Mistakes That Prevent Self-taught Developers From Landing A Job

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If you are struggling as a self-taught developer or just want to increase the chances that you'll land a developer job with this path, this podcast episode is for you. Unfortunately, most self-taught developers give up before ever landing their first position. In this episode, I'm going to dive into some of the main mistakes people make while going down this path and how to avoid them. By the end of this, you'll have strategies that'll greatly increase your chances of success as a self-taught developer.

[@DigitalNomadOnFIRE]

As a 20 year dev a big piece of advice, if you get stuck for ages on one tutorial, find 5 others on the same subject, either blog posts, videos, sample apps - all of the above and keep approaching the subject from multiple angles. One of them will click.

[@z00lus]

Good advice. In adding to this I suggest sometimes to go back to topics you do not understand now. Maybe after 1y or even 5years after.

[@ruslan_yefimov]

Been stuck with fixing some f**ed up quaternion math at work for nearly a month and only managed to fix it after digging into books for a couple days💀 Patience and confidence are main parts of success!

[@seeibe]

@@ruslan_yefimov Yeah, this is so true. The devs on my team lose so much time because they want the quick and easy solution, when it would be much quicker to do a deep dive into the issue and get a good understanding before attempting a solution. The worst is when someone on my team tried to trial and error a solution for 2 weeks, I take the task over from them, and find the solution after 30 minutes of reading the documentation with patience.

[@thecoolnewsguy]

Agree. I was trying to implement minimax but I just couldn't understand the code. So, I read more about it and I could finally manage to understand how it works and hence, I implemented it myself without understanding their code.

[@Kraska93]

ChatGPT is also quite useful nowadays. Helped me a lot with my Django learning.

[@ozankaya7718]

As a person who is at 6 month mark, I can approve that learning programming is frustrating. No endaviour ever in my life made me doubt myself this much. Despite all the frustration I just embrace the chaos and keep pushing.

[@turolretar]

At this point I just don’t care, I do any entry task, take any test, just anything. Still nothing. Even if I don’t get any programming job in 1-2 years, I still won’t stop programming. Maybe this career is not for me. I thought maybe it was, but reality disagrees. Sometimes circumstances are just not right. But I’m done with beating myself up over this. I’ll just keep trying whatever I can, until I go insane. I can feel the need to do this

[@Macheako]

You studying by yourself or taking classes? I ended up doing both and honestly, I can say I learned a great deal in both paths 🤔 so if one’s not working out, definitely consider the other 😊

[@LordmkKING67]

@@turolretar when programming gets into your blood, its impossible to stop :D

[@vfryhn2]

I've been learning for almost 4 years, and it has been a long journey and I don't think it will ever finish, I got my first programming job like at a year and a half after I started learning but unfortunately my boss was abusive so I decided to take the freelance route, I really love to have all the time I want to learn new and more advanced topics, and also to have the entire freedom to apply my knowledge in the projects I want

[@codeintherough]

Update?

[@HighSpeedRaam]

dude, I'm not new on this developer journey. I have been working as a developer for 7 years, and let me tell you something, I wish I have heard all of this since the beginning! Thanks for your comments, this is a hard to swallow pill of reality, but, we all need it.

[@daan3298]

I'm self-taught. Bought PHP for Dummies in 2002. Read for cover to cover and made the examples, took me 3 months. Then I created my own CMS and started a company in 2003. Very quickly I started to make serious money. But it's not all roses. Staying motivated - self-motivated - is extremely hard. Focus is also very hard. Create environment where you will not get distracted. Have kids? Better get an office out of the house. One weird thing: I used to smoke. The I stopped smoking and my focus was gone. Turns out many years later some research was done on micro-pauzes. The smoking was giving my brain micro-pauzes all the time. Micro-pauzes let your brain catch up to what you are doing. It is extremely important in coding and staying in the flow. I still have nto found a good alternative to get those micro-pauzes back (but also still don't smoke so that's good I guess). 20 years later, it's a good career BUT with AI and AGI around the corner you might think twice about being a developer in certain areas. AI is already doing part of my work for me. It's going fast.

