Introduction

When I created my first post, I was mainly thinking about documenting my journey and I had no idea how to do it and didn't even think about it being a blog.

Then I was inspired by generous developpers here on Dev.to who spent time on sharing knowledge with others and now I want myself to give, to share with you what I learned.

So here I am on my 4th post!

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What I've Learned

Technical

I started with HTML, CSS and JavaScript. And they said it is easy, but I struggled with them and it took me long before becoming comfortable enough. Before using VS Code, I was writing code on notepad. It helped actually. It forced me to remember stuff, to write code carefully and to debug. Now, I am very good at finding missing letters, commas, brackets and so on. :)

Then I continued my journey learning version control. It was weird at first, but I gradually started to understand. But even now I find myself looking for some commands. And there is still room to learn more Git. It will always be.

Next I learned React. I spent almost one month on tutorials and small projects. It wasn't easy at first, but now I feel ok enough.

After that, I learned NodeJS, Express, mongoDB and mongoose. I still have to practice and to learn some more, but having the basics makes me feel comfortable, because now I can work on bigger projects, like MERN stack apps.

And lastly I learned TypeScript. This happened in the last two weeks. Now I am planning of using it with react, to really see what it has to offer.

So there is a lot more to be done...

Personally

The most important thing I realized is that I don't have to be perfect. I don't have to go full speed everyday and it is perfectly fine to take breaks, even full days.

Consistency is key. I have to keep showing up, even if it is less than 1 hour a day.

Doubting myself is no longer my enemy. It just shows me what I should polish more. Whenever I doubt, I ask myself why. Is it a concept I don't fully get? If so, let's practice some more!

I now accept this is going to take a lot of time. This is not a 6 months marathon or a 1 year marathon. This is a lifelong journey.

Progress is not always visible, that's why I have to look back, open my eyes wide and see it and accept what I have been going through and what I have done.

Sharing with others helps me understand better. Documenting my journey, teaching something I learned, showing up here every week, helps me reflect deeply, build my momentum and my resilience.

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Challenges I've Faced

No matter how much I enjoyed coding, throughout my journey I had those moments of getting stuck, not knowing what to do and doubting myself.

• Learning How to Learn
  At first it took me so long to learn how to learn. When I first started 10 months ago, I only knew I want to be a frontend developper, but I lacked the structure and the discipline. I didn't think about roadmaps back then. I should have focused more on making a progress map and having a clear structure of what to do, because it is hard to learn and not knowing what to learn make it even harder.

• Time Management
  Although I had a lot of time to learn, it was often hard to do the job. Lots of distractions and finding the perfect life balance is not an easy task. Time was really fast and I didn't know how much to learn and how much is enough. I could easily miss a day because I was so busy doing other things. I had to force myself to be consistent, even if it was only 30 minutes a day.

• Impostor Syndrome
  I often felt like an impostor. I remember, when I was learning JavaScript, trying to create a small application and having no idea what to start with. I was telling myself I am not good enough, maybe web development is not for me. I was doubting myself. Comparing to others made things worse. A lot of advertising saying that you could become a web developper in 4 months and when after 4 months I still struggled with CSS, I felt like a failure. But it helped to remind me that no matter how long it takes, I am not broken, I can do it at my own pace.

Now I know this is just part of the process. I know I will always fall, but I will always have to get up and keep going.

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What's Next?

For the next weeks I am planning working on more projects which I will share with you, of course. And I will focus more deeply on fundamentals. I will build on top of what I learned, before moving on to new tools.

I would like to make this a weekly blog first and later on I will post twice a week. This will keep me accountable, it forces me to show up and do the job. I will do this even if the posts may not be perfect, incomplete or small.

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Final Words

These 10 months were really tough, not only technically, but also on a personal level: ups and downs, roadblocks, confussion, far far from perfect. But I am looking back now and I acknowledge the progress. Even if I don't see it, I know it is there.

If you are struggling too, remember that progress takes time and you don't have to be perfect. Small steps at a time matter. You keeping showing up matter.

As always, feel free to say what you think. Your feedback is important to me.

Thank you for reading and see you in the next one!