| I'm not sure when I did it, but at some point I managed to adopt the idea that "everything is learnable" as a core belief. It's really valuable. A few examples: I took up a management role. Management is hard! It's a whole new package of challenges that have little to do with being a great software engineer. The difference between humans and computers is that humans don't automatically tell you the exact truth, and don't do exactly what you ask them to do. But... it's learnable. Books like The Managers Path. Courses. Coaching. Thinking hard about what makes good management. Talking to peers. Very good manager started as a barely-adequate manager. Talking to other managers about their journeys to actually being good at it was really useful. I've tried and failed to learn languages before. I'd let myself believe that if you're older then twenty you have a big disadvantage in language learning. Then my dad learned a new language in his sixties and I realized my excuses were rubbish. So I started a Duolingo streak to learn Spanish. And 578 days later I'm still going. I have a weekly Spanish lesson with a teacher now. I recently switched my phone to Spanish to more fully immerse myself. I'm no-where near a fluent Spanish speaker but I can feel myself getting a little bit better every day. Languages are fantastic for helping you get better at learning, because there's no magic shortcut: it doesn't matter how smart or quick you are at learning, it's going to take you a LOT of work to master a language. Its humbling. And yet almost everyone does it once and hundreds of millions of people have learned multiple languages. I just finished a year at Stanford on a fellowship program. I very deliberately took classes that were WAY out of my comfort level: things like classical guitar, improv, and screenwriting. Watching fresh faced undergrads (I am not a fresh faced undergrad) go from incompetent at something to actually pretty good in just a few weeks - and watching myself do the same - was a healthy reminder that everything is learnable if you put the effort in. And often that effort is ten weeks of intense exposure, showing up and putting in the work. I also realized that in many skilled professions the entry-level workers have only had 2-3 years of training and experience in order to get good enough to be paid to do their thing. And a lifetime has many multiples of 2-3 years in it. I don't need to be an expert at everything - but racking up a few disciplines in which I'm as good as an entry-level professional over the course of a lifetime now seems achievable and worth considering. |