
Ask HN: How do you stay sharp? - taigeair
I feel like I&#x27;ve stopped rapidly learning after university and plateaued in my career in the last 1-1.5 years. How do you stay sharp and continue to climb in your career?<p>I&#x27;m a product manager at a tech company. I read. I work on side projects. I learn new programs like Sketch, take classes on Udemy and Coursera, but do not feel like I&#x27;m learning as much as I&#x27;d like. I&#x27;m not learning that much on the job anymore, just adding value to the company.<p>Update: wow, thanks for all the advice. I&#x27;ll definitely read through all of it. But beyond advice, I&#x27;m also curious what do smart people (like you) do to continue growing in terms of activities.
======
LoSboccacc
I kept learning til 30. Now i'm still learning at 33 but it feels different.
Once you learn enough is more about the ability of connecting dots.

I.e. I know a load of libraries and built a fair deal myself, including a orm
and a crud framework from ground up, and I know many of the pitfalls (I fell
for many of them but I was young and foolish) however I also learned the why
stuff grlets built a certain way and now it's ten time easier to pick up new
things (yeah ember does this and that because it solves the problem x in a way
I already saw done here and there, which is better than this other way under
these conditions)

Another example I've been around to see the latency/bandwidth problem arise so
many times it's not even funny anymore. and each generation solve it's time
solution (initially it was the terminal because bandwith was the problem, then
the thick client because latency, then it was again dumb data screen within
browser, then ajax become viable so code moved back to the browser, last
framework are so bloated latency is an issue again and they are moving
templates back server side once more)

Learn enough new thing about solving the problem yourself, and basically
you'll know every class of library that tries to solve that specific domain.
Then you are free to learn higher level stuff. If you start too much high then
it's easy to be lost in a flurty as technology shift without understanding the
whys.

~~~
danso
Seconded...learning is not a linear-time experience...or, it shouldn't be at
least.

I didn't learn much during and right after university. But after a few years
on the job as a reporter, I started getting ideas about how to apply my
programming experience. One of my first programming-on-the-job experiences was
writing a scraper for the local sheriff's website, so I didn't have to
manually click through the inmate list.

(this seems to be a common idea among programming journalists; someone wrote a
tutorial about it: [https://first-web-
scraper.readthedocs.org/en/latest/](https://first-web-
scraper.readthedocs.org/en/latest/))

To reiterate LoSboccacc's point...with every new thing I wanted to explore, I
had many excuses to try out new languages and tools...early on, many of my
ideas were dumb (Drupal was my first concept of a website backed with a
database)...but after enough misguided, but not crippling efforts, you get
much better at being less misguided. And learning new technologies becomes
less of a chore :)

~~~
LoSboccacc
To expand about university: it's my personal experience so ymmv

Almost nothing in my curricula mapped to anything I worked afterward, and I am
very glad of that. They forced me to learn how to think, how to solve problem,
and gave me a set of analytical tools to understand the software world.

True, I had to figure out java and javascript and aLl the other stuff on the
gritty nitty details of programming myself, but I learned a lot faster than
people attending work skill universities how to not work by coincidence and
how to solve the real problem of software development of which coding is
actually the very minor part.

I'm amazed when I see people lost in coding while that is actually the less
relevant part of the job.

------
Hoff
Careers and jobs and employers and technologies all come and go.

Figure out what interests you yourself, whether you want to go somewhere or do
something, and how you might get there. What's important to you.

If your current job can or does line up with that, great. If not, then start
working toward your target and toward a different role at your employer, a
different employer, or self-employment.

Have enough cash and/or short-term assets available to operate for at least
six months without a job. Maybe longer, depending on what the job market looks
like in your area.

As for yourself: diet, exercise, regular sleep and regular meals, and working
sane hours. Work on your own mental, social, and physical health. Your
finances and your cash flow and your sleep and your meal schedules are all
part of this health, too.

Schedule time for yourself. Outside of your job. Both to learn and grow, and
for socializing. Seek out folks that will challenge you — either at work, at
university, at a Maker's event, or outside. Seek out and talk with folks of
different backgrounds and interest areas and any of the different genders and
of different personal histories and experiences. Learn a new language.

Once you have pondered on these and have your plans underway, then you can
start working on the technologies and the tools and the online courses and
classes and the rest. If they're applicable, and how you best learn.

While your employer will certainly like the focus on your career, life is more
about yourself.

~~~
taigeair
How do you seek out folks that challenge you?

