Formalizing Ideas
Throughout my education in college I realized that I never really understood something until I had to actually write it out. In all of my programming classes I would always think that I understood something when working at conceptual and theoretical level, but it was only until I actually had to implement something that I finally knew what I didn’t know. This became very evident for me when I took an algorithms course at my university. About half of the understanding of the problem and concepts came from whiteboarding an algorithm, but the other half came during the write up. While LaTeXing my homework solutions I was forced to actually think through my algorithm and all the edge cases. I was forced to convince myself and my readers of my algorithm’s correctness. I was forced to explain my thoughts in a clear, concise, contextual, and correct manner and this probably is what truly gave me insight on the problems. I carried this philosophy when I got on course staff for a System Programming course. I realized that students pretty much passively listen to lectures. They think that by physically being present they are going to learn something through passive diffusion. They might be able to pick up some definitions and vocabulary, but they are not going to truly develop their mental model unless they are forced to actually think about the concepts. This is where assignments come in. I write labs for the course with the purpose of exposing students to how little they actually know. If all they get out of thinking about the lab is “Wow I just realized how much I need to know about the material to actually do anything”, then the assignment was successful in my mind. Obviously I strive to have an assignment teach learning objectives, but that is an entire blog post on its own.
One day in my Programming Languages course my professor mentioned how Dijkstra maintained a blog. I kinda sat there thinking that he was joking about how the single source shortest paths algorithm guy maintained a blog. But my teacher explained that Dijkstra did it, because he wanted to write down his ideas that were not necessarily publication worthy. The act of writing down his ideas later led to some of Dijkstra’s publications, because formalizing his thoughts gave him insight on the subject matter. So I decided that if writing things down for my students in system programming, myself in theoretical computer science courses, and Dijkstra in … well he got a Turing Award, then I should give it a try. So I am going to be my own teacher and give myself homework assignments as a form of self teaching. My goal is to write one blog post a week; no matter what. These posts don’t have to be very elaborate or well sketched out. Some will obviously come out better than others and that is perfectly fine with me. I currently have pages of bullet points of ideas so I shouldn’t run out of things to write about for a while. It will simply be a matter of consistency and commitment.
Self Reflection / Snapshots of My Thoughts
Recently I adopted the concept of spending time on myself. I actually joke about it being my 4 credit hour class where my grade is entirely dependent on spending time on myself for the sole purpose of happiness and mental health. Because of this I don’t register for more than 14 credit hours, since I would then be “overloaded” by hitting the 18 credit hour limit. This limit is completely self imposed, but I keep it for one reason “self reflection”. I tell my students all the time that I can’t really help them unless they first self reflect on their understanding of the material. Learning is far from a passive process and this is especially true when the subject material is yourself.
What I hope to get from blogging once a week is time dedicated to self reflection. This self reflection will be about many different aspects of my life and hopefully I not only learn more about those aspects, but also discover new ones along the way. Part of what makes becoming a better person and stronger version of myself difficult is that I don’t always know what my weaknesses are; I believe self reflection is the key to discovering these weaknesses. By knowing what my weaknesses are I can dedicate time to “killing weaker versions of myself”.
Writing also adds a whole new dimension to self reflection. By documenting my thoughts I will have snapshots of them. I have changed a lot as a person in a short 5 years and I am sure that 16 year old me would be proud of the person that I have become. I look forward to seeing 21 year old me when I am 26 and calculating the differences. I look forward to looking through the snapshots.
Reaching Out To Others
Part of why I love teaching is that I can meet a lot of people who have unique upbringings and stories. I enjoy hearing their perspective on life and for them to hear mine. This exchange of ideas is what makes being human great. This is probably why I have decided to implement my writing through a blog instead of a private journal.
I also want to help people who might go through some of the issues I faced and continue to face. If I can inspire just one person to become a stronger version of themselves, then this blog will have been worth it to me.
Practicing Writing
I have always been a weak writer in school. Part of that is that I never had the initial talent for it and I never really put effort into something that I wasn’t already good at. However experience has taught me that people aren’t born great at anything; they become great by beating at their craft. Every now and then I get underclassmen asking me how I got to where I am in programming. They always wait in anticipation expecting one of two answers; either “I was born great at programming” or “I came to a magic revolution that they just need to realize”. However the simple answer is that I got good at programming simply by programming a lot. Without fail they will look in disappointment when I give that answer. I don’t know if it’s because they want some form of validation that their short comings in life stem from something outside of their control. I personally don’t really like giving that story, because it makes me look like a mean person, but it has a purpose. The lesson of the story is that if you want to get good at something you should beat at that craft until you become good at it. Working hard is always prerequisite to success. Working smart is another topic on its own.
Here was the part that hit me. My coworker asked me “Why are you procrastinating so much on your blog?”. I told him that it was because I wanted to first learn to write before I start writing blog posts that will be publicly available. I love whenever this happens to me; he pulled a page from my own book and asked me “What would you tell your students who want to get better at programming? ‘Program.’”. That struck a chord. He had a great point. If I wanted to get better at writing, then I should just write. I would never learn to write if I waited to get better at writing.
New Treadmill
I never really know if I am on my “destined path” in life. But I am completely fine with that. I just take life one step at a time, moving one foot in front of the other. I live for challenges, because I believe that I only grow and develop in situations where I am forced to persevere. I call it my treadmill in life; it’s whenever I am doing something without worrying about the destination. When you get on a treadmill you literally make no progress in terms of distance traveled; your displacement is zero. But people don’t run on treadmills to get from point A to point B. They run on treadmills, because who they are when they get on and who they become when they get off are different people; the former could never compare to the latter. However before I decided to start this blog I realized that my old treadmills don’t challenge me anymore. I normally wake up and get out of bed for the sole purpose of getting on my figurative treadmills. This concept of the treadmill deserves its own blog post, but for now I have decided that blogging is my new treadmill.
Discussion
Contact Me
Email: bschong2@illinois.edu