I’ve often made statements in this blog, to friends and family, or to co-workers along the lines of “I’m going to learn how to X…”. The problem is that I can look back on those statements, and with a bit of shame, realize that not many of them have been realized. This isn’t to say I’m a lazy person, but rather that I think I sometimes think I’m going to bite off more than I can chew.

One of my problems, I’ve come to realize, is that the more experience I get under my belt the quicker I want things to come. Let me give you the perfect example. I’ve long wanted to learn how to code. I’m not interested in changing careers or spending time coding into the wee hours of the morning. However, I’m responsible for managing technology and all the people & process that comes with that. Earlier in my career I was “closer” to the day to day coding. I would occasionally write my own queries to pull raw data, I would examine the code of a page to figure out what was going on. I used the knowledge to better converse with my developers and DBAs in determining the feasibility of solutions. As my career has advanced, I’ve had to deal with more administration functions, management work, etc., and therefore have lost some of my skillset regarding coding, understanding what is possible, and ultimately my ability to critically think about what my team tells me. Hence my desire to dive into coding.

I’ve spent/wasted a decent amount of time deciding what language to learn. Something that truly is a waste as I’ve learned (and probably already knew). I’ve downloaded, watched, and interacted with tutorials on iOS, Java, PHP, Ruby on Rails, and others. I briefly read about object oriented principles, agile development methods, and the development lifecycle. Basically, I’ve skimmed over the surface of coding and never actually taken the plunge. I spent the weekend doing a bit of a “self-assessment” trying to understand why I can’t just get this going. The answer that I get is…wait for it…I want it to be easier. Not really profound, but true. I’ve spent a lot of hours in the classroom and in the real world amassing, what I would call, a wealth of knowledge. In my day to day job, I am occasionally challenged and need to pull from my past experience to put together a solution. However, it is all within an area in which I am COMFORTABLE.

I think that descriptive word is the key. Things are comfortable. When I have to step outside that comfort zone and learn things I tend to let things slide. I think part of my brain says, “You should understand this better…don’t you manage people who do this?” I need to dive in and get started.

With that said, I am going to start learning how to program in PHP. Again, back to what I said before, I’m not looking to change careers and lock myself in a room with a screen. (Yes, I know that all coders don’t do that…but it is quite the stereotype isn’t it?) However, I need to stretch outside of my comfort zone, in fact I think it is more important that I am occasionally uncomfortable than that I learn PHP. I think all of us need to push outside of our comfort zones. It’s good to be uncomfortable every so often…it reminds us to grow and develop. Hopefully in a few months I’ll be able to report back that I’ve made some progress.

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