

Ask HN: How do you find motivation to teach yourself? - argonaut

I tend to have really serious problems getting motivated to teach myself new technologies and new things in general, even if the technology interests me. I've started MOOCs before but I've never finished. I similarly have trouble teaching myself new web/mobile technologies. This gets so bad that I've considered paying for in-person classes. What tips do you have for self-motivation?
======
glimcat
The problem with "learn x" from a motivational standpoint is that it is
extremely open-ended. Say I want to learn more JavaScript. How do I know when
I've met my goal? If the goal is indefinite, how do I measure progress? This
is very demotivating.

Instead, try to find something _completable_ which requires the skill you want
to get better with. Build something, even if it's mostly frivolous. You need a
destination, a path from here to there, and the ability to measure progress
along the path.

~~~
zgohr
To add to this point, I personally find the smaller the goal the better. The
quicker I can get gratification the more willing I am to continue working at
it.

------
argonaut
To add more details to my question: Right now I'm trying to learn web
development (having previously done mobile development). The way I'm starting
off is by learning Django using online tutorials.

I guess my problem is exacerbated by two things: 1) the field of web
development is huge, and becoming proficient in it requires knowing a little
about databases, a back-end framework, front-end development (JS, jQuery,
HTML,CSS), and eventually some devops stuff for when I move off Heroku; and 2)
Django itself is fairly complex (i.e. takes a while to get running at full
speed).

I try to approach this systematically, with my goal right now of groking
Django/the back-end before moving on to learning front-end development and
exploring databases (SQL, NoSQL) and devops. HN has definitely given me a good
idea of where to start, but it's still a daunting task.

My eventual goal is to write mobile/web applications with a back-end. I want
to learn all this because I have a long list of all kinds of ideas for
services/apps I want to write.

------
mrbarrett84
Given my slightly advanced age, my motivation seems to come from the desire to
feed and clothe myself and those I care about.

Initially, I was motivated by the idea that learning certain technologies
could make me valuable to employers in many industries and regions. Having
previously studied business and foreign languages, it took my breath away to
search for tech jobs and find hundreds of job openings across multiple
continents.

I guess it can be summed up as motivation by a lingering fear of failure with
a desire for freedom thrown into the mix. Classes can help, but if you hate
what you are learning, why not find something equally valuable that you love?

------
codegeek
Try and apply the S.M.A.R.T rule. Specific, measurable, achievable, realistic,
time bound. Any learning objective should have most of not all of the SMART
attributes. For example, if you want to learn a technology, figure out how you
will measure whether you succeeded or not. How long ? Are you being realistic
? For example, "learn to code" is very abstract while "learn to code website
in python in 6 months" is a lot more relevant.

------
twunde
I myself have the same problem with MOOCs. I've found that it helps to chunk
things up. So start off with the basic information and then look for online
tutorials to complete. And of course the best way to learn is to use what
you're learning in a project, whether personal or professional

------
shkabazi
Decide why you wanna learn it. I consider this to be very important, because
learning a new technology/language(or whatever) just because it's name is
nice, wont take you far.

~~~
mrbarrett84
Agreed. There are lots of technologies and tools you can learn. It helps to
step back, take a deep breath and ask yourself a few questions.

Do you want to work with the Web, with distributed systems, with software, or
none of the above?

Once you narrow it down, it becomes easier to prioritize and pick your tools
accordingly. I learned this the hard way, as I aimlessly spent a summer trying
to learn Ruby, Python, and Java all at the same time, just so I could say I
"knew" them.

It hurt my brain and my motivation suffered.

------
revorad
I hear you. Can you be a bit more specific and say what you are currently
trying to learn? I'd like to help if possible.

------
tagabek
Profit, Fun, Community

