Tell Me What You Love About It

I've been watching '7 Years In Tibet'. And in it, the Dalai Lama says to Heinrich (about climbing): 'Tell Me What You Love About It'. 

This hit me right in the heart. It came at a time when there have been a lot of changes in my situation. It has been making me wonder if I will still have as much time to code as I used to. And this has been breaking my heart.

I love to code. I love to code so, so much. 

I love to code more than anything else in the world. I love to code with a passion so much that it hurts my heart.

Marina, from Marina and the Diamonds, said that before she became a singer she had an obsession with becoming a singer. That it 'was like a disease'. I don't want to frame it in a negative way, but I often think of this statement when I think of coding.

I tried so hard. 

I tried so hard to forget about it. To block it out of my mind. I told myself that I was stupid. That I already had 2 MSc's in other subjects (true facts). That there was no way that I could be a software engineer.

I couldn't forget about it.

October 15th, 2022, was the day that I finally fully decided that I was going to be an engineer. It was the day that my mum told me she thought it was a good idea. I had had so many moments of 99% before. But hearing the words of the go-ahead from my mum finally made me realise there were no more doubts left in my heart.

So what do I love about it?

It is very hard to put into words what I love about coding. 

I love the fact that it makes sense. 

I feel like I have been creating codes for different things for myself in all my life.

You can tell me that £$%$£% means XYZ, and I don't mind. I can handle it. I don't need an obvious pattern to memorise something (although if there is a pattern that makes sense, that helps!). This is one of the reasons why I love Malbolge, a computer programming language named after the 8th gate of Hell 😂

I love how && means and in JavaScript.

I love how || means or in JavaScript.

I even love how === means equals in JavaScript.

I just love how it makes sense. I have always been open about my neurodiversity. I am very, very different; I think very, very differently. 

In a world where things don't always make sense, coding makes sense to me.

Coding is the one time when I feel like the world has been made for me. When I feel like I'm not in a world that I'm struggling to understand. It makes me feel emotionally happy. I had never been so happy in my life as after the first hour I spent coding. I love it so so much.

And this is why I couldn't shut myself down. I couldn't listen to the voice inside my head that was telling me I was being stupid. I couldn't listen to the people telling me I already had an amazing opportunity in Product and stick to that.

Tell Me What You Love About It.

I love it because it makes sense to me.

I love it because there is so much I understand about it.

I love it because the word 'Properties' has the capacity the light up a fire down my spine and send shivers down my back. 

I love it because I love to code.

I love to code because when I code, I feel powerful. I feel powerful. I feel powerful.

Here is a picture of me with Baby Yoda (I've never seen the movie!).

Onto the JavaScript

Okay, so what have I learned this week? 

After the JavaScript basics

I have to admit that not very much. I have been absolutely busy. The busiest I have been in a while. But I have managed to cover a tiny bit of JavaScript conditionals. 

These are pretty easy for me, as I have done them in Python before.

But I am still struggling to understand the logic behind them sometimes.

I had to wrap my head round the fact that I don't have to put (true) or (false) in the initial brackets; I put in the name of the variable itself. As, beforehand, this evaluates to 'true' or 'false' beforehand and then this in turn affects the conditional statement. 

I am just onto the fact that some non-boolean data types, like strings or numbers, are 'truthy', or 'falsy' (lol). 

Things which are 'falsy' include:

• 0
• Empty strings like "" or ' '
• null 
• undefined
• NaN (Not a Number)

It's a lot to wrap my head around, this late in the day. But I think I understand it.

The next thing I am onto is 'Truthy and Falsy Assignment'. But I think it is too late in the day for me to learn this. 

I wish for:

• More time to code again
• Clear vision on my journey
• Guidance.