Finding the motivation to improve your Python skills?

Hey there,

On past newsletter issues I've been going on and on about how becoming great at Python is more like a "marathon" rather than a "sprint"—

You can't just plow through this stuff in a few weeks.

And so, the most important factor for your success is making sure you don't "run out of steam" before you reach your goal.

Keeping up your motivation and improving your skills over months and years is what eventually makes you successful. 

If you run this marathon with a sprinter's mindset you're going to see some quick initial results—only to collapse from exertion way before the finish line...

Not recommended.

So, what you want to do instead is to manage your energy so you can *make sustained forward progress* over the long term.

How do you achieve that?

I know this is all very high level "mindset stuff." It's too abstract to be immediately actionable.

So let's try this instead. Here's how you'd break down this idea and turn it into a four-step "learning algorithm" you can follow:
 

Step 1: Find your core motivation 

(= Why do you want to learn programming in the first place: you love technology, make more money, don't-know-why-but-I-enjoy-it, ... Sounds like a bunch of woo-woo? Yeah, but it helps. When you have a DESTINATION it's much easier to find a PATH that takes you there.)
 

Step 2: Set an achievable short-term goal

(Based on your core motivation, pick a small-ish goal that's almost within your reach: "I want to write a Python program to replace my budgeting spreadsheet", "I want to make my first $1000 from freelance programming work", "I want to get a full-time job as an entry-level Django developer", etc. Pick something that's doable in 1-3 months given where you are at the moment.)
 

Step 3: Set up a process that will lead you towards achieving that goal

(Come up with a repeatable set of steps that put you on a path towards achieving your goal, e.g. "Make $1000 from freelance dev work" --> "Every morning, I will search Upwork/Craigslist for small dev gigs and respond to 5 ads", "Get a job as a Django dev" --> "Every week I will cold email 3 hiring managers at local software companies that use Python and invite them out for coffee")

Step 4: Achieve OR adjust your goal

(Either you'll achieve your goal after following the process you decided on in step 3, OR you'll come to a realization which will make you re-adjust the goal and start the process anew: "All job postings I find are for Flask web developers" --> "New goal: Make a small Flask app to track my monthly expenses so I can learn about Flask")

Essentially, you can repeat these steps forever.

The key parts here are having goals that align with your core motivation & breaking down your goals into processes and habits that you follow daily or weekly.

Don't just stop with a high-level goal focused on a specific outcome—always break your goals down into repeatable processes.

Process-oriented goals are MUCH more powerful than outcome-oriented ones. And you can benefit greatly from this difference.

I've got to cut it short here—

But if you haven't taken my (free) "5 Thoughts on Mastering Python" email course yet then you should check it out.

It covers this "continuous improvement" mindset in more detail.

To take the course, click the link below and you'll receive the first lesson via email right away:

>> Click here to receive the first "Thoughts on Mastering Python" lesson

Good luck and...Happy Pythoning!

— Dan Bader