~~~
maerF0x0
For me, moving to the bay area was a big deal. Was easy to be the "big fish in
a small pond" in my old town. If moving is not an option, contributing to an
open source community you respect may be a good analog.

------
karamazov
I try to work through hard technical material. Personally, I enjoy both
technical books and MIT OCW lectures. There were a number of courses in school
that I was interested in and didn't have time for, so I've been looking at the
online equivalents.

"Working through" means doing exercises and projects. Reading or watching
material without applying it doesn't help.

I aim to spend an hour a day on this. It doesn't always happen, but it's a
reasonable enough goal that I can find time for it most days. Occasionally,
I'll take a full day to study on the weekend.

Some specific recommendations:

    
    
      books:
        SICP (https://mitpress.mit.edu/sicp/)
        K&R
        The Art of Computer Programming (if you have lots of time)
        On Lisp (http://www.paulgraham.com/onlisp.html)
        Learn you a Haskell
        Types and Programming Languages
        CLRS
        The Dragon Book (Compilers, http://www.amazon.com/Compilers-Principles-Techniques-Tools-2nd/dp/0321486811)
    
      OCW Courses:
        6.172 (High performance engineering)
        6.046 (Algorithms)
    

This is just what I've been interested in and is by no means comprehensive.
Outside of CS, math is great to learn if you haven't studied it formally.

I've found it's best to pick a topic you know enough about to be motivated to
study it, but haven't done serious work in.

~~~
nemesisrobot
Just out of curiosity, how much of TAOCP have you worked through in terms of
exercises? I'm currently working through Concrete Mathematics and while it's a
very good book, I'm also finding it very challenging, so I'm a little hesitant
to even think about working through TAOCP...

~~~
karamazov
I've only used TAOCP for reference. Working through it is on my to-do list,
but I'm not sure when I'll get there.

The problems are ranked by difficulty, so you might be able to work your way
up to the harder ones.

------
Htsthbjig
Learning new programs like Sketch, or taking classes on Udemy and Coursera
makes no sense to me if you don't apply it.

You don't really know unless you apply it. I grew up disassembling and
competing cracking programs, then I learned c because assembler was too slow
for creating things like compilers that I wanted to create.

Then I had to learn c++ in order to create graphic interfaces for my programs.

Then I needed python in order to develop faster... java, objective c, c sharp,
they provided me with things that I needed.

Then after years of programming I created a company and felt behind. We were
so f*ching slow. We needed something else: we discovered metaprogramming in
Lisp. Much better then, things improved.

We modified the CLang compiler in order to do much better than anybody else
what we did. We were pretty successful.

But it is not enough. We want to change the world. We want people of the world
understanding each other using their own languages. We want to understand DNA
and end cancer and aging. We want robots that drive and cook. We want to
understand nuclear fusion. We want to improve battery technologies, to remove
the salt from sea water cheaply. We want to make inexpensive LED plant growing
so we can travel to Mars or Venus.

And all the technology that we have is not enough for solving those problems.
When you face those problems you became humble and you met the best people you
could ever imagine.

Surrounding yourself with really smart people you will learn in a year what
you will in your entire life if you only face trivial problems.

~~~
taigeair
Well Sketch I use, but I know what you mean.

I'd be happy to meet those people. I do from time to time but it's really
random.

------
compostor42
>I read. I work on side projects. I learn new programs like Sketch, take
classes on Udemy and Coursera

Sounds like you are already doing more to improve than most!

>I'm not learning that much on the job anymore, just adding value to the
company.

Do you feel like you are often the smartest person in the room where you
currently work? If so, time to move some place where that isn't the case. I
find working with people more skilled than myself is the fastest way to
improve. Sure, your ego will take a hit, but it is worth it for the self-
improvement benefits.

However, short of places like Google, I'm not sure how to go about finding a
place with more skilled people. Can't know for sure until you are actually
working there.

