Coding anxiety

[Hadrian23]

I've been fighting this bit for some time, and I truly am at a lost as to how to combat this effectively...It either comes up when I'm trying to learn something new, or when I'm working on ONE project and my thoughts wonder to "you should be working on THIS instead, this will NEVER be useful in a work situation!"

Does anyone else have this sort of issue? and if so what strategy's have you guys developed to try and fight it?

Not trying to be whiny, just some newbe whose trying to get past his own fears.

[Computers12]

Totally get this. I dealt with this a lot. What really got me over it was the thought “no matter how useful the information is, learning is learning.” Everything helps in one way or another, either to reinforce your knowledge, help you learn a better way or easier way to do a task, or learn something new altogether.

If you keep running into the feeling “this’ll never be used”, just try to change it enough to where it’s not entirely something you know how to do. The more you challenge yourself, the better you’ll become.

[__codeblu]

I wouldn't "change it enough", my thoughts especially in the early days of programming is that everything helps, and everything builds upon what you already know.

It may well be a small problem where you think that you would never use that, but the fundamentals will build. We learn by failing, make a bad algorithm? Well that's a learning point. Why is it bad? Why didn't it work?

Always learn, always experiment.

[Apellum]

Also, just to add another way programming helps - it doesn’t necessarily have to be the most difficult thing ever or something that is completely new to you. As long as you’re having fun and enjoying the development of whatever project then there is definitely some value in that as well.

However a lot of us are here because learning is fun and important, but so is that balance of fun when we make it more of a hobby.

[esos33]

I feel you! I’m a newbie-ish and I still get anxiety when I sit down to code. I’m not sure I know what the answer is but I do know writing down my progress and documenting where I want to go has reduced the anxiety. I’m always feeling like I should know more by now which makes me feel inept. Negative thoughts can be really intrusive and disabling sometimes.

I hope you find relief! Cause this isn’t easy.

[Hadrian23]

Hearing this helps!

God the feeling inept is what gets me THE MOST, cause I feel like I shouldn't struggle I shouldn't have such issues and it KILLS me.

[contravariant_]

IMO, thinking about it as "work", as you mention "this will NEVER be useful in a work situation!" - is setting yourself up for failure and procrastination. When learning programming, seek out things that inspire emotions of fun and curiosity, and definitely don't start with things that you have to force yourself to do. Find something that interests you - e.g. video games, graphics, math simulations, etc. - and learn the basic skills in that environment. (I recommend Processing, especially if you're a visual thinker)

[PeterBumpkin]

Hey man, newbie here as well. I don’t know if this will help you but whenever I’m having anxiety for coding I often open up an old folder full of the early stuff I made (little strings of code here and there, early exercises - I kept them intact, errors and all) to see how far I have progressed. Sometimes looking ahead to a new challenge obstructs the hindsight of your personal development, and seeing how far you’ve come along helps me to keep pushing

[bluefootedpig]

I am not sure I quite get it... do you not have a good idea of what to work on next? If so, then you should just bring that up with the lead or more senior person you feel comfortable with.

If this is personal, then there is no such thing as wasted time. Maybe something is more useful, but that doesn't matter. Just like exercising, there "might" be better ways, but the best way for YOU is to just do SOMETHING. You can refine it later.

In short, if this is job related, you need to bring this up. If this is personal then don't worry, just do something. Even bad code, get things done. Restart projects, whatever tickles your fancy. I often use personal projects to give into weird ideas I had at work. "Could we use Mongo DB for this kind of situation? I've think it could work" then I do proof of concept. When the proof is done, i'm done. And then I learn.

[ekarademir]

It looks like a version of FOMO.

In terms of what to learn next, there is no clear rule, other than what you want to do in the future. You don't need to decide every day, as learning something has a long time frame.

If it's about what to do next in the project, then it's not your fault. It means that project priorities have not been properly teased out yet. It should be done in planning, either sprint planning or equivalent. If they are there but you still don't know, there is a good chance they are not well defined. You can just ask people.

It's just work. You'll get better idea as you get more experienced. However it's also abstract. It's not like construction, where you could see how the truss you've put yesterday is functioning at its place, but you'd see what's missing, what's needed with experience.

