The One Habit That Transformed My Developer Journey

Let me share a little story from my early days as a developer. I was one of those self-taught folks who, with a mix of determination and a good bit of luck, made my way into the world of coding.

There was a time, not long ago, when I would stare at my computer screen for hours, wrestling with errors and bugs that seemed like they were on a mission to break me.

Every time I thought I had solved a problem, another one would pop up, and the cycle continued.

But here’s the thing: I wasn’t just struggling with code. I was struggling with how I approached the whole process of development.

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At first, I was all about getting things to work. I’d sit down, type out lines of code, hit “run,” and pray that the program wouldn’t crash. And when it did work — oh, the satisfaction was real.

But as I progressed, I realized that just getting something to work wasn’t enough. In fact, it wasn’t even the most important thing.

So, what was the game changer for me?

It was this one habit: thinking beyond the problem at hand.

Let me explain. Early on, I’d focus exclusively on making my code run. The task at hand would be my sole focus — get this function to return the correct output. Easy, right? But I…