~~~
sadkingbilly
What if you're the smartest person in the room and also highly paid? It may be
more strategic to stay put, save as much as possible, and spend your time
getting intellectual stimulation outside of work.

~~~
compostor42
I don't necessarily disagree. However, it sounded like OP was already doing a
lot to get intellectual stimulation outside of work. He specifically mentioned
not learning much on the job any more so that's why I recommended looking into
a new job.

------
zinxq
Battlefield 4. Laugh if you will, but playing this game (or games like it)
against other humans is an incredible mental exercise. There is little
downtime and twitch does win the day. Interestingly, I usually only play when
I'm too tired to code productively anymore - and playing brings me wide awake.

It's amazing to me when watching others play how they miss cues I can now see.
Or how my mind has subconsciously optimized where to aim in a heated firefight
depending on the gun I'm using (sometimes sternum, sometimes head - I more
notice I'm doing it as opposed to actually doing it).

Plenty of good advice here, but high-speed mind activities should be included
in any advice of "staying sharp" (i.e. Battlefield, RTS computer games, iphone
brain games I suppose)

(relevant: Starcraft performance factored by age:
[http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal....](http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0094215))

~~~
staunch
I agree there's a lot to be said about the mental benefits. Highly recommend
anyone interested checking out Insurgency. I've played every competitive FPS
game over past 16 years and latest Insurgency version is the most exciting
realistic twitch FPS ever, especially 5v5 competitive mode.

------
brokentone
Surround yourself with people far smarter than you are. Bring up interesting
topics that you want to learn about but can also contribute to, let them fill
in the gaps. Ask them what they are most interested in at this moment. Ideally
do prior steps while buying them drinks.

~~~
taigeair
How do you find these people? I found lots in London but not so many where I
am currently.

~~~
SyneRyder
You might need to travel to find them: I've found conferences are a good way
to find interesting people. And not necessarily programming conferences, it's
good to know smart people in other fields.

Also, as patio11 once suggested, just contact people you think might be smart
/ interesting and invite them to chat over coffee or drinks. I did that while
I was travelling through Berlin and invited folks I'd talked to here on Hacker
News. I got some really useful advice from it personally, and they at least
got free drinks & snacks from me (and hopefully interesting advice / ideas
too).

Check out Patrick's standing invitation for ideas on how to connect with
people: [http://www.kalzumeus.com/standing-
invitation/](http://www.kalzumeus.com/standing-invitation/)

~~~
taigeair
Cool, thanks! I should start doing that.

------
hluska
Since I left University, I have gone through a few periods where I felt that I
had plateaued and stopped climbing, both in my career and in terms of
learning. To snap out of this, I found the following helpful:

a) I changed my perspective. In University, learning was broken up into easy
to digest semester long chunks. In four months, I would write papers, write
exams and receive marks which sort of indicated what I had learned. Since
University, I have had to change my expectations, both in terms of chunks of
time and in terms of feedback. I try to remind myself that I am learning, but
sometimes I just learn in chunks that are almost too small to notice.

b) I keep a journal about what I am learning and what I am working on. This
journal tends to be long on opinion. Every few months, I go back and read how
far I have come. For me, there is no better way of seeing how far I have come
than to read how wrong I used to be. Hacker News helps with this, since there
is no shortage of extremely smart people who are willing to tell me that I am
wrong.

c) I added hobbies. When I was in University, learning was my job and all of
my hobbies and social interactions were built around this. Since University, I
have picked up some hobbies. For me, lifting weights and jogging started off
as a way to solve a serious health/stress problem and evolved into a bonafide
hobby. I may not be learning as much as I was in University, but I can bench
press my weight now and run 10km at will. Progress (of any sort) is addictive
for me and it forces me to keep finding ways to progress.

d) I got into public speaking. In University, I belonged to a Toastmasters
chapter, but after University, I not only joined another chapter, but I
started seeking out speaking opportunities. Not only did my public speaking
improve, but I have learned an immense amount through speaking in public. The
old adage that you never really know something until you can explain it to
someone who knows nothing is 100% true.

Right now, my biggest challenge is to incorporate meditation into my day to
day routine. I love meditating and I know that it makes me a better, more
mindful person, but it is hard for me to incorporate it. My hope is that a
little more mindfulness will keep me from obsessing about the big picture
(where change is so slow) and keep me in the moment.

Good luck, my friend and if you need anyone to talk to, my email is in my
profile.

~~~
qu4z-2
I like your journal idea.

It occurs to me that I just assumed you meant a physical journal, when that
wasn't in the post. I feel like that would help me a fair bit compared to a
digital one (I find physical books easier to focus on. Something to do with
the spacial consistency, I think).

------
agnokapathetic
\- Write prose. I find my verbal fluency (and my inner monologue) become far
more dull when I haven't written anything in a while

\- Keep alcohol consumption to a minimum, even a single glass of wine impacts
memory formation and recall.

