[t-writescode]

When it comes to recognizing patterns in programming and such, I have a couple questions:

* did you ever go to college for programming? if not, a lot of the 'patterns' people see were beaten into their heads in college, so that's something that can be helped :)

* have you ever done competitive programming, like TopCoder problems (the old ones. Last I checked, TopCoder has gotten WAY over my head and probably a lot of other people's heads, too)?

Doing programming problems can be a great way to flex those muscles and see common patterns in code and problems you need to solve. It might be able to really help you :)

Topcoder is the one a lot of people know, but there's others out there. I kinda liked this one, and it's used as a recruiting tool, too: https://app.codility.com/programmers/

[throwaway88p]

Never went to school, i did have an brief experience with competitive programming back in HS, but didn't do very well.

[t-writescode]

Oh! Well then there you go! Let's get you sitting down and doing algorithm stuff! It may help you a ton! Honestly, it's a lot of boring stuff, but the idea is to get your brain thinking in a different way :)