[@DamianSzajnowski]

Maybe take deliberate short breaks to stretch your feet, walk, brainstorm, even chill or play a game for a planned time frame. If you're into less-unhealthy habits that are still unresearched and probably not healthy for you, vaping is probably better than smoking and provides that short break but I'd never recommend that to someone who managed to ditch smoking. Interesting point btw, I'll find that research.

[@OrionRox]

My biggest advice for anyone who is taking any sort of coding course (it doesn't matter if you are taking courses from Udemy or Coursera or BootCamp): build something on your own. For example, if you are taking React course, after learning how to build a reusable button component, pause the course and start building a button component on your own, you will realize that you might not be able to make it even though you just learned it, if you can make one, try to make 10 of them differently, repetition is the key. While you are progressing through the course, pause again, and make everything that has been covered on your own again. Do this over and over you will remember and learn the patterns, therefore by the time you are making your own project, you could apply those patterns.

[@michaelmagill5466]

I think it's better to blast through the courses, learn only the basics, but get a big picture idea of what a language is capable of. Then, using that knowledge, think of something you're interested in, and then build it, using the course contents as a reference manual. If you made something, destroy it, and then rebuild it, but this time make it faster, concise, and more readable. Redo the course, thinking of the things you did not use in the course, and think about something interesting that those things you didn't use could be used for. Then repeat the process. If you're a creative individual, this won't be difficult, and the lessons learned will be much more satisfying. You'll also retain the information for a greater length of time because the lessons this way are more emotionally gratifying, which is the key to learning and enjoying anything. Repetition for the sake of hammering information into your memory stores is boring, at least for me. And for that reason, I think you're much more likely to become burnt out before you even complete your first project.

[@digibrett]

I think this is great advice. I'll add that I think what is a good approach to this is to think about what things you'd like to be different, whether that be organization of the code presented or application/UI behavior. Ask "what can I remove from this example, or how can I simplify this?". Ask "can I make this code more portable/re-usable?" Mutating code and refactoring are essential exercises to understanding. And a lot of professional work is mutating and refactoring code anyway, so put reps into doing that!

[@DamianSzajnowski]

That is the gruelingly difficult part for me - do the actualn unguied work, when your mind is blank and blanketless of the cosy validation of code-monkeying the tutorial cose and reapplying it to similar concepts, now irl.

[@dauntoldrnodgroot3437]

Thank you for this. Do you use memory palaces?

[@bladelazoe]

This is something I started doing recently, I take something programming related and start experimenting with it unti I got it down. Right now as funny as it is, I hardly incorporate Boolean values in my code so I'm searching up different scenarios to use them and coming up with my own versions to practice with them.

[@Macheako]

I’m a professional developer now, bout 10 years, and if there’s one piece of advice I could give…skip those goofy book exercises and take the jump into writing an actual program that uses an actively used API or framework. But in all honesty, being a good developer really is kind of a “journey”. I’ve been a system administrator, got my A+, and it wasn’t till after getting my computer science degree, a few years, EVERYTHING I learned started coming together ❤❤❤ It takes time! so long as you’re moving upwards with each new week/month…I wouldn’t worry 😂❤ 💻

[@bivensrk]

Definitely mirror your experience! Also, these videos of also highlighted that TikTok is presenting a weird way of looking at the whole profession. In the 90s, when I started, it was all about just wanting to be good enough to work at Microsoft, as a system level developer. Nowadays, it’s all web. Don’t have to worry about memory management as much now.

[@oleggold]

It's a good advice, and a bad one. Even after a few weeks (depending on the time invested) some people cannot write one line of code that makes any point in a big picture of a project. Without basic things, people just write stuff without understanding or, even worse, copying code. Depending on the project, you sometimes need 3-4 different subjects from different languages or frameworks. So it is not as easy as you described.