\- Get lots of sleep

~~~
Balgair
On the booze: Alcohol's effects on memory are indeed severe, but mostly at
high doses and with chronic consumption. Also, this is very individual and
varys from person to person, as most things in bio do[0]. Additionally, OP
mentioned that they want to stay sharp, and alcohol does have a positive
effect on creativity in low doses, something we all know in coding[1]. In the
end, OP should trust themself and drink as deemed appropriate (check with a
Doc of course).

Sleep though, yeah, try to get more of that. Exercise too. Oh, also eat right.
Hmm,... maybe should lawyer up and quit FB too, or so I am told... :P

[0][https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effects_of_alcohol_on_memory](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effects_of_alcohol_on_memory)

[1][https://xkcd.com/323/](https://xkcd.com/323/)

------
heardtheword
Try teaching other people. It's amazing what you find you don't know by
explaining things to others. If there aren't people who want to learn what you
know then post on a blog or forum and get feedback from those who are
interested.

~~~
Fiahil
I must second this. I worked as a TA for 2.5 years while pursuing my Master's
degree, and I learned a whole lot more by teaching than by studying. The most
amazing thing is to be able to tell students that you have absolutely no idea
of the answer to their questions, but that you're going to find out together.

~~~
taigeair
Do you have any suggestions for starting to teach?

~~~
heardtheword
First, teach something you are interested in. This will keep you going when
something is challenging. Even if you don't consider yourself a "pro" in the
subject, you can always get to that level.

Find somewhere you can teach and receive feedback. I teach piano to students
and several times I've been caught with a question I had to look up. The best
thing you can do is say "I don't know but I'll figure it out for you". Plus,
this way you also have to figure out a way to explain it in a simple method to
those you are teaching.

Feedback is really important because it will be how you can affirm what you
know and also give you opportunities to branch out. If you aren't getting
feedback on a blog, forum, or wherever you may just need to find the right
place to share your knowledge.

~~~
Fiahil
Great answer, I will add to this that you need a lot of patience. So yeah, if
you are not interested in the subject, this gets a whole lot difficult.

------
vowelless
I don't particularly enjoy online courses. The density of technical
information is very low. I prefer reading papers and then doing a nose dive on
related papers to fill in the knowledge gaps. Papers are like nodes of
knowledge with edges to relevant information (references). For things usually
not covered in universities, papers are pretty much crucial. For example, I
found it a lot more useful to read the original or early b-tree and octree
papers as opposed to looking them up in text books. And these directly
affected my code. The DynamoDB paper was another one that affected my work
thinking, even though we don't do a lot of distributed systems.

There are many famous papers out there (search on HN, the topic gets posted
frequently). I highly recommend you choose a topic, and just look up the
important papers in that topic (google scholar is a great tool for checking
citation numbers).

------
danwakefield
Apprenticeship Patterns[1] was linked in a thread a while ago and its got some
good ideas.

I think that learning a lot can hurt the overall effort, Focus on one or two
things at a time and use them to do stuff. Try and get to the 'know what you
don't know' stage for each thing, even if you cant do something at the moment
knowing what steps you should take to get there is a good feeling.

[1]:
[http://chimera.labs.oreilly.com/books/1234000001813/index.ht...](http://chimera.labs.oreilly.com/books/1234000001813/index.html)

------
evo_9
Workout, eat smart and get more than 7 hours of sleep a night most nights.
It's absolutely amazing how much these three things affect everything in your
life.

~~~
PatZawa
I think the workout one is great here. Whenever I feel like my mind is out of
energy, I go and exercise for a while and usually my mind feels more energetic
afterwards.

------
clamprecht
Work at a smaller company. Like 10 people. The smaller the company, the more
roles each person does.

------
jhawk28
Find a bigger pond. Big fish in small pond is a good way for short term
benefits, but it limits the growth.

------
andresmanz
I wasn't interested in studying at a university, so I have plenty of things to
learn. I usually work from home and I learn a ton every day. That's primarily
because I always have a book or two around and read about new stuff on HN.
Luckily, the world of programming is huge, so there's always something to
learn. In my opinion, at least reading a book on general programming is
beneficial to everyone, especially managers.

------
allendoerfer
I think the reason for this is not only the obvious "young brains learn
faster" but also different hormone levels, ego and so on. When you are
younger, you overestimate your skills and take on things that are actually
above your level. Once you get older you start thinking more realistic about
your skill-set and realize that other people are smart, too. You become better
at estimating how much time a given task might take and you realize that you
have other things to do.