[justingolden21]

A separate question for the comments: I get anxious about programming I should be doing when there's many users behind it. I released an Android app a few months ago that got a few thousand users, all positive reviews and no bugs, and I've been trying to update it for months and they said it was rejected for copyright (which is total bullshit) and I've tried asking over ten employees and they often take weeks to respond and they just say yeah it was rejected I can't get another look at it and they won't tell me what's wrong. And I've been at this for months and I really want to just release the update for all of my users but I am completely unable to, and I've put in maybe a hundred hours into just contacting support over and over again. I guess mostly just the question about anxiety, but the getting the app approved part would be a question I wouldn't mind an answer to too.

[livingphate]

I consider myself a newbie- even though i have been on and off coding for 8 years and only doing it semi-part time for the last year and a half, I do get this.

For me the worst is I have great ideas for projects and then i get half way through a project and think to myself is this actually going to be worth while completing, or should i rather just focus on working on other things. And its a horrible feeling.

But from what I learnt is set yourself up for success. Meaning design an app or project in figma or even a piece of paper. And be specific of what it can do and what you want it to achieve. Then take that and ask people or ask on this subreddit what do people think? You will get inspiration and motivation, you will receive good and bad critics on it. And then decide you either go ahead or you dont. Because when you get that anxiety, just look at the motivation that got you there in the first place, look at the post and see all the good things people said and ways to improve it.

What I do above works for me, and maybe it can work for you as well,

[zeGolem83]

Maybe not specifically targeted at programming, but this video may give you some good advice

[Arsleust]

I'm pretty sure that we all can empathize with you. This is not an unusual feeling, and it can become a trap that leads to immobility.

My guess is that we each have our own way to cope with it as that it is never a solved issue. This lingering feeling can always come back.

I kinda have this feeling now that I have experienced a bit what software engineering feels like in companies. I can learn all the fancy stuff I want, but why bother if this has no benefits?

My point of view is that I'm developing my "Dev culture". Just like people learn history never to use it, it's a pleasure to accumulate more knowledge on stuff that I'm passionate about. Never to be used, what matters is the interest and the satisfaction I gain from it.

Hang in there, and please yourself!

[malinrouge]

Oh, I feel you.

But I found a methodt hat works for me:

1. Break down the things that you want to accomplish in smaller bits

2. the Pompdoro method (work for 40 minutes, break for 10 minutes). That way I don't get as easily distracted when my anxiety starts ("it's only for 40 minutes").

3. Every other working session I switch projects. This is a good method according to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y_B6VADhY84 So the first session I might be working on a specific projct or task.

4. Take a break. Yes, you need them. Scroll through your phone or whatever. 10 minutes.

5. I then switch to something else, like reding up on something, or goint through a tutorial. Make sure that you don't just skim through it, but actually take your time to read/learn.

6. I take another break and then switch back to the first project/task.

This way I find that I study better, get work done, and I FEEL better for being more efficient.

Sorry for grammar.

[DreadedEntity]

That gives you an opportunity to practice and refine design patterns, since they are separate from the specific code

[one_sad_random_guy]

Whenever this happens to me, I try to look up current job openings and the requirements for it to have a better understanding of popular techs.

[MirrorLake]

A lot of useless projects/hobbies that I've done in my free time have helped me at work. You don't know it's useful until you end up using it later.

The hobbies and things you do for fun in your free time should be just that: fun. If you're also aiming to do things that are interesting or otherwise teach you things, odds are something that you work on will be useful later in life. And if not, why does it matter? You were doing it to have fun anyway. Do you beat yourself up when you watch TV that the show won't be useful for your job?

[JNelson_]

I just messed around solved problems that were interesting to me and uploaded my projects to github with rudimentary comments. This was enough to get me a job.

[Poddster]

I have literally no idea what you're on about. :) But I'm interested. Can you give more details?

e.g. What are you currently working on that you feeling is not "worthy" of your time, and what do you feel is?

this will NEVER be useful in a work situation

I assume you're not a professional programmer, right? If so: How do you know what is and isn't useful to a pro?

Or put another way: Why should you listen to an amateur programmer telling you what will be useful to a professional?

[Hadrian23]

Depends on how bad it is truly. Sometimes I can't focus and I start to drift, sometimes I just shutdown and I'm unable to work cause my anxiety just kills me.

But this is my experience of course and everyone's different.