[@KILLCHRISU]

So many aspiring devs are afraid to struggle on their own and that's the biggest issue from what I've seen

[@Macheako]

Heh….struggling alone is almost part of the job description 😂 but some of the best times I had was on a team of 5+ other developers, so I definitely believe in finding a good team IF you can. Cuz yea, it’s not always gonna happen not to mention some teams will even hold you back 😢

[@enzoflp]

Man this video really came at a perfect time for me. Been teaching myself to code since November last year and started applying to job since late April. Yesterday I received yet another rejection after my third interview and I started questioning myself a lot. As you said it is a number game, I have probably sent close to 150-200 applications and yet only had 3 interviews. When you put things like this it feels like nothing but I am trying to look at it in a way that I am still getting some interviews, which means that it is doable and now it is just about getting better at selling myself and my skills during the interview. Not many people talk about how finding a job is probably the hardest part in becoming a dev and how long it actually takes so I appreciate you making this video to talk about it, brought my spirit back up !

[@stacisoutherland3388]

Interview rejections are the worst I understand keep going you got this!

[@varuntyagi6116]

Sorry about the interview rejections, but reaching to the interview stage after 6 month of self study is no small feat either. I'm sure one of these days you'll clear an interview. You're much closer to getting a job than most of us are. Goodluck 👍

[@89kylestyle]

Do you have a CS degree? You can get one online now also and it's affordable.

[@smallstar88]

A reputable coding bootcamp is the way to go. Save you time. So in a long run. You could easily make up that tuition cost.

[@dannylaza1326]

@@smallstar88 As someone who did both a bootcamp and a CS degree. I would say that even though college is a scam because they make you take so many pointless classes including the CS classes, they give you structure and time to absorb the stuff. The bootcamp was literally a waste of time and I've never met someone who went to a bootcamp who was actually a good developer. If you believe you can learn everything you need to know in 3 months, starting from scratch, you're delusional. It's a bigger scam than college. They prey on people who are desperate and teach them all the same BS in 3 months or less and say good luck. If I could do it over I would be fully self taught or go to college as I planned for a couple of a years and after getting that foundation, drop out and become self taught. I am working as a dev now and coding in my free time for the last 6 months and have learned infinitely more on my own than anything college/bootcamp taught me.

[@ossysongs]

I'm not oblivious to how hard the self-taught path is....but as a blue-collar worker, I'm miserable and I've realized that this isn't the life for me.... and I lack the money for college, so I'm going the self-taught way... and as hard as it can be, I'd still rather struggle through learning to be a software developer rather then to stay at this dead-end job being unhappy. I started learning by self teaching just a month ago, but learning it and dedicating at least 3 hours a day to studying and working on my skills has really distracted me from the negative thoughts. So I'm honestly just trying to discipline myself to keep at it . I'm hoping I can make this a career even 2+ years down the line.

[@syrus1233]

Why don’t you do a skilled trade like electrician

[@div4374]

Hey man, I saw your comment yesterday, didn't replied to it... I took my first IT job after 2 years of preparation, Main reason was I made a lot of mistake when I was starting, Some advice I'll give you that, read almost all the major topics of the framework/programming language you are reading, Create your own software program cause it'll give you actual knowledge in the thing you are reading, and after that revise and Try to take as many interviews as possible, it'll give you idea where you are lacking and also gradually you'll get a job.... It's been 3 months, I don't know if you quit reading/preparing but if you did quit, start again, it won't matter much

[@TheRealBrockRoberts]

The software industry would be much better off if more people in it, were more like you. Great humanity and compassion. Well done!!

[@Mars-oc2gq]

Absolutely. I completely agree with this comment.

[@MnemonicCarrier]

Hmmmmm.... I know what you're saying, but it's not necessarily true. In the early days, when the software industry was just starting off and had very few people in it, the money was flowing! There's so many people in the software industry today - it's heeeeeeeuge!!! Today, it's very common for companies to simply find software developers in markets where wages are peanuts.

[@BillClinton228]

@@MnemonicCarrier I know business owners who did that and regretted it, there were time differences and huge communication difficulties. He ended up paying for something he couldnt use and had to start from scatch with local developers. If you're a massive business and have the money to hire project managers who would manage these projects it's still challenging but you might pull it off, but again you will need to make that big initial investment in local people who will push the people overseas and make things happen. The phrase "you get what you pay for" didn't come out of nowhere.