The problem is, you cannot grow if you do not push yourself to the next level.

Practising something you already kind of know how to do will mainly optimize
speed and avoiding mistakes and will let you plateau slightly above your
current level. To really advance at something you have to take on tasks that
are out of your comfort zone. You can then reapply the learned skills and
concepts back to other areas.

I think you have to actively massage your brain to prevent it from stagnating
and freezing the algorithms it applies the most. It think we are blessed to
work in a field that is conceptually challenging enough that we can actually
observe this. In another area you would just wake up one day saying stuff old
people say :D

------
phodo
From the above description, it seems like you might be trapped at a local
maxima. Try expanding your horizons in other areas. You will gain perspective
including ways to get "unstuck". You will find other maximas, and realize that
you have a long way to go. For example, try reading about medicine or art -
that can give you a perspective on "how" to think and "why" and connect the
dots, rather than the "what" of the latest framework. To give you a more
concrete and prescriptive example you can apply, let's say you are learning
Sketch and teaching yourself UI/UX. How about exploring color - the science
and art behind it? Pick up a color palette program, and look at famous works
of art and good UIs - what palettes do they use and why? Can you come up with
your own palettes? Why did you choose what you chose? Can you use a palette
from some apps like Slack or Monument Valley and build your own UI? Basically
try to go in an adjacent or even orthogonal direction. You are on the right
path... you seem intellectually curious and a lifelong learner. Just shake
things up a bit and that can pay dividends. HTH.

------
rifung
Have you considered the idea that you are still learning but just not things
that you care about/appreciate?

When I left school and started working I also felt like I wasn't learning, but
when I sat down to think about it, I actually was learning a great deal. I
just didn't feel like I was learning because I didn't care for anything I was
learning.

You will almost certainly learn new things on the job but those things are
likely things aligned to your employer's interests and not your own. I think
you might want to see what interests/excites you and try to dive into that
material instead of learning things that other people think are useful or
suggest.

Even in the comments here you can see people recommending learning new
frameworks and others recommending classical texts like SICP or even learning
functional languages. Clearly each of these groups of people thinks what they
are learning is useful or important. On the other hand, they might not think
what the other group is learning is very useful. I certainly don't feel very
happy learning a new language or framework, but other people don't like
learning theory unless they can use it to build something.

------
hellofunk
I find that having a voracious appetite to explore as many associated fields
and topics to your area of work or interest is not only interesting and
enjoyable but gives your mind some pause on the close-at-hand stuff while you
gain the very important pieces that inform a big picture view of what you are
doing. Plus, you can often get new outside-the-box ideas this way.

~~~
tumbling_stone
Exactly. I had been wondering if my way of sticking to work related things
while exploring stuff in my own time was the best way of learning, but due to
the kind of free time I get it is the most optimal strategy. For example
though I would love to complete SICP I just don't have the kind of time it
needs, so instead I try to read as much as possible about OOPS explore
languages that are exemplify OO design but aren't that mainstream like Pharo.
This way I don't have to worry much if the knowledge acquired would be
forgotten and wasted, whatever I learn I practice at least a part of it daily.

~~~
hellofunk
I'd offer a different take. SICP is pretty intense stuff in parts. Don't feel
obligated to understand it all or to finish it as a full-read. Rather, when it
gets tough, continue reading, but give yourself permission to not fully
understand it. Skim it, whatever, the exposure will leave something. You can
always come back for a second round. But, more importantly, also explore many
different programming paradigms, don't just focus on OOP. Learn a lot about
FP, FRP, Declarative. Whatever paradigm you use, it will make you think more
openly about problems.

------
jfoutz
Part if the plateau might be not knowing the new stuff cold. There are times
when it's hard to progress if your base understanding is kind of shaky. as you
actually use the new stuff it'll gel, and open up new avenues for inquiry.

I'd also suggest Haskell. compare this:
[http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/LeakyAbstractions.htm...](http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/LeakyAbstractions.html)
to abstractions from math. mathematicians ensure the abstractions never leak.
they make the rules, there is no way out of the game. this kinda points in
that direction: [http://conal.net/blog/posts/denotational-design-with-type-
cl...](http://conal.net/blog/posts/denotational-design-with-type-class-
morphisms)

I think the most important thing is just keep trying.

