehensive Next.js courses. Zero hours memorizing Python’s standard library. Yet I’ve built multiple production applications, trained LLM models, and ran an EdTech startup that served thousands of students. How? Fast Food Learning. And before you judge me, hear me out. This isn’t about cutting corners. It’s about recognizing that in 2025, the way we learn needs to match the speed at which we need to build. ...

I was stuck on a database indexing problem for three days. The problem: Queries were slow. I’d tried different index strategies. Nothing worked. Then I went rock climbing. Completely unrelated to the database problem. Or so I thought. At the climbing gym, I watched an instructor teach a beginner: Instructor: “Don’t try to solve the whole wall at once. Look for the next handhold. Then the next one. Chain them together.” ...

Three months into my first software engineering job, I was absolutely certain I knew everything. Well, not everything. But I’d built a few projects, shipped some features, and felt pretty comfortable. When senior engineers talked about “architectural concerns” or “scalability tradeoffs,” I’d nod knowingly, thinking I got it. Then the production incident happened. Friday, 4:47 PM. The API started returning 500 errors. Users were locked out. Revenue was bleeding. My manager: “Can you look into this? You built this service.” ...

I spent six months writing code that I thought was good. My process: Build a feature Test it locally Ship it to production Move on to the next feature What I never did: Get feedback on the quality of my code. The result: I got very good at writing bad code quickly. Then my company hired Elena, a senior engineer. Her first week, she instituted a new rule: “No code gets merged without a code review from someone senior.” ...

For six months, I wrote every SQL query like this: SELECT * FROM users WHERE id = 123; SELECT star. Get all the columns. Always. My reasoning: “I might need all the data. Better to have it than query again.” This worked fine for my bootcamp projects. Tables had 5 columns. Performance didn’t matter. Then I joined a company with real production data. My first code review: Senior Engineer: “Why are you selecting all columns?” ...

I had just learned about microservices. They were amazing. Scalable. Independent. Deployable separately. The future of architecture. So naturally, I rewrote my side project as microservices. The project: A simple todo app. Maybe 100 users. What I built: 7 separate services Docker containers for each Kubernetes for orchestration API gateway Service mesh Distributed logging Service discovery Time to build: 3 weeks Time to build as a monolith: 2 days My manager saw it and laughed. ...

Three years into my career, I had an identity crisis. The specialist path: “Master React. Become the React expert everyone comes to.” The generalist path: “Learn everything. Frontend, backend, DevOps, design, product.” Everyone had advice: Senior Dev A: “Specialize. Companies pay for deep expertise.” Senior Dev B: “Be a generalist. Adaptability is the future.” Recruiter: “Be T-shaped. Deep in one area, broad across many.” Me: “What the hell does T-shaped actually mean?” ...

I spent my first year as a developer learning from the wrong people. Not bad people. Just the wrong people for where I was and where I wanted to go. My learning sources: YouTube tutorials from people who’d been coding for 6 months Reddit advice from anonymous strangers A bootcamp instructor who’d switched careers 18 months prior Other junior developers at my skill level What I learned: How to copy-paste solutions. How to feel productive while making minimal progress. How to stay stuck in tutorial hell. ...

Brain Series Current: Speed Reading vs Deep Reading Second Language Learning All Posts Cold Showers and Cognition Speed reading promises to help you read 1,000+ words per minute-triple or quadruple your normal pace. Imagine reading entire books in an hour! ...

Brain Series Current: Learn Like a Child The Forgetting Curve All Posts Second Language Learning A 5-year-old can learn a new language in months, picking up perfect pronunciation without formal instruction. Meanwhile, an adult spends years studying and still speaks with an accent. ...