[@MnemonicCarrier]

​@@BillClinton228 I recall those days. Many moons ago, I worked for a bank that outsourced a project to an offshore company for an overnight batch-processing system. It took over a year and cost a small fortune, and in the end, it couldn't be used because it took longer than 24 hours to process a single business day's worth of transactions.However, things have come a long way since then - those days are long gone. Of course you can still find stories about offshore software projects that spectacularly belly-flop, just like you can find horror stories about ludicrously expensive local projects that fail. My point was more about the "supply-and-demand" equation - something the software industry is not immune to. I started my career in software development in the late 1970s - back then I got paid obscene amounts of money for doing very little. Towards the end of my career, I had to work like a dog for much less money (inflation/CPI adjusted). Thankfully, I managed to strike it lucky with a couple of startups, so I exited the software industry and did my own thing 😄

[@DJAlax909]

Back in 2017 I did this exact thing after graduating with a degree in software development... I quit my customer service job that I hated; took out a loan to get by for three months... And I ended up landing 0 programming/ developer jobs. 😂 Financially it was a horrible choice but mentally it was the break I needed. I ended up going into IT/ entry cybersecurity after everything. I'm back to being a self taught developer to become a cybersecurity engineer. Thanks for the advice. 👌🏻

[@prettyboishah2898]

Did you got college for Cyber-Security?

[@Razvanh29]

I have been a software developer for more than 15 years and I still do "personal", open-source projects. It is _fun_ and it gives me a lot of professional satisfaction. (The job is to make a living). I have a CS degree, but I never stopped teaching myself, I advise everyone to do the same.

[@prettyboishah2898]

Do you think it's worth even getting a degree?

[@Razvanh29]

​ @prettyboishah2898 In Romania, where I live, one degree is paid for by the Government (by the tax-payers, in reality, of course), so YES is the answer in my country.

[@codervince4957]

I’m an aspiring front end developer. I’ve been teaching myself for just over a year and I just want to thank you for this video. I’ve definitely watched all the videos where people say they landed a junior role in 3 months, 6 months , 9 months and here I am at the 1 year mark. However I do look over my progress and am impressed with the projects I’m able to make on my own now compared to the beginning. I know I need to keep learning and building better projects

[@zorro8375]

Yooo that's literally me rn I been doing it for a year and I feel like I'm going in circles but I can see my progress, would you be interested in doing some stuff together talking about web designs and layouts? I been looking for people to talk to about front end topics I've been solo throughout my journey

[@ifeellikedirt]

@@zorro8375 I'm also interested in this

[@zorro8375]

​@@ifeellikedirt do you have discord?

[@TheSoulCrisis]

For frontend development you flat out need a solid portfolio of projects to demonstrate, schooling and even beginning resume tech work don't seem to cut it in this hyper competitive era with all the frontend frameworks popping out!

[@LordmkKING67]

@@zorro8375 i am also about a year in, and just like you, got no one to talk about this topic with. Would be happy to

[@davidmora2583]

Your channel is very underrated! I'm definitely following your advice! Keep up the good work

[@hanasschoolwork4564]

'Get your hands dirty' is a good advice. I started college with almost zero coding knowledge and our first language was c++. As soon as the basics of OOP course was over we had to build a project with c++. It was very confusing at first but building stuff (and suffering) really makes you learn. Learning the basics of the new language and then building something with it has been a very useful model. "wtf is happening" is a VERY effective way to learn coding and debugging lmao.

[@TheSoulCrisis]

'"wtf is happening" is a VERY effective way to learn coding and debugging lmao.' This line is life looool xD

[@LordmkKING67]

@@TheSoulCrisis true, i at this point i am suprised if a code works right away. Even if i follow tutorials! lmao. Them typing mistakes sigh..

[@Michael-tj1dq]

I took 30 minutes of free time to watch this, and I needed it. I am going down the self taught path right now. It has been very taxing with work and family, but I take a look back every time I get frustrated to where I started or where I was a week ago. Thanks for the "fuck your motivation" bit I got a good laugh and it's true.

[@TheSoulCrisis]

Yeah I gotta remember dedication > motivation. xD

[@syedmuzzammil13]

Liked and Subscribed! I am a Frontend Developer going through job search phase and I could not agree more with all the things you mentioned, especially about removing emotions from this whole experience. I literally realised this 2 days ago and wrote it in my journal to remind me of this daily. Thanks for making this video. Back to my search...

