I’m learning the value of plugging away on a task without judgment instead of obsessing about progression.

Progression isn’t linear. Some problems remain shrouded in a thick fog until you put in the time and work, and suddenly the fog is lifted and you break through to a new level of understanding.

If you’re worried about your progress or lack thereof, you won’t have the patience to wait for the breakthrough.

This Coursera class on Algorithms that I’m taking is a good example. It’s a tough version of a basic course on algorithms and data structures, and not so different from the one I took at UCI a decade ago except that the video game difficulty setting has been jacked up a few notches. A lot of the exercise problems I’m facing are novel in presentation and concept.

Thankfully, I’m armed with the best that Adam Robinson, Toni Krasnic, and the XMind mind mapping software have to offer, and putting in the effort is easier when there’s a framework that you can put your faith into. Yes, I have faith in these systems, and these systems have empowered me to take control of my own education.

Instead of forcing myself to memorize how to use a union-find data structure, I ask myself a series of questions. What is this data structure trying to solve? What’s the naive approach? What are some optimizations? How might I use this in other situations? On and on, I ask myself better questions and am rewarded with better answers. I map these concepts, stare at them, ask more questions, draw relationships, and constantly edit and reorganize until they make sense. I flex those muscles with exercises, and reinforce them after some time has passed.

It works, oh miracle of miracles, it does. I wish I’d known earlier that learning is about asking good questions, wanting good answers, and having the mindfulness and patience to enjoy the ride. Still, I’m thankful that I know now what I couldn’t before.

These days I don’t experience much dread when I run into an obstacle, I experience bemusement. “How will I get past this,” I wonder. And off I go.