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Programming lessons

One of my friends shared this in Google Reader - most of them are items I already knew about and been rehashed in several programming articles/books. I do feel like #5 needs to be repeated over and over again for me.

"You are not the best at programming. Live with it. - I always thought that I knew so much about programming, but there is always someone out there better than you. Always. Learn from them."

One must never forget the fact that we are all "standing on the shoulders of giants". Well, Isaac Newton put it that way but you get my point. Everything we accomplish in our field today is because a few pioneers in the past did the ground-work to get us here. I understand that, but tend to stumble at the "Live with it" part. I do realize that I have to keep learning and keep improving myself, but its hard for me to calmly accept that someone is much better than me. I don't mean that I don't acknowledge my weaknesses, its more along the lines of me obsessing about - "what can I do to be at least as good as X". I start over-analyzing and set unrealistic goals for myself which I don't meet.

The point is - its not about beating someone at something specific, its about what new skill/tool I learn over time and how it makes me more efficient at anything else I do in the future.

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