[@opbsx]

Thank you so much for this video bro. I've just been on the grind for almost a year, built my first "acceptable" project and got into that pit of desperation, heavy impostor syndrome and lots of self-doubt, but after watching this video i felt that it wasn't all in vain and I got a surge of new motivation. If you're reading this, you can do it! let's go!

[@JoeMama-ui6yh]

Thank you so much don! Your advice always help, honestly I was a bit discouraged but this will give me that extra push!! Can’t thank you enough!

[@danielmbirch]

This has to be the best coding advice I've ever heard. Thanks for posting. I started with the fundamentals and now I'm doing my own projects and it's such a big win when I write code that works and when I can troubleshoot an issue and solve it. I still do some tutorials, but then I'll follow up with a project of my own to really understand and remember it.

[@andrews8733]

There's a bit of a personal identity sacrifice if you pursue it full time. When you get to the age of people associating you with your career (25+), it's awkward to explain. You could say you're learning to code, but you're unemployed. Something I never heard talk about

[@salami4855]

just say you're learning software engineering. sounds fancy enough to me ;)

[@KILLCHRISU]

as a 25 year old self learning full time I just tell people I'm a software developer lol they (usually) don't ask any questions after

[@Chuckichanly]

Identity sacrifice? It's called shame of being unemployed at 25 and it's ok if you are really working to get a job😅

[@AM-cs8yi]

@@Chuckichanly I am older than that and have no shame in being unemployed while learning to code, and yes I do tell people I 'work in tech' as freelancer no further questions after that 😂😂its your life and do what you want with it

[@michi40]

I used 3+ years with heldp from: My second son on it's way, that I took care while my wife went back to work after maternity. I started a "soloprenur" startup that failed big time, from that time. You know what happened when I took the plan down after almost a year trying to sell my SAAS project? 0 money, but and interesting CV with real experience. After I closed operations I got an interview at 45yo 2 months later. Month later I had a junior web dev job. That was 4 months ago. I can't explain how many of the things I learned trying to start up my SAAS helped me survive and hold my job till today. I can say I am doing great at job and got a promotion 2 months into the job. It's weird breing a 45yo jr. But I don't care. I love this job, and it shows.

[@nonfungible_kid]

i really needed this. thank you 🙏🏻

[@ianpropst-campbell6028]

Thank you for this helpful tutorial. I have been feeling pretty discouraged about my journey. This was very encouraging!

[@stevebob240]

Thanks man, I needed to hear this. Been working hard but feeling discouraged some days. Great talk!

[@sparklitd]

I keep watching this video, over and over. . . You don’t know how valuable this message truly is, Don. Thank you

[@jackiehenson8450]

Thank you. Needed to hear this today

[@micaiahowoeye]

I really appreciate how honest you were. Thank you. 💪🏿

[@varuntyagi6116]

Thanks, man. Really needed to hear this. Your first point really helped me. I quit my god awful job 6 months ago hoping that I'll land a developer job in 5-6 months of self learning, but honestly, I'm nowhere close and now it's taking a toll on my mental health. Sure, I've made a lot of progress and learned a ton of things, but I still don't feel confident enough. I'll go with your suggestion and adjust my expectations accordingly. Thanks once again.

[@stevealbert9054]

In your case, you not feeling confident means you are competent. Don't give up. J.Cole said "follow your heart and you'll make that [money/peace of mind/wealth] fast."

[@Words-of-encouragement.-.]

How is it going at this point? Have you landed a job?

[@copsarebastards]

i'm in the same boat basically. I quit my job at the beginning of this month- i'm coming up on a year of self teaching, but really losing some steam. haven't applied to jobs yet because I don't feel ready still. I have a gig still as a contractor making wordpress sites for a computer repair shop near me, but that just demotivates me more. I hate using wordpress and i hate the drag and drop site builder. the job is essentially a design job, but extremely constrained since the company only uses one wordpress theme. I'm not a designer, and so far I don't think the shop is happy with my work (there are also issues with their management and whatnot- no adherence to the timeline I'm given in my contract, boss going in and doing large amounts of work or changing work I've done, etc) I would be happier making the sites using wordpress with react as a headless cms, but I don't have enough experience with react yet. I'm grateful to still be living with my family so my bills aren't going to destroy me, but I am running out of time on my goals. I wanted to get a job in germany this year, before the summer. I need to in order to make my relationship work (ldr german gf of 10 years not willing to do ld any longer)

[@SIRLAWRENCE79]

half year? seriously? i'm learning evry day after work for two yerars now(python, javascript, css, html) and i think i need like one year more :)

[@crazydude69]

Thanks for the heads-up i was thinking about quitting my current job to start self learning and hopefully get into development.