------
someear
Start your own company: you'll learn a ton, and be forced to stay sharp, since
your survival depends on it.

~~~
astrodust
Destroy your marriage and social life! Ruin your financial situation for
decades to come!

No. Just no.

It takes a certain breed of individual to take on this kind of challenge, to
throw caution to the wind and just do it, plus a whole lot of tenacity and
sheer luck to make it work out.

If you want to learn new things, this is the worst possible advice. It's akin
to saying "If you want to learn how to fly, throw yourself off a building."

Having been through the start-up cycle many times, I'll tell you one thing:
You won't learn a whole lot about technology compared to learning _business_.
As a founder you'll spend far less time coding than you do wrangling
spreadsheets and worrying about payroll.

~~~
someear
The OP asked how to stay sharp - not how to obtain ultimate happiness, or how
to obtain the best balance of everything. Being a founder is probably the best
way to learn and stay sharp. Of course it's not for everyone. Of course you're
going to fail (at least a little, most likely a ton).

And why is it decades of ruin? I could argue that running and failing your own
company for 2-3 years will work better for you financially than going to work
for a big tech company straight out of school (or at any point in time
really).

There's no need to "throw caution to the wind". Just be on top of what you're
capable of, where your priorities are, and what your financial situation is
(stay sharp on all these things).

------
agentultra
Sounds like you're doing all of the right things. Try reading material from
outside your primary interests: biology, pure maths, civil engineering,
electronics, chemistry, etc. Ideas are not born in a vacuum and over-
specialization can sometimes give you the illusion of progress. I find digging
into a new subject exciting and it often gives me new connections or angles to
programming and maths that I wouldn't have otherwise encountered before.

As for commercial applications... well software for business is usually dry
and boring grunt work. Interesting, innovative, and challenging are,
paradoxically, antithetical to commercial software. You want reliable, boring,
and simple. Perhaps you need to look for a research position or take a risk
and start a venture based on one of your ideas.

------
Xorlev
Go outside your comfort zone, learn a functional language and give a talk on
it. Learn higher-level maths. (IMO) There's satisfaction and clarity to be
found there if your current path isn't challenging you. You might find that it
takes you into new roles too.

~~~
seivan
For me, staying sharp was never an issue because I have an addiction to 'toys'
and learning.

By Toys, I mean new concepts and tech-stacks.

Unfortantely, I don't control it. It could be the most useless thing, or
something valuable. I haven't figured out what 'actuates' it.

Been everything from replacing FSM with Behaviour Trees, to learning game
development, A*, Steering Forces[0] to just toying with Redis and Obj-C.

[0] I really, really, really recommend
[http://natureofcode.com](http://natureofcode.com)

------
hellbanner
What are your side projects? IMO learning is only useful is it lets you build
something.

~~~
taigeair
Currently, I'm working on this idea... Not sure if it's ready for attention
yet, but I guess it doesn't hurt. www.littlequest.me/secret

My main concern is I don't feel as sharp as I did in high school, university,
and first years after grad. And I want to continue to have that mental
sharpness, not just be good at my job and do it day in and day out.

~~~
haack
Love the testimonials section.

Are you working on this alone?

~~~
taigeair
Thanks! I thought that would be a fun way for people to tweet about the
product :)

I'm working on this with a friend. I'm really curious where this goes. It
should be ready in 2 weeks.

------
davnicwil
> I work on side projects.

I'm intrigued this is here, because when I read the title this was my
immediate suggestion.

In my experience there's no better way to learn than working on side projects
that explore technologies that you don't already know. Is this what you do?

Writing an app on the same framework/languages as you use at work is also
definitely valuable, it'll give you more depth of knowledge that's then
directly applicable at work (in fact when starting a new job I recommend doing
exactly this) but it won't stretch you much intellectually. To do that you
kind of have to force yourself to use completely new stuff.

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nkassis
Could it be that you've exhausted the easy things to learn? I feel that at
some point it gets hard to keep the same learning velocity as the knowledge
you are acquiring gets more complex and difficult to grasp. Also major
breakthroughs are much rarer. While learning things similar to previous
subjects seem trivial. Learning new programming languages for example. Once
you've accumulated enough of then pattern start to repeat and learning the
next one becomes more and more trivial to the point where it doesn't feel like
learning the same amount of stuff as previously.

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sosuke
Take on more responsibility at work, either do it on your own or ask for more
from your boss, say you want to do more, you feel you can do more.

Or start contributing to meetups, be out there, and get another job that is a
step up.

