I’m sure you’ve heard the old saying “the best time to plant a tree is twenty years ago, the second best time is now” so I have a challenge for you? What is the tree you want to plant? For a long time learning website development sat on my “someday/maybe list”. I had learnt the essentials of HTML and CSS but that was it, nothing more. Then the opportunity came up to use those skills to help my church develop its website further. Suddenly all those moments of (relatively) unnoticed practice became useful and yet at the same time, I wished I had invested more time in the past on this skill. I wished I had planted the tree of web development 10 years ago.
But the second best time is now, so I started pushing myself again. I grabbed some useful resources (I really recommend going through Codeacademy), dedicated an hour to coding everyday and found a couple of projects to push me forward. I planted the seed and started watering it.
Now some of those projects are coming together nicely and I’ve learnt a lot from them. There’s still lots to learn but I’m taking some small steps everyday to push me forward.
What is a project you will wish you started today?
What is a skill you will wish you had started learning today? Imagine it’s ten years in the future, what is your future self regretting about? What could you do to help your future self the most? If you have an idea then you can start learning that skill in only 20 hours.
This isn’t for you if…
If you are developing a skill, or have too much on your plate then this isn’t for you. There is a reason for someday/maybe lists and often it’s to allow us to be okay with not developing in certain skills. Web development was on mine for a while because I didn’t see the need and I had more pressing needs. Maybe it was the wrong decision, but as I look at other things on my someday maybe list, I’m sure it is right not to pursue them…at least not now. Maybe one day I will…and maybe I won’t. I’m okay either way.
Working it out for yourself.
You need to work this out for yourself but if there is a skill you have longed to develop, today is your chance. Plant the seed, and start watering it.
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