[@magixbeats2214]

On point. Thanks!

[@nati.g]

This is so great! Thank you Don 👍

[@rudolphvonstroheim3551]

This is just phenomenal advice for ANY beginners in ANY field. You have just laid out the proper strategic outlook that is applicable basically in any endeavour that requires producing or engineering. You've got yourself a new subscriber

[@dlizard04]

Thank you for this information.

[@digestedvalue3369]

Love your videos man. Thanks

[@xXTheSalvationXx]

Wow thanks man...even with a Bachelor in IT i am having trouble finding a job right now...makes me feel like it's worth nothing. But you just gotta keep on going and having faith in yourself. Best advice

[@alzanders]

Thank you, I needed that

[@williamEcubed]

Needed to hear this, thanks

[@Ambr1942BR]

Thank you so much for your advice.

[@graytonw5238]

Man, this is definitely going into my list of go-to videos! I'm no doubt in the minority here, since I'm retired and have no plans to get hired for anything anymore. But I do a lot of data extractions and custom reporting for different companies as a solo freelancer, and I've been trying to learn C# for the longest time. Always something that gets in the way though, but I'm going to have another go at it and apply these suggestions. Subbed!

[@narudesigns]

Awesome, thanks for sharing!

[@dylanm7638]

this helps Don, thank you so much

[@marcreaume8689]

I think you spoke to everyone of my insecurities as a self taught developer in this video. Sincerely thank you for making this.

[@aww2historian]

thanks for the solid advice Chief! Sending you good energy, you got a strong Spirit!

[@reggietheroman]

so glad the yt algo recommended your video to me. your videos are nice to listen to while coding

[@barbaratess6103]

I enjoyed the realness in this video. Thank you for putting it together. It's very refreshing and it's helped put some things in a different perspective for me as someone who's self-learning how to program. Is it weird that one of the things I'm enjoying the most is all the different keyboard shortcuts that are available to use? Learning and using them as I go motivates me. Just a random weird quirk I guess.

[@Ahmed-cy4jp]

Thanks man! ❤

[@ihateyourusernames]

Thanks man, I really needed to hear this. Tutorial hell is real, and when you're budgeting hours, some of these 10-40 hour long 'FULL' courses are intimidating because I didn't think I could build anything until I was on the other side of it. Now I'm putting tutorials aside and will get familiar with code by doing things that need to be done. I'll learn along the way. I'm trying to make the switch from operational IT support to development. I've fiddled with a ton of languages, but C# seems to be the one I'm getting traction with, so I'm going to follow that trend.

[@ahmedschhaider4762]

Thank you for these words, very inspiring !!

[@allmightfan]

thank you man i really needed this

[@chrislukkayembe]

Best video on dev on KZbin 👌🏾 great advice 👊🏽

[@Jose_T131]

4:27 on point bro, this learning path is a roller coaster not as school that if you remember some shit you get a star on the head(the path is linear and very limit). By using different technologies or been on different teams when working as a SW "whatever_role" or for personal projects we start at 0 again sometimes even when we "already know"

[@sapphirestarlight7341]

Love this! I'm at the beginning and was honest with my husband and said "It won't happen in 6 months, more like 2 years to be a reasonably decent web dev". Thank you for being honest, I'm doing a bootcamp on Udemy and there's so much that I'm not learning from the platform. I will continue the deep dive but, I have no illusions about how long it will take to be average.

[@paypalmymoneydfs]

That "Fuck your motivation" speech is why I'm now subbed. We need reminders about how fickle motivation can be sometimes.

[@sabuein]

Thank you, Don, much appreciated.

