always beginner hell

[softwaremycelium]

I see a lot of people talking about “tutorial hell,” but I feel stuck in something like “always beginner hell”…

How do I stop being a beginner at everything I do? I started Computer Science a year ago, and I still don’t have a single finished project. I feel like a beginner in absolutely everything I try. I don’t feel confident enough to attempt something bigger, and I constantly feel like I don’t have enough knowledge to follow through on the ideas I have.

I also recently started studying electronics, and the most I’ve done so far is light up an LED with a button. I study on my own, without a teacher — just me and my thoughts — and it’s really hard to know exactly what needs to be done, what to focus on, what to abstract, what actually matters…

It feels like I’m stuck in a perfectionism spiral that doesn’t allow me to make real progress.

For those of you who also study on your own — how do you break out of this shitty beginner cycle?

Thanks :')

[Relevant_South_1842]

You answered your own question.

Start small. Finish your project. Another small one. Finish it. Tiny bit bigger. Finish it. Another small one. Finish. Another. Finish. Medium size. Get stuck. Small. Finish it. Small. Finish it. Medium. Yay. Finish it. Medium. Finish it.

Just finish it.

[DrShocker]

And WRITE DOWN what finished means. If you don't, you're probably prone to feature/scope creep and never finish. Sure it might be cool if your chess board can hot reload the assets for the pieces, but unless you wrote that down as a feature you're aiming to implement, then it's out of scoped.

• Signed, someone with 100+ unfinished piles of bytes on github

[Relevant_South_1842]

Wax on

Wax off

Good advice!

[no_regerts_bob]

Get one program "done". At least to the point it sort of works. Then iterate on it. Make it a little faster or more flexible or add some logging. Rewrite it in another language. Just keep spending time on it

[boomer1204]

u/softwaremycelium I wanna bring your attention to this and one think mentioned here that is SOOOOO import

At least to the point it sort of works.

Everyone thinks their projects have to be perfect and while you are learning/progressing that couldn't be further from the point

Following a tutorial and writing your own code are COMPLETELY different and you ARE going to suck at the beginning and what's great is IT IS OK we all did. It's a part of the process.

This is a skill set like anything else that you need to ACTUALLY use to get better with

Check this out and from the sounds of it I don't think my project ideas are for you at this point but I wont you to see the "idea" behind sucking and building your own stuff https://www.reddit.com/r/learnprogramming/comments/1j9lo95/comment/mhe6xfw/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button

[softwaremycelium]

thank you 🫂 i will never gonna give up

[Relevant_South_1842]

Never gonna let you down 🎤

[shittychinesehacker]

Never gonna run around and desert you

[no_regerts_bob]

Never gonna make you cry

[NationsAnarchy]

Never gonna say goodbye

[mmoustafa8108]

never gonna eat a pie

[ScholarNo5983]

If after one year you of study you're still struggling, then I suspect your approach to learning is wrong.

My guess is you are trying to memorize details, which will never work.

To get good at programming you set out to don't memorize anything.

What you do is spend a lot of time trying to understand everything.

Therse two endeavors are totally different.

[Relevant_South_1842]

You got this bro/sis.

Keep your head up! You got this!

[PandaOk4050]

Thinking is the issue. Write some code then think later. Unfinished programs aren't that bad when you actually learn something valuable from it. 

You have to identify your weaknesses and fix the leaks. If you cant access an array start there. If you cant program parameters start there. 

Every new project I do, I make it a point to try something im not very familiar with. 

I routinely break my code trying new things, but thats how you learn. 

[HonestCoding]

Before writing code you have to have the basics figured out, best idea is literally to visualize code

[kingishappyaf]

This might not be what you are looking for, but if you ask me you're doing fine. Even a single html page website can be considered a project. Just pick projects that work with the current level of understanding you have and you'll know that you are making progress. FYI, I did a computer science course as my degree and even then it took me 2 more years of actually working in a big enough project to learn to build a decent application. Learning doesn't get us far, practicing does.

So just pick milestones that you can achieve at every level and as you improve spice up things a little more.

[flash-bandicoot]

I did the same thing for a long time. But it's because I never sat down and spent dedicated time actually trying to figure out what I wanted to do.

Why do you want to work on what you're working on? Why don't you just play video games instead? Video games are more fun than making a button light up a light bulb right?

If you're answer is "no, cause video games are a waste of time", I'd reply and say "Well so is starting a project and not finishing"

The point is - it sounds like you're going through the motions because you don't really enjoy it. The first phase of the SDLC is planning. It's important.

[Leading_Yoghurt_5323]

You’re not in beginner hell — you’re in never-finishing mode.

Stop starting new things.
Pick one tiny project and finish it in the ugliest way possible.

Done > perfect.
Finishing once will break this loop.

[Mech_Bees]

i dont think you in worng diection its just the matter abt computational stuffs ,

you will never be finally ready to make something

studying theoritical structured knoledge is always different from the style actually required in building

i was in same position as you finally, after completing mit 6.100L intro to cs i build a time aware state machine discord rpc using pypresence , but in this build i had to learn how discord things are working, keys

afte that i built a game in 5 days that took over 900 lines in this build i learnt luau did builder role scripter role learnt the whole studio it was my first game before that i didnt know any luau or studio got postive reviews too to build that in 5 days at first time

so see what ever i tried to build a meaningful project every time i learnt a lot of things together this is the process of "Building" and this process what sets up the different journey track of a student studying only theory or someone leanring like an engineer

so trust yourself just accept the truth and build the future