I was just searching how to learn React and Overreacted crossed my browser. After reading the first blog My Decade in Review, I became fond of this Dan Abramov not just because my partner is also Russian or he now lives in London where I also lived, but more because of his passion in programming, starting from penniless working his way up and having never given up.

From his experiences in the past decade, from 17 till 27, I see Dan is overall making linear progress. And as usual from anyone’s biography, I wish to draw some tips from his narratives:

  1. Luck and accidents: like Marcel Duchant’s artwork, our lives are full of surprises, we live in an uncontrollable environment or with limited handles. Accidents happen. Good and bad. We can not wait for the good ones to happen and can not hang on to the bad ones, however:
  2. if you want the good accidents to happen, like Dan’s meeting with Chen Jing who offered him the possibility to work for FB in London, is because he had been working on programming for a while and he earned the chance to have a public appearance, which brings me to the next point:
  3. examine your passion in programming: so long as you keep working towards one direction, even though sometimes you have to adjust your course, it doesn’t matter, just remind yourself the passion which brought you here
  4. surround yourself with like-minded people: working in a company, reading/following posts/blogs online, building a project together, take part in a talk, put yourself in the worldly community… as long as you are surrounded with coders, you will learn/make progress much faster than doing it by yourself
  5. burn-out happens: Surely you need time to refuel, it’s necessary. Don’t be stressed out. Find a way to relax and you’ll feel that everything has always been fine, you’ll regain the strength to keep it going.

I was amazed by the first computer I got in 1996. When the Windows 95 appeared on my screen I was fascinated. To look back, I have always been fascinated by the UI or the graphic part of the OS, and not so much as the machanism behind it. Partly, because there wasn’t any opportunities for me to get into it. But when I wrote my first Django app and React app, I knew I could spend hours sitting still and play with the components. Every part of a class, a function, an html tag is a small part of a machine. I need to be more patient to them. Be more steady with them.

I enjoy how the technology brings to our daily life, the convenience, the ease and peace of course depending on how you implement it in your daily life. I want to participate in the process of making as well! Watching many open source projects taking off, I want to contribute, to give back to the community, too…