[@aaronkirchhoff1658]

Super helpful and motivating video, thank you for posting! I'm going on 2 years of job searching and coding on the side while working full-time job, I wanna give up All The Time, lol!! But I believe in myself and will keep going! Thank you!!

[@maad1670]

needed this so much. thanks Don

[@azy3929]

This was way better then I expected at first and that neat English accent, wonderful ! Thanks for guidance

[@abdebig]

What a great podcast, Don. Keep up the good work.

[@mistymu8154]

I have been a software developer for over 10 years now. I think tutorials can be helpful, but like you say, nothing can replace just creating stuff, making mistakes along the way. I am not the sort of person who is able to just read a book or watch a KZbin video and fully understand the concepts straight away, it takes iteration until you finally understand. Even as an experienced software developer who moves to another job, you will go back to feeling a bit like a beginner again, but stick at it, most employers won't expect you to hit the ground running on day 1 and will expect a bit of onboarding time. Don't be afraid to ask questions of senior developers, a lot of people are happy to help.

[@kirwan1414]

Thanks for such an honest, heartfelt advice.

[@barcalona55]

Thanks for keeping it 💯

[@pouyaabb]

Your honesty, made me subscribe.❤

[@siriusplayz5871]

Thanks a ton for the advice bro! I started learning web development 3 months ago and this helps a loootttt. Again thanks ❤

[@atbmts6]

This is the best video I’ve ever watched on this subject. Thank you man. Sincerely.

[@timpook]

Thank you for the advices

[@batuhanavakado8138]

Very contributive. Thank you.

[@charlietripi]

This is one of the most encouraging videos ive seen. Thank you

[@ho5835]

By far the most authentic and reasonable video on this matter! I am a subscriber now.

[@109cgutie]

Thank you Don! I really needed to hear this. God bless you.

[@Gary4DLC]

I can't tell you how much I needed this video. Thanks man.

[@Mmaxum]

only getting started and got motivated by your video since all advice you give here already checks with what i do i knew it'll be curvy ride and i knew i should start doing things early following tutorial, already did some cool things - running one single file and adding everything i learn into it + test file for stuff i experiment on the way

[@demolazer]

Great stuff. In my own journey, ive found that making programs I actually want to use myself is very powerful.

[@danielcardone8622]

Thanks man. Good video. It help settle me a bit.

[@austinbaker5665]

Thank you so much. You are the man

[@gamingwithados6903]

This is a really motivating video Don. You are thrown so much info when starting as a self taught learner it’s hard to pick out the facts/good advice from all the rubbish 🙂 appreciate it

[@DonTheDeveloper]

The information can definitely be overwhelming at times. It was for me anyways when I first started.

[@igorgoncalves5691]

Thank you Don this's what I was need! Hugs from Brazil!

[@Phill_F]

Tutorial hell was me up until about a month ago. Thank you for this.

[@androschizo]

Even with being in a bootcamp, I feel like I have to supplement A LOT of information on my own, even though it’s somewhat a linear path. And i feel like I don’t know ‘more’ (?) than before but I constantly remind myself where I was 4 months ago.

[@MrBlackspoon]

Oh it is going to be a struggle. Buckle up!

[@Words-of-encouragement.-.]

How is it going for you now? Have you landed a job? Which bootcamp did you choose?

[@androschizo]

@@Words-of-encouragement.-. I've actually taken a hiatus and focusing on my job at the moment. I took Nucamp's backend course and it was a great introductory course I would say. Since it's completely virtual and only meet on Saturdays, you don't really cover as much material as other in-person bootcamp. It's way cheaper though, so if you want to get your feet wet, please do! And they have a great community

[@Words-of-encouragement.-.]

@@androschizo Thank you so much for answering! I did look into Nucamp (as well as many others), but I decided on going to the bootcamp at my university (University of Texas) so I am enrolled already, but I don't start until 3/27. Best of luck to you my friend. I hope you get to wherever you want to go!

[@FHangya]

great insight, thank you so much for this video!

[@mwwaldro1]

Thank you for making this video, for us newbies starting out it’s awesome to have this resource to push through the self doubt.

[@MatiasBaldanza]

Thank you for this video.

[@uuuppz]

very inspiring. subbed!

[@sventripikal3032]

hands down, best 100% honest video by far. you hit all valid & necessary points in this video.

[@user-ik8pk5ll5f]

I'm struggling with learning for more than a year now and often doubting myself. Thank you so much for this video! You gave me hope ❤️

[@AverusMuto]

Thanks for this. I have been learning for 2 years and always felt like I was going back to the fundamentals.

[@andyackon2743]

Man this is one of the realest videos on KZbin…you awesome bro

[@tizahn5262]

This video is gold for me. I am currently going through this self-taught process as well. I do not believe that there are shortcuts like 3-6 months to a full-time junior dev job especially when the preparation of portfolio and (technical) interviews AND finally getting hired is gonna take a few months for some of us, much less to say the time required to pick up the different coding languages and skills. Yes, there will be a few talented individuals that can make that possible but not the path is not going to be as straightforward for most of us. I totally agree that staying disciplined is so important because there are really just days that you feel stuck, dumb, and unproductive but the whole idea is just to show up every day.

[@korionterivers9995]

I smiled the whole time listening to this. Great advice. I’ve learned early on I have to apply what I’ve learned almost immediately. Those time staring at a black page not knowing where to start will begin to disappear after a while

[@DennisJHarrisonJrHere]

This is great, will be sharing with some devs I'm helping gain proficiency. Discipline > motivation for sure. Most important is build things there aren't tutorials for, as often as possible. Thanks Dan, good content.

[@erickcedillo6470]

Seariously, thank you for this video, I haven't even started to look for a job I'm almost done learning the things I want to learn before searching for a job, but I was extremely worried and losing faith in myself, where I'm from everybody thinks I'm going nowhere because you need a college degree to have a job such as web developer, I went through day one to today from sheer faith in myself and my self expecations were starting to get in the way of it, I was very frustrated and burning out from desperation to know if the people around me was right, even thought I know inspite all my effort may be I won't be able to get a job as a developer I know I have the time and energy to keep trying and I'm not doing as bad as I thought... So really thank you

[@pfg222]

Thank you so much for this. Really helped me get back on track on myself. Im about to graduate as a CS major in may and i have not passed any internship interviews or even gotten calls back for sooo many jobs ive applied. A bit nervous to because most of the sruff they aks for i wasnt taught in school so i have been self teaching myself on the side. I almozt gave up but thank yku this video ready just slapped me in the face to tell myself its all in my head. 🙏

[@Waterbottles711]

Really appreciate you making this. Thank you so much and thank you for repeating and hammering the idea of doing projects, gettings your hands dirty, etc... I think i did almost did get into a type of tutorial hell or just doing courses without having done a single project before. I do codewars but ik its not enough. I need to start a project and ty for helping me realize that

[@DonTheDeveloper]

Trust me, most of us have been there at one point or another.

[@jimba6486]

As someone who is almost done with my CS degree. I found this helpful and useful information. I also find myself having to relearn the basics. Also, the life lesson really help clicked for me, he kept it real. You gotta commit to blocking out time. I run away from that because I always want to be motivated to do tasks, but that is not how the world works. Which is why I fail to be consistent with my health choices and career goals. Thank you.

[@Macheako]

Keep at it bro. Last year or so for me was almost like getting water boarded 😂 but I’m GLAD I finished ❤

[@MianUsmanjaved-ht7lg]

Really very amazing podcast . you made my day . 🌟

[@fayoztoshmirzaev7895]

Thank you! So supportive

[@krimsonsun10]

THis is so timely for me. I cannot Thank you enough for the straight shot advice. Subbed ☑rang the bell 🔔

[@grumpyoldman4621]

Sound, nay, fantastic advice!

[@Bair994]

Thank you for giving it straight, no one really gives you a simple answer about this when you first start out, they all say "do a boot camp" "Become full stack" etc. Setting the expectation and example right at the start of the video was nice. Some days suck, some days are great, but everyday no matter what i say "I have to code".

[@beckyb9215]

This is wholesome, thank you!

[@BizzaroBrainBoi]

tutorial hell! thank you for the video!

[@zacharyfranczak]

"If you could build something for your old self in your old profession, what would it be?" - DonTheDeveloper. I love that!