Or try and make a product on your own, even if it is a silly idea, until you
launch it. Do it again.

1-1.5 years isn't a plateau don't stress too much, that you want to do more is
nearly all you need to climb, there are countless people that don't want
anything more

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joshuapants
> I learn new programs like Sketch, take classes on Udemy and Coursera, but do
> not feel like I'm learning as much as I'd like

Maybe you're not challenging yourself sufficiently. Try to find something that
will be very difficult for you and start to attack it.

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realrocker
I want to say this to my Product Manager, and if aren't doing this already try
investing 10-20% of your time on doing hands on work. Details matter.

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ruffrey
Are you enjoying your work? Is it challenging you? It might help if your "day
job" was the primary driver of your learning, vs fringe efforts

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daedlanth
Concentrate on things that you suck at or avoid; technology or not, building a
good stone wall is as enjoyable as an elegant RAILS deployment.

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daedlanth
Concentrate on things that you suck at or avoid; technology or not, building a
good stone wall is as enjoyable as an elegant RAILs deployment.

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elara003
I find my time limited but I have a 35 minute commute to work and a 35 minute
commute back home. So I download podcasts and listen to them.

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daenz
If you're challenged, you're learning more and staying sharp. Stay challenged.

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talles
Open-source projects, specially the ones out of my comfort zone.

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viach
I thought training doesn't increase intelligence. Does it?

~~~
heardtheword
It may not directly increase intelligence but it will solidify what you know.
Explaining something to others requires a deeper level of understanding in my
experience. It will also show you what areas you don't know and give you
opportunity to learn those things as well.

~~~
maerF0x0
The brain is plastic, why wouldnt intelligence also be so?
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuroplasticity](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuroplasticity)

>Neuroplasticity involves the higher cognitive functions as well as memory and
motor and sensory functions. No part of the brain is an exception. IQs of
retarded individuals have been raised. Even thought and imagination, as brain
scan technologies have clearly demonstrated, can change the structure of our
brains.

[http://www.nas.org/articles/Education_and_Intelligence--
Part...](http://www.nas.org/articles/Education_and_Intelligence--
Part_3_Neuroplasticity)

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pw
Meth, mainly.

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awoland
No rebate ...

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spectrum1234
Start a startup

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dummy7953
I think it's possible that people who tend to over-intellectualize, possibly
are missing some tenderness in their lives.

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anon3_
Open source projects are a free and self-reinforcing way to be on top of the
latest tech, build a resume and give back.

You can do so pretty easily via GitHub. Sign up to a few mailing lists, not
every important project is on GH.

Consider a daemon you use really often. Familiarize yourself with the code
until you master it.

------
hlawson
I work as a consultant so I am always getting exposed to new industries and
technologies. Sometimes I am learning because I absolutely have to in order to
be successful on the project I have signed up for, or otherwise I find my self
learning new things because I have either heard of a topic through a
friend/colleague or I have a general interest. I usually have 2 or 3 topics
i.e. Ruby, Systems Thinking, Presenting, that I want to focus on.

For each of those focus topics I then: \- Read a lot! I try and get a book
done each week, maybe a second on the weekend. I have worked hard at improving
my reading speed and if I really focus when I read (sit down at a desk, remove
any distractions, get a nice coffee) I find I can get through material very
quickly. While I am reading I take notes, I use these notes later on for
writing (see later point) \- Listen to podcasts/audiobooks, I like to put on
an audio book and do a repetitive form of exercise or just walk around, I live
in a city with lots of great places to walk so heading out for a 4 hour walk
in the evening is easy and I can easily get through an audiobook, I take notes
while I walk too. \- Write about it, if I am learning about something I like
to write about it too, this helps me cement the topic I am learning. \- Do a
course or workbook on the topic

Apart from the focus topic areas, I am subscribed to the Economist, Bloomberg
Business week and various mailing lists, I like to scan through these articles
and read any that catch my attention, I feel that having these taps on broader
interest areas keeps me from getting too bored or narrow in my field of
specialty (which is software).

I think the thing that helps me the most though is that I work as a
consultant. I move industries (banking, retail, government, biochemical) and
technology (c#, java, ruby, javascript) every few months so I am constantly
finding myself in the deep end in new fields - this drives me to be on top
things and is a good motivator to rapidly learn.

I have learned more in my 4 years as a consultant then I did in the 4 years at
uni and 3 